JACKSONVILLE —
For two years in a row Mark Ford has out fished a host of competition in the Jacksonville Bass Club. This year he beat out 38 other contestants.
Ford had three first place finishes. Ford said, “I never zeroed out the whole year.” To stay in first place you have to be consistent all year long. Ford said, “If I ever get a decent bite going I would do well. When we found a pattern we would stick with it. If we could get a bite every two hours or so we stuck with it (the pattern). Sometimes it was a matter of adjusting – like on Rayburn we zeroed out pre-fishing. Then during the tournament we did something completely different.” By adjusting to the situation Ford and his partner were able to get together a winning stringer.
Ford fishes with a variety of lures, but his bread and butter lures are swim baits, spinners and ribbon tail worms. Ford also uses a variety of crank baits. Ford said, “We fell back on crank baits to pick up a few extra fish.”
Ford told me that it was a tough year all the way around. He said, “Even though I didn’t win in other lakes I still felt good because I was catching fish.”
At the beginning of the year the club ran into a tough situation when they fished Brandy Branch which is a power plant lake. Ford said, “Brandy Branch had a major impact on our weights. They were not generating power causing the lake to cool down significantly. We had a lot of low weights.”
Ford weighed in a total of 29 bass during the season for a total weight of 74.58 pounds. He ended the season with 95.58 points.
The bass club has instigated a new format this year. All of their tournaments now will be team tournaments only. A two man team can weigh in a total of 5 bass.
This change came about after the club sent out a survey to members. Ford said, “Instead of dictating to members what we thought was best we asked for their feed back. We also looked at other clubs that were successful and found out that they had team tournaments.” Because of this change and many others the club attendance has really increased this year.
The Top 8 Fishermen of the Jacksonville Bass Club are: Mark Ford, Tony Goodman, David Watson, Dale Meeks, Barry Moore, Anthony Holcomb, Randy Dykes and Jim Buckley.
The Jacksonville Bass Club fished Lake Jacksonville in August. The team of Tony Goodman and Thomas Goodman won first place with 5 bass totaling 12.85 pounds. Norman Terry and Earl Socia had 4 bass totaling 10.40 pounds. Tyson Metzig and Mark Poole had 5 bass totaling 9.40 pounds. Tyson Metzig weighed in a 5.70 pound bass for big bass.
The majority of the bass were caught on a Yellow Magic and other top water baits.
The Top 8 Fishermen are headed for Choke Canyon on September 25th and 26th to fish in a TABC Tournament.
The club will be fishing Lake Palestine on September 11th and 12th. Hours are from 6:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Launch site will be the deep end.
Jerry Miller can be emailed at gonefishing2@suddenlink.net
Local Sports
Mark Ford wins Angler of the Year
Gone Fishin' with Jerry Miller
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