By Jason Duran
The 2024 season of The Alabama Bass Trail began at Lake Jordan for the south division. 225 teams competed for a for an increased payday of $15,000 for first Place. Teams reported having a tough practice but were expecting to catch the quality 4-pound bites needed to win this event.
Eric Sommers and Robbie Pelt. ABT photo
Lake Jordan is full of largemouth and spotted bass. The results show the fish catching was good. The top five teams all weighed in over 19 pounds. It took 14.35 pounds to collect a check in 40th place. 208 teams weighed fish in this event. The competition was tough but at the end of the day, the Team of Eric Sommers and Robbie Pelt took home the win in the first event of 2024.
The first-place team of Eric Sommers and Robbie Pelt spent the day fishing much differently than other teams on the lake. A large majority of the field spent the day using forward-facing sonar to locate and catch fish. However, Robbie and Eric kept it old school for the win.
The team shared, ‘We had a good day. It wasn’t a fast and furious day. We caught maybe 10-11 fish all day.” Erik said, “We had to fish multiple baits today to get the fish to bite.” A key for them was bait presentation, “We noticed that when we got a bite, we had to multiple casts with different baits to the exact same area to finally catch the fish. We had to use many different presentations to catch the fish we ended up with.”
They made a long run upriver to fish the way they love to fish. They called it “old-school fishing.” Robbie shared they really mixed it up, “We drifted some, went offshore fishing ledges and used a jig, a spinnerbait, swimbait, and we fished a Scrounger.” The team said they relied a lot on their long-time history and local knowledge of the lake to put together a solid bag weighing 21.35 pounds. They collected the $15,000 first-place check and a $8,000 Phoenix Boat Bonus.
Kolby and Kade Crowson. ABT photo
The first-year team of Kolby and Kade Crowson caught 20.18- pounds of Lake Jordan bass and finished in second place. They shared, “Practice for us was pretty good we caught a 6-pound spotted bass and a couple of other three-pounders. We just left them alone and didn’t really fish the area again until today. We are from Lay Lake and we understand the Coosa River spotted bass really well. With boat number 41 it helped us fish the area we wanted. After a 15-minute run upriver, we fished an area in about 15 feet of water. We knew the fish were keying in on bait fish, so we stuck with a shad pattern. We used natural color six-inch swimbaits with a Dirty Jigs Guppy Swimbait Jig Head in blue shad color. For us, the key was to fish the current and make cast around rock piles today. We caught about 7 fish total and had our limit at about 8 o’clock this morning. We couldn’t have asked for a better outcome for this tournament our goal this year is to be consistent.” They collected a $7,500 paycheck for their second-place finish
The third-place team of Lucas Lindsay Brendon Holt shared that practice for them started back in December. Lucas said, “I love this place. We are from Auburn Alabama. Characteristically the fall is tough here. However, as we move into December the bite gets good. The fish start chasing bait and they start to fatten up for the spawn. During this time of year, baits like the Damiki Rig and the jerkbait really come into play. I was here seven- or eight times during December. The fish were more in the pockets, and they were really biting well. I caught lots of numbers during that time.”
Lucas Lindsay Brendon Holt. ABT photo
“Today the fish had pulled out of the pockets working their way back. I assume the bait had pulled them out of the pockets and they are now making their transition back.” Brendon said “During practice, we noticed the water was really dirty on the end of the lake near take-off. The areas were really blown out down here. We had to move up the river to find the better bass and clean water.” The team shared, “We fished the main river in about 60 feet of water about 15 minutes upriver. The key for us was to stay out about two full casts from the bank.” Lucas said, “Garmin LiveScope was the deal for us today. I run an 8616. The pixels are crisp and it really helps a lot when you’re trying to catch these fish. It helps you see the details and gives you every little edge to show your bait a lot better. The bait for us was the Damiki Armour Shad. We probably covered 2 miles of water today” For third place they caught 19.44 pounds and collected a $6,000 check plus a $300 Garmin highest-finisher bonus.
The top ten standings and a complete list of standings please visit: https://www.alabamabasstrail.org/lake-jordan/results/
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