Austin Christian Bass Club

Fall is finally here and the cooler temperatures are making it hard to resist spending some time on the water enjoying God’s creation.  Don’t miss the upcoming club meeting!

Tournament Overviews:

Our September tournament was held on Stillhouse Hollow Lake in anticipation of the TABC Top 8 Tournament that would be held the following weekend.  Eleven teams participated and 9 members caught a limit of fish.  Craig Mooney and his guest, Ron Young, won the tournament with 28.96 pounds.  Jim Pollard and Bill Bratton came in second place with 18.95 pounds and Mitch Shelton and Brooks Griffith came in third place with 16.26 pounds.  The biggest bass (22")  was caught by Craig Mooney and he also had the biggest 5 fish stringer at 16.01 pounds.  The Money Minnow swimbait was the ticket!

Our October travel tournament was held on Choke Canyon and twelve teams participated.  Choke Canyon produced several quality fish and 15 members caught a limit of fish.  Art Cruser and Roger Growden won the tournament with 28.51 pounds.  Jim Pollard and Tom Clark took second place with 23.16 pounds and third place went to Darryl Smith and Gary Burnham with 22.50 pounds.  Gary Burnham had big bass of the tournament (25.5"), one-half inch longer than Art Cruser’s big bass.  Art had the biggest 5 fish stringer at 19.06 pounds.

Gary’s PB (25.5") at Choke Canyon

Top Ten Standings for 2008:

Tom Clark-130.25 pounds            Darryl Smith-100.23 pounds
Mike Wiles-119.36 pounds           Brooks Griffith- 99.42 pounds
Vince Martin- 117.87 pounds     Carlton Yarbrough-84.11 pounds
Jim Pollard- 116.17 pounds         Gary Burnham- 77.32 pounds
John Kirkland- 106.53 pounds   Al Lykins- 76.91 pounds
Gary Burnham and Vince Martin are tied for Big Bass of the 4th Quarter.  They each caught a 25.5" bass (9.06 pounds) in October while fishing at Choke Canyon.

November Meeting and Tournament:

Our next meeting will be Thursday, November 13th, at 7:00pm.  Our November tournament will be on Saturday, November 15, 2008.  Al Lykins and T.V. Minner have volunteered to bring refreshments to the next meeting.

TABC Top 8 Tournament- A REPEAT!!

It was truly a repeat of the 2007 tournament.  While the ACBC Top 8 team finished 6th in the overall competition, team members caught the two biggest bass of the tournament.  The biggest bass of the two day tournament was caught by Jim Pollard on Day 2 of the competition while fishing Stillhouse Hollow Lake.  With less than an hour of competition remaining he was throwing the Yum Money Minnow at some timber and thought he had gotten snagged until his snag pulled back.  His big girl was 27" long and in all the excitement, Jim forgot to get a picture of his winning catch.
The second biggest bass of the tournament was also caught on Day 2 of the competition by Tom Clark while fishing Lake Belton where most of the Day 1 catch was relatively small.  Tom’s fish was the biggest bass caught on Lake Belton during the tournament.

Tom Clark’s 6.94 pound bass
Congratulations to Jim and Tom on their big catches and the rest of the team on their 6th place finish.  A Great Repeat!!

ACBC Couples Club News:

Since the last newsletter, the Couples Club has completed their tournament schedule for this year.  They had their travel tournament in early October to Fayette County Lake and only 2 couples could participate.  Jim and Nita Pollard won this one with a 5 fish stringer weighing 21.37 pounds.  Jim caught their biggest bass (22.5").  Their final tournament of the year was on November 1st at Lake Bastrop.  Five couples participated and 20 fish were weighed in totaling 42.4 pounds.  Ken and Melba Haulotte won the tournament with 5 fish weighing 12.95 pounds.  They also had the biggest bass of the tournament (21.5").  Many of the fish caught were small and generally bit soft plastics.  Grass was fairly rampant in many areas and sort of hampered fishing in some areas.  The Couples Club had a great year with two 5 fish limits exceeding 20 pounds and three 5 fish limits over 15 pounds.  Big Bass of the year was a 24" beauty caught by Peggy Duda.  The final results for this year are shown below:

Fishing Reports:

Last Friday, November 7th, Art Cruser and a friend had an excellent morning on Lake Travis.  They were catching fish on white spinnerbaits along shady shorelines and on soft plastics in the shade of boat docks.  Their best 5 fish would have weighed around 15 pounds.  The grass is in excellent shape on Lake Bastrop and the fishing was pretty good during the Couples Club tournament earlier this month.  The weather is looking good for this upcoming weekend and the full moon will still be up early Saturday morning.  I hope to see you at the upcoming meeting.