Well, I am sad to say that my second district event in the TBF didn’t go quite as well as the first one. Yesterday, district 6 held an event at Lake Erie and since the weather was going to be calm the main lake was on limits. That was good news for most guys, but for me it spelled disaster. With very little experience on the main lake and no time to practice for the tournament I was hoping that the weather would force us to stay in the bay. I have a lot of experience fishing in the bay because I have always just fished out of my 16′ carolina skiff.
My father (Ron Cancilla) fished Mr. Bass West for the TBF Friday and Saturday and won as a rider. He convinced me to run west to the spot that he was able to catch 19+ lbs of smallmouth. He described it the best that he could to me. However, there is no true way to know if I ever found that exact spot. My rider caught the first keeper of the day at 7:30 on a drop shot rig. It was a nice 3lber. About 30 minutes later I was able to land my first smallmouth of the day. It was a 4.66lb smallmouth. At this point we were thinking that we were on the right spot and we just had to keep working for more strikes. That is when things started going south. We each caught a dink smallmouth and a bunch of sheephead. I unfortunately lost 2 more smallmouth that probably would have shot me up the standings. One that I actually got to see that was around 3lbs. The other just gave a couple quick head shakes and was off. I caught my keeper dragging a tube on the bottom. The keeper that I say and lost was on a drop shot.
By running to the spot that I didn’t know exactly where it was I knew I was taking a gamble. However, without a chance to practice for the tournament I decided that was my best chance to win. Perhaps if I had gone to the two spots that I know in the east and worked them I would have gotten a limit, but I feel that the results may have been the same. I know that I want to spend more time on Lake Erie because the smallies are giants. Congratulations to the winners and I look forward to event 3 at Conneaut.
