Big Finishes and Possible Return to the States
James Moore and I have got some team chemistry going on. After only our second tournament fishing together we took 7th at this past event and now are sitting in 5th place overall in the standings going into the Classic. I’ve got myself a great partner who can definitely pull his weight. I’m telling you, he’s someone to watch out for. He is one heck of a stick. It feels so good to be on the water with someone who knows exactly what I’m talking about and knows how to execute.
I remember when his wife came to me. She said you need to get my husband out there fishing or she was going to go berserk. He was just watching Youtube fishing videos all day and he needed an outlet. From that first tournament we fished, I knew we were going to have success. We finished 13th in our first event as a team and the last one was even better.
We had right around 1460 kg with only four fish including a 500 gram penalty. In Korea, if after weigh in your fish doesn’t swim straight up when they put it in the tank, you are penalized. All of our fish seemed fine before weighing in so it was a surprise when the one was on its side afterwards. Even with the penalty we were so close to winning it because the weights were so tight. The crazy thing was that after we weighed in we had no idea we were even in the top ten until they announced our names.
For us, it was an exciting tournament all around. We didn’t catch our last fish until the final fifteen minutes of the event. I’m a drop shot guy, but it wasn’t working so I decided to try a popular technique around here called free rigging. It’s kind of like a Texas rig, but instead of a bullet weight you use a bell weight that goes all the way to the hook with a buoyant plastic like a Zoom Craw. I had tried using it in the past without any success, but it paid big dividends in the final moments of the event for us. We not only had a good finish, but were able to qualify for the Classic despite only fishing the two events.
One of guys from the winning team was actually someone I knew. He was an American that I had been trying to convince to come out and fish these events. Now that he finally did it, it looks like he’ll be back for more. He was paired with a very good Korean angler and they had a great event fishing together.
After talking to command, it looks like I’ll be heading home by July at the latest so I’m excited. By December 1st I have to make one of two choices. The first option is to use my priority placement which will move me back to somewhere in the U.S. doing my same job. Some of the location options are in Florida, Georgia, and Alabama, but my first one would be to go back home to California. The other would be to request return rights which would put me back in California at my old position. They are not allowed to hire until I make that decision though. At any rate, our return to the states is very close.
This is my daughter’s senior year and with basketball season getting here, I’m planning to spend a lot of time at her games and helping her apply to colleges. Because of this I may not fish the first part of the next KSA season. It’s disappointing in a way because they are opening up the Hon River for us next year which is a great looking place to fish. We actually stopped there on a family trip and I was able to catch a few in the fifteen minutes we spend fishing from shore. I can’t imagine how good it really is; especially from a boat. But, I’m really looking forward to watching all of her basketball games and helping get ready for college.
I’ve been over here for two years now and even though I’ve been able to fish, I haven’t been able to replace that feeling of fishing BASS, FLW, and even club events. I miss the camaraderie and everything else about it. We’re getting closer and closer to heading back though and I cannot wait to sit in my boat and tell it how much I’ve missed it.
