Yesterday, eighteen of us ventured to Oldham Pond for a post-season team/zone event. Anglers were paired randomly and then one drew for their starting zone, A or B. Anglers then fished each zone for four hours.
It was not our most efficiently run event, new format and all, but we made it through. Definitely needs some tweaks if we’re to ever do it again.
Because we were fishing Oldham, we ran an optional crappie lunker pool, as they’re abundant there and usually pretty aggressive.
In addition, we ran optional smallmouth and pickerel lunker pools.
Smallmouth are even less abundant, but appearing in greater numbers as time passes. Only one smallie was caught, though—an 18.75 fatty caught my Kevin Amaral Jr., who once again did not enter the lunker pool. Someday he’ll learn…
Those who did enter got their money back.
Pickerel lunker was a three-way tie between me, Peter, and Bruno. We each had a 20-incher and split a $100 pot. Though, upon further inspection, my pickerel was very clearly a 20.25, which makes my taking a smaller cut of that uneven $100 pie even sadder. Haha.
Ari Stonehill walked away with the crappie lunker, catching an 11.25, the only one caught all day.
The day’s biggest largemouth was hauled in by Zachary Smus, who put up a 20.50-inch largemouth. A bit of good fortune, as he also lost his phone to the depths. Sorry, dude!
Since this was a team event and pots were being split, we paid out only three spots.
Coming in third place was the very creative Team Lame Name, consisting of me and Ari. Prior to culling our smallest fish, Ari had the biggest limit of the day with 79 inches. As a team, though, our best five went 81 inches. I only caught two fish on the day, so Ari most definitely carried us. Thanks, buddy!
Gerard Elias and Mike Elrick comprised Team Hobie, and they managed to maneuver around the rocks and shallow areas without breaking those cheap drives (LOLZ, I keed, I keed), ultimately catching enough bass for second-place with 82.75. Congrats, fellas!
And first place went to…
Team Get Outta My Spot!
Rude, am I right? Not unexpected, really, coming from John Ferreira and Kevin Amaral. Mean bastards, those two.
Anyway, their best five went 83.75, enough to cement the victory in our first ever team event. Great job, you big meanies!
Full results here.
(Ignore the angler standings, as fish were culled, making those irrelevant.)
As always, thanks for coming out, everyone. Pretty sure this was our last event of the season. I’m not burnt out, but I’m looking forward to a break from fishing. I have a lot of other things I need to work on. But if the weather remains mild and some of the other guys want to run one, go for it!
We’ve been discussing it for years now, but I think we’ll finally see an MAKB ice tournament this winter. If you’re into that, keep an eye out for details.