In what other sport can you be a 40-year-old rookie?
Preston Clark is just that in the big leagues of bass fishing - the Bassmaster Tour - and he owes it all to his wife, Katrina. After years of being a dominant force on the St. Johns River tournament scene, she talked him into aiming considerably higher.
"I never tried to make it to the Tour until the last couple of years," Clark said. "My wife started reading my Bassmaster Magazine and started looking at some of the weights that it took to do well. She said, 'Why don't you try to do that?'
"I said, 'Well, we really don't have the money.' She said, 'If you'll quit fishing all these local tournaments, I'll make sure we have the money for you to go out and give it a try.'
"She asked, 'How do they get there?' I told her they usually fish the Federation first. So that's what I did. I joined a club and started fishing the Federation. I did well in the Federation and won state Angler of the Year in my first year. That gave me a guaranteed spot to get into the Opens. I got into the Opens in 2004 and went to the first tournament in Mississippi, where I didn't do well. Then I bounced back and had two top-10s (qualifying for the Bassmaster Open Championship) and just barely squeaked in (to the 2005 Tour). When I called my wife and told her I had made it, we were both asking ourselves, 'Now what?'"
One of 18 newcomers on the Tour, Clark has shown promise and done fairly well in the first four events of the six-tournament season. Entering this week's Tour stop on North Carolina's Lake Norman, Clark finds himself in third in the race for the $10,000 Toyota Bassmaster Rookie of the Year title after finishes of 52nd at Lake Tohopekaliga, 113th on the Harris Chain, 35th at Lake Guntersville and 21st at Clarks Hill.
"My goal this year is come across the stage every day," Clark said. "If I can come across the stage and weigh a fish every day, I'll be happy.
"My second goal is to win Rookie of the Year. There's a fellow out there right now who is doing really well, but there are still two tournaments left."
Born to a father (L.E. Clark) who is practically a legend in north Florida tournaments, Preston Clark has paid his dues in the minor leagues of competitive fishing. He won "probably 250 to 300 tournaments," many of them team tournaments with partner Terry Scroggins.
Scroggins, also from Palatka, has already made the transition from local superstar to Tour pro. After winning a Bassmaster Open in his second BASS event in 2001, he moved up to the Tour where he owns a victory and one Bassmaster Classic appearance in two full seasons and is currently leading the Bassmaster Angler of the Year race.
"Terry has been very supportive," Clark said. "He's got a few years out here, and it sure has helped. Who would think that two guys from Palatka that used to fish team tournaments together would make it to the Tour?"
If this air conditioner salesman makes it big in the BASS wars, much of the credit will go to a supportive wife back home with their six-month-old daughter, Samantha.
"I've got a good team back at home - my parents, Katrina's parents and a lot of friends are behind us," Clark said. "This has been a dream for a lot of people, including myself, and I can't believe I'm actually out here fishing."
NON-BOATER STORY NO. 1.
If you think it's only the amateurs who do the learning during a day on the water at a Tour event, think again.
Marty Stone's non-boater partner at Lake Guntersville, Justin Nichols of Tuscaloosa, Ala., taught the North Carolina pro a valuable lesson.
"I really love the shared weight format, and here's why it really works," Stone said. "Justin was my second day partner and he finished 20th. He's a great guy.
"I had figured out the fish a little bit the first day, but I knew they were going to change. I had been catching them on a red lipless crankbait. I caught a keeper and then missed a fish. I threw back in there four or five times, but they wouldn't bite again. Justin kept messing around with different colors all morning until he found one he liked. He fired in there and caught a 3-pounder. He did everything the right way. He let me do everything I could to try to catch that fish before he went after it.
"We went on down the bank and I had five or six fish in a row knock the fire out of my bait and not get it. The whole time I'm experimenting with colors. I'm getting the bites, but they're not getting the bait. Every first cast through that area he caught them on a bait that was a color I couldn't match. They were swallowing his lipless bait. He was culling 3-pounders like they were candy. By the time he culled his third fish, I only had three fish in the boat, and I was playing with every color I could think of.
"He finally looked at me very sincerely, cut his bait off his line, laid it on my rod box and said, 'Would you please help my total?' He then quit fishing. He sat down and said, 'You've got to catch them for me to do well.'
I'm not too proud to admit that I tied on his bait - and it was a very color-specific thing - and caught a 5 and then a 3 1/2-pounder on my last cast.
"If not for the shared weight format, he would have had a phenomenal catch, and he would have kept on catching them. I would have never got my hands on that bait, and I probably wouldn't have done as well as I did."
NON-BOATER STORY NO. 2.
At Florida's Harris Chain of Lakes, in the second Tour event of the year, California pro Mike Reynolds finished 27th with 23 pounds of bass. He managed to do it with a healthy assist from his day two partner, Gary Simpson.
Simpson is one of Florida's most decorated tournament fishermen, but it was his hand-to-hand combat with a quality bass that helped Reynolds post such a high finish.
Reynolds hooked a 5 1/2-pound bass in the far end of a large tree, and soon it was hanging perilously, suspended in mid-air over the water. Simpson moved up to the bow and started breaking limbs and pulling the boat towards the fish. At some point, Simpson's upper torso was hanging out over the water as he reached for the bass.
"I was supporting myself with my left hand on limb and reaching with my right when the limb broke," Simpson said. "I went underwater - my head and my face down to my chest. I was totally helpless, so I stuck my left hand up and Mike grabbed it. He pulled me back up, and, as soon as I could see again, I went back to ripping limbs until I finally had my thumb in this fish's mouth. I hollered, "I got her, pull us in." We busted through limbs all the way back to the boat and then we laid on the front deck and laughed for five solid minutes. It was one of the neatest things that I've ever had happen in tournaments.
"And for it to happen in a BASS tournament was something else."
WEIRDEST CATCH
Two-time Bassmaster Angler of the Year Davy Hite had to think long and hard to come up with an answer.
"It would probably be an alligator snapping turtle that was a monster," the South Carolina pro said. "I didn't snag him, either. He actually ate a jig while I was flipping. I set the hook, and it came up and scared me to death. It was in a tournament, and I was fixing to lip him before I realized what it was."
Hite estimated the snapper, which was caught on Old Hickory Lake, at about 30 pounds. "I cut my line," he said. "I hated to leave the jig in his mouth, but I wasn't about to put my hands in there."
DID YOU KNOW?
In the history of the Classic, just 24 percent of the first-day leaders went on to win the event. Rick Clunn did it twice (1977 and 1984). Takahiro Omori became the eighth angler to do it last season.
PRO BIRTHDAYS
Florida's Chuck Economou will celebrate his 49th birthday on March 27th, while Curt Lytle of Virginia is 35 on March 28th.
IF I HADN'T BECOME A BASS PRO
Veteran Georgia pro Tom Mann, Jr., would likely be juggling dual careers as a fishing guide and golf pro.
THEY SAID IT
"I love it, especially for the Angler of the Year chase. You're going to get a truer picture - not to diminish what the recent winners have done. I've said it often with our circuit; you've got to be on top of your game every day. The late Carl Maxfield told me that when you get on the BASS Tour, 'You can't slip up even one day.' You have to be consistent and catch them every day. Expanding the Tour to 11 events and spreading them out over the year will be a great test of the best. It'll show who can adapt the best during the season and who's not just stuck on one technique." BASS tournament director Trip Weldon, a former tournament pro, on the impact the expanded 2006 season will have on the annual Bassmaster Angler of the Year race.