Parting the Seas
By Jason Sealock
Brent Ehrler shares the secrets of his success in bass fishing
 Are folks born with problem solving skills? Or do they acquire the skills because they had no choice? They either had to figure out how to swim or drown, metaphorically speaking. Yet some folks are so good at dissecting problems into manageable pieces and overcoming the obstacles inherent that it appears to be part of their DNA. Their efforts appear as luck to some. Others see it as an uncanny ability to read things as they are, realize when the opportunity or solution presents itself and manage a strategy into successful completion.
So how does that apply to fishing if it’s all luck? We’ve all heard someone say it at some point. But if an angler sets out to catch fish consistently, then does so, is it still considered luck? If the same angler can do it on 10 different fisheries consistently, is it still luck? If the same anglers are always vying for a win at any given tournament venue, is it because those people are overly lucky?
Some would argue that anglers can’t choose the size of the fish that bites, yet we’ve seen instances where anglers will pass on a 2-pound bass on a bed because they know where a 5-pounder is guarding a nest. But it’s true in 90% of fishing, the angler doesn’t get to choose the size of the fish that bites, and the unknown element is really what keeps us all coming back for more. There is definitely some degree of luck in everything fishing. However minimizing the luck factor is what separates the best from the rest.
Consistent fishing is about preparation more than luck. Sure anglers can go to a local lake and just cruise the banks throwing their favorite bait and catch fish, and there’s not a thing in the world wrong with it. It’s one of the most relaxing ways to fish. It’s the carefree approach that often helps to center us in busy every-day lives.
It’s no secret what Brent Ehrler has been doing lately in tournament fishing. He went out and beat the local hot shots and west coast pros on a tough Lake Shasta in January. Then he backed it up by coming back east and whipping the best of the best on the FLW Tour on Table Rock Lake. There’s been plenty of press about the magic spot he found there and how he “stumbled” upon it. If I had a $100 for every tournament winner that said he “stumbled onto” the winning spot, I’d be a very wealthy man.
Ehrler did his research before going to either lake, he dissected the lakes in an efficient manner and he kept track of his progress, covering as much water as possible to ultimately stumble upon winning areas and patterns. That’s not stumbling; that’s simply a process of elimination.
For those that don’t know Ehrler’s credentials, here’s a brief rundown. He fished the FLW American Fishing Series (formerly the Everstart and Stren Series) for two years in 2003 and 2004. The first year he was ranked first in the western division. The second year he won the American Fishing Series Championship and was ranked third in the western division. He moved up to the FLW Tour.
His first two years he struggled. In 2005, he was ranked 73rd in the angler of the year standings and in 2006, he was ranked 40th, but he qualified for his first Forrest Wood Cup, which he subsequently won, taking home $500,000 in the process.
“I think I was too caught up in the dock talk and what everyone else was doing because I had never fished back east before those first couple of years,” Ehrler said. “I was too spun out in what I needed to do and was throwing everything and running everywhere.” That all changed at the Forrest Wood Cup.
Most analysts said he’d arrived. Almost overnight Ehrler’s consistency out west had translated to fishing the big tours back east, and since then he’s never been ranked out of the top 10 in any angler of the year standings. He started fishing the FLW Series Western Division events on top of the FLW Tour, traveling back and forth across the country to fish both tours. That alone has been shown to derail even the best fishermen just from the mental focus it takes to put in the hours on the road, practicing, prepping and fishing the two tours.
Yet Ehrler has been ranked 2nd, 6th, 2nd and currently is ranked first in the Western Division of the FLW Series. Since 2006, Ehrler has also been ranked 9th, 2nd, 3rd and currently sits in first in the point standings of the FLW Tour. There’s really only one other angler who has showed this much consistency and uncanny ability to find the right quality of fish no matter where he goes.
“It is kind of cool to be compared to Kevin Van Dam,” Ehrler said. “If there is a fisherman that I can try to be like, it’s that guy. He’s so dominating over at BASS. Everyone else is trying to be like him. That’s what I want to do. I want to be the guy that everyone else is trying to be like. So that’s cool to be compared to him.”
So what is it that made the Brent Ehrler from 2004 such a consistent angler in 2010? It’s all about finding the right fish and fishing what gives him confidence. Sometimes that’s the local hot baits but sometimes it’s just doing something he knows works back home and applying it to the situations he sees back east.
Here is a breakdown of some of Ehrler’s strategies for learning what the fish are doing on a given body of water.
Breaking the Lake Down
Photo courtesy of Navionics Hot Maps Explorer DVD
Ehrler starts by breaking a fishery into manageable pieces for his practice time. He’ll start by looking up as much information as he can about general patterns, general types of areas on the fishery, maybe whether the fish are typically deep or shallow this time of year.
“It sounds strange, but I’m basically looking for the area that’s going to have the most fish,” Ehrler said. “That’s not always possible, but I want to focus on the places and stretches where I feel I can get the most bites and the right quality of bites.”
The theory sounds simple enough. But to some that seems like a daunting task in and of itself. Looking at how Ehrler broke down Table Rock Lake should help understand the method to his madness.
He had done well in the past up the James River. The previous year he caught them well enough in a 10-mile area of the James to finish sixth. Ten miles is a lot but he basically knew the key pattern to run, and that 10-mile stretch had the most consistent number of bites.
So this year, he wanted to expand on the James River one day, then run up the White River one day, then run the main lake the third day and put it all together at the end. He ran the James River all day the first day staying off the 10-mile area he fished the previous year. At 2 p.m. he had not had a bite and neither had his co-angler partner for practice, Brandon Hunter. So he started running stuff he knew in the 10-mile stretch. He got a bite here and a bite there. But he felt it was really hit or miss and worried if another guy got on those same banks, were there enough willing fish to still bite.
The second day he ran up the White River. Again he fished all day until about 3 p.m. without a bite. He was working way back in a small creek and caught a 3-pounder. The fish prompted him to fish another hour in the creek without a single bite. So nearly dinner time, Ehrler started to make a run out of the small creek. As he was motoring out he noticed a high spot on his Lowrance graph.
Basically he was a few yards off a bluff creek-channel bank, and the inside turn formed a point that went all the way across the bay before dropping into the channel. It had trees scattered on it down into the channel.
Ehrler pulled around and made a cast. He caught a 2 1/2-pounder on his first cast. A few casts later he had another hit and Hunter had a few hits so they packed up and left it. Now he had another dilemma. Does he make a 50-mile run and hope that he can get on one spot, not knowing how big the school or how good the quality was on the spot. If he did that, there would be no time to fish up the James River that day.
The last day he hit some main lake points and swings and marked a few places that he thought were similar to what he had found to fish on his way back to the weigh-in if he did make a long run up one of the two rivers.
The rest as they say is history. Ehrler’s spot yielded the majority of his weight during the four-day event. His best fish was a 6-pounder that fell for a Lucky Craft Pointer 100DD on channel swing bank he’d found on the way back to the launch. Another spot he found quickly while scouting the lake in practice.
Lure Selection
Photo by Rob Newell / FLW Outdoors.com
 “I go with my gut,” Ehrler said. “I can almost guarantee what I have tied on starting practice is not what I’ll have tied on in the tournament. You start fishing one thing and that doesn’t work well and you start experimenting. I go with the flow and what feels right for the situation. At Table Rock, I went out one morning and caught a 5-pounder on a crankbait I thought to tie on the night before on a whim. I fished it another two hours and never caught another fish on it. But I went with my gut instinct and hit one fish I needed. If we could all fish our instincts better, we’d all be better fishermen.”
Part of going with his gut is also going with what he learns works in an area or a time of year on a given fishery. “When you hear guys talk about Table Rock Lake that time of year, you hear three things – a Wiggle Wart, a jerkbait and a grub,” Ehrler said. “I threw crankbaits almost all day the first day and had little success. I threw jerkbaits most of the next day and had mild success. I mixed it up the last day but I didn’t get too radical.”
The Yamamoto grub paid off and the Lucky Craft crankbait and jerkbait both came into play as well. So knowing the local generalizations helped. But Brent realized the Wart bite wasn’t there because the water was so cold. And he learned that a deeper jerkbait was producing better. The Lucky Craft RC2.5 DD crankbait he thought might get down over the tops of some of those trees and give the fish another tempting look.
Ehrler keeps it pretty simple but continually tries to refine his offerings until he’s using the most practical tool in his box given the situation faced.
Covering Water
Once Ehrler has some good generalizations about lures, it’s just a matter of covering as much water as he can efficiently. It’s hard for some to understand how you fish fast when the water is cold and fish won’t chase much.
“I fish really fast in practice,” Ehrler said. “That might mean a cast every 10 feet or something even faster. Because I don’t want to really dissect any one area until the tournament. I just want to find a biting fish or two. I don’t want to learn too much or educate the fish too much in a spot.”
 Ehrler has spent too much time in areas during practice because he felt like something had to be there even though it never was. Traps like that can really trip anglers up. The thing that helps anglers is confidence that you’re throwing the right bait coupled with the fact that you don’t need to catch every fish out there. You just need a fish or two to tell you they are in the area. Winning practice gets an angler nothing. Ehrler will only yank on fish to figure out if keepers are in the area. On lakes where it’s hard to get a fish that meets the length limits, he’ll set the hook on them more. But if a limit is easier to get, like a 12-inch length limit, he will shake off more fish and leave areas sooner.
“I typically fish more on the first day or two of practice and drive around and look more on the last days. I specifically won’t fish areas that I drive around and look at that fit a pattern I’ve found earlier because I want to save the fish for the tournament.”
Expanding areas during the event is a monumental key to Ehrler’s success. You want to be finding new fish during the tournament and not have educated them all during practice. Sometimes it might just be something you find driving around that you can hit 10 minutes before you head to the weigh-in.
Final Thoughts
Ehrler has made a living off seeing the potential in an area during practice and then exploiting that potential with huge catches in tournaments. That’s not something you can learn from an article. But these guidelines should help you mentally stay focused on the task at hand on your own fisheries. Learning where they don’t live is equally as important and learning where they do live at various times of year. If you’ll fish fast and cover water, knowing you may only need one bite in an area to forecast its potential, and keep the lures to a practical selection for the given season, conditions and fishery, you’ll be ahead of the game.
This doesn’t just apply to tournament fishing. We so often get caught up fishing memories, even when fishing for fun that we forget to explore and expand upon the potential of what’s around the lake. Try picking a new section of your local lake each time you go out this spring. Really try to breakdown all parts of that section, being sure to try several different lures in every area until you really hone in on where the fish are holding. Doing this with some diligence can make your fishing and more importantly catching a lot more rewarding.
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