B.A.S.S. Communications
Shaw Grigsby, you still have it.
The veteran pro from Gainesville, Fla., outfished the 99-man
Bassmaster Elite Series field in a nerve-jangling contest over four days
that hinged on an on-again, off-again sight bite on the Harris Chain of
Lakes.
Sunshine Showdown, it was called. For Grigsby, it was a personal test as well as a competition.
“I’ve been close quite a few times since my last win in 2000. I’m
turning 55 in May, and at this age, you wonder, you question, do I still
have it? — and I guess I do,” Grigsby said.
He flashed his trademark grin and waved the $101,000 check he’d
just been handed as reporters interviewed him. “This is awesome,” he
said. “Yeah, baby! That’s a lot of zeros.”
Grigsby led for two days in the Harris event before he wrapped it
up with 75 pounds, 4 ounces on Sunday. He won by 7-6 over Grant
Goldbeck, who finished second with 67-14 after starting out in 97th
place. Stephen Browning was third with 66-9. Kevin VanDam
finished fourth with 65-13, followed by his nephew, Jonathon VanDam,
fifth with 56-13.
Day 1 leader Pat Golden ended in sixth place with 55-5.
Grigsby’s Sunday win was his first in a Bassmaster event in over 10
years. He also won a 2012 Bassmaster Classic berth. It was the first
one awarded under new rules that give each of the eight regular-season
Elite winners an instant entry, bypassing the
points system under which non-winners can still earn their way into the
world championship.
“That to me is as big a thing as you can have,” he said. “Winning
is great, but making the Classic is like a load off. In the past, I’ve
had some good years, but still I struggled to make the Classic, sweating
it until the last second — a lot like this
tournament, sweating it until the last second — so to make the Classic
and know it’s in the bag is like heaven, it’s so nice.”
Even though he led by more than 11 pounds going into Sunday’s final
round, Grigsby said he questioned all day whether he would pull off the
win. His fears were not ungrounded. Any one big bedder could have
altered the outcome on the final day.
“When Grant (Goldbeck) weighed in only 16 and he had the lead, I
knew I had it, and I went ‘ahhh.’ It was a relaxing moment,” Grigsby
said.
He competed under one of the sport’s most unusual circumstances.
For four days, Grigsby and Goldbeck fished almost side by side in a
small canal in a residential area between lakes Eustis and Griffin. They
respected each other’s water, and didn’t jump
a prior claim on a spawning bed the other had been working.
It was a new twist on bass competition, Grigsby noted.
“That was really fun. I guess in another sense, he was my main
competition, so you could keep your eye on him, and as long as he
doesn’t bust 20 pounds, I’m doing OK — and I did OK.”
Like Goldbeck and a few others, Grigsby said, he found the canal
off the Haines Creek during practice. It looked promising, he said,
because of the hard bottom, quiet water thanks to low boat traffic, and
deeper water adjacent to shallows.
The first day’s wind and rain created conditions that wrecked his
chances to actually look at the spawners. Grigsby managed 14-7 out of
the canal for 11th place.
“It was really brutal conditions with overcast skies and a lot of
wind, so you couldn’t see,” Grigsby said. “I went back the second day
and, oh my goodness, all the ones I’d see were still there, and it was
just a slugfest from there.”
He slammed them Friday, that second day. His catch weighed in at 29
pounds, 8 ounces, for a lead of more than 8 pounds over Kevin VanDam.
Day 3 Grigsby held on handily, stretching his lead against Goldbeck to
more than 11 pounds.
Grigsby didn’t credit any one lure or setup for his fish. He tried
anything he could think of to entice bites from the big females settling
on the beds, from 8- to 25-pound Stren to casting and spinning reels.
He pitched different baits to the spawners.
His choices were mainly Strike King’s Rage Craw, Rodent and Ringworm
lures.
“I just mixed it up, and it didn’t matter what color. I did a lot
of black-blue, Okeechobee craw, white — white Rage Craw was really big
for me. I just kept pitching and going, and stopping, locking down on
one and working it, hopefully catching it and
going on.
“It was rare that I could just pull up, cast and catch one. I did
that a couple times, but it was more like fish one bait, and he wouldn’t
pay attention, change to another one and he wouldn’t pay attention,
change again and maybe he’d tee off on it.”
It was not a numbers game. He made repeated trips to the same beds
for his five bass Sunday, five or six the first day, and seven each of
two middle days.
“I didn’t catch very many, I caught the right ones,” he quipped.
For Goldbeck, Sunday’s second-place finish was a victory. Second
place is the highest he’s ever finished in a Bassmaster tournament, but
it was his zero-to-hero performance that thrilled him more. He had ended
Day 1 in 97th place with 1-1, but went back
to the canal’s spawners for another try, and sacked 27-1. That moved him
up to 16th. Day 3 he did it again, 22-15 for the runner-up spot and
direct threat to Grigsby.
“You don’t have to win them to get that feeling,” he said. “It’s an awesome feeling.”
