Making it happen

Regular guy Kevin Wells qualified for the Forrest Wood Cup the hard way

For every successful bass pro, there must be a hundred everyday anglers wishing they were in his place. Kevin Wells of South Shore, Ky., is one of those everyday guys, spending his days in a factory and his weekends on the lake. But Wells achieved what scores of everyday people wish they could – he earned a slot in the $2 million 2007 Forrest Wood Cup.

The reason why the Forrest Wood Cup is establishing itself as the sport’s premier tournament is not only because of the cash awards, which are certainly rich – the winning pro could win $1 million cash. The other facet that sets the Forrest Wood Cup apart is it is truly a bass-fishing championship, with qualifiers that run the gamut from The Bass Federation to the Wal-Mart FLW Tour.

Wells is one of the TBF guys, and as such, he definitely took one of the longest roads to the Forrest Wood Cup that one could possibly take. It all started in 2005, when Wells first began what would ultimately be his Forrest Wood Cup journey at the club level of the Ohio TBF. That took him to a regional tournament and then on to one of two state qualifying tournaments. After navigating those hurdles, Wells qualified to compete in the Ohio Bass Classic, which determines the 12 anglers – out of a field of approximately 160 – that comprise the Ohio state team.

That particular Ohio Bass Classic was in October 2005, and Wells fished his way to a slot on the 12-man Ohio state team that would compete in the Northern Divisional Championship, held nearly a year later on Wisconsin’s Lake Winnebago. The Northern Divisional was a competition among five states, with the top two finishers from each state team advancing to the 2007 TBF National Championship on North Carolina’s Lake Wylie. Though he finished 17th overall at the divisional, Wells was the No. 2 finisher from Ohio, enabling him to advance to the nationals as a co-angler.

At the TBF National Championship, competitors fished for two days to determine which 12 anglers – the top boater and co-angler from each divisional championship – advanced to the final day of competition. Those 12 also earned an automatic berth into the 2007 Wal-Mart Bass Fishing League All-American. As day two of the nationals wound down, Wells found himself in the top position among co-anglers from the Northern Divisional, and though he finished fifth among the final-round co-anglers, his All-American berth was set, and that tournament was less than six weeks away.

An All-American homecoming

What Wells didn’t know at the time was that the All-American was set for the Ohio River out of Louisville, Ky., a playing field close to Wells’ heart, as he considers it his home waters.

“I knew there was an All-American berth on the line, but I hadn’t even thought about getting past the nationals,” Wells said. “It was my first national championship, so maybe I was a little too complacent. I felt good just making it – it was a sigh of relief, because the nationals are the pinnacle of the Federation. I didn’t realize until (weighmaster Charlie Evans) told me onstage that the All-American was going to be on the Ohio River. That was a very good feeling, that’s for sure.”

Because he qualified for the nationals as a co-angler, his berth in the All-American was also from the back of the boat. The All-American turned out to be an extremely tough tournament, and after racking up an impressive lead heading into the final day, Wells experienced a thrill some anglers only dream about – he earned $70,000 as the 2007 All-American co-angler champion.

That win is what propelled him into next week’s Forrest Wood Cup, a tournament he never dreamed he would wind up fishing. But even without entry into bass fishing’s most spectacular event, the All-American victory alone was enough to change his life, and not only because of the big-time payday.

“The money is totally awesome, but I’m just like any other fisherman – if there had been $5,000 on the line, I’d have still been there competing,” he said. “That’s what drives tournament fishermen – we all just want to win. The money’s great; don’t get me wrong – it’s the first time in my life I can say I’m debt-free. Still, it’s been almost two months now, and I still think about that moment as the best thing that’s ever happened to me, just standing there on that stage with Charlie.”

Being in that position fulfilled a dream that Wells had confided in his wife just days before the event, as he had watched countless hours of “FLW Outdoors” programming on Fox Sports Net and yearned to hold a big check over his head on the big stage.

“It’s awesome when they crown a champion, that feeling that comes over you,” he said. “It’s hard to describe, because I hadn’t fished big-money tournaments before. I’m probably not any better a fisherman than anybody there; I was just the most blessed fisherman by God that day. Things worked out in miraculous ways. Two months down the road, I can think of it in a room by myself, and a big smile will come on my face. It may be a once-in-a-lifetime thing, I don’t know.”

A miraculous journey

Like the majority of the so-called weekend anglers, Wells has a wife, children and a regular job. Packing up the family and leaving behind the job to focus on a fishing career really isn’t all that feasible. He knows that it would probably take another big-time title – say, a Forrest Wood Cup co-angler victory just months after an All-American co-angler win – to get the attention necessary to further such a goal. As such, he tends to nurse what he considers more realistic dreams of working in the fishing industry. Nevertheless, the prospect of spending a day fishing with his heroes at the Forrest Wood Cup is enough to get his heart pounding.

“I could very possibly be fishing with my heroes that I watch every day on TV,” he said. “It’s a true championship – we’ll have Federation anglers represented, and the pros from the Stren Series and the tour. Everybody will be there. I still get excited about it, but I don’t get as nervous as I used to because I’ve fished a couple (big tournaments). But it will be different when I’m standing at registration and there’s Larry Nixon and Jay Yelas and all the guys you idolize on TV and want to be like.”

Wells describes his All-American experience and his climb to the Forrest Wood Cup as miraculous, claiming he can give two or three stories dating back to qualifying for the state team that he says proves there was a higher hand involved in getting him to where he is today. That is easy to believe as he relates a tale of how he learned what he now knows about Lake Ouachita, site of the Forrest Wood Cup.

“It’s just another unbelievable thing,” he said. “The night we were leaving the Ranger banquet after the All-American, my family and one other family was leaving. We were kind of lagging behind. I looked over at this guy and said, `You wouldn’t happen to know anything about Lake Ouachita?’ and he said, `My mom lives a half-hour from there.'”

Turns out the man himself lives within a couple hours of the lake and had ample information he was willing to give to Wells to help him prepare for the biggest tournament of his life.

“I was curious, because all lakes and rivers have their little niches, and I wanted to know what I needed to restock my tackle box with,” he said. “Without the official practice day, I’ll be going out blind that first day, and I know the pros are fishing for $1 million, so they’re not going to share a lot. He told me what would work, and I’m going to be able to go out and fish with him a little bit and look at the water clarity and the fish. I’ve never been to Arkansas in my life. We’ll just keep the bait wet and see what happens.”

Big dreams in a small town

In the meantime, Wells will continue to toil in the factory where high-temperature brick and mortar are manufactured for use in the furnaces of steel mills and glass factories. At 43, Wells has worked there for 22 years and has worked his way up to No. 6 in command. But he still yearns to devote his working days to the fishing industry, one way or the other.

“I would love to win the co-angler championship and be able to get people backing me and be able to fish for a living and travel one of the tours, like the Stren Series,” he said. “But I’ve always been the conservative type – I’m not a big gambler. For a small-town boy like me, it would be a big step to quit my job and walk away from that to fish. If I go to Arkansas and win it, it would turn heads somewhere along the line, if I won that and the All-American co-angler titles. But you have to make a commitment to that. If you get two or three national sponsors, you have to fish national tournaments, so you have to quit your job and walk away and do that. So I haven’t pursued anything as far as sponsorships. If the good Lord would bless me and I happened to win in Arkansas, I might be able to pursue something like that.”

With that in mind, the self-described small-town boy will head to Ouachita with a goal of making the top 10 as well as meeting some contacts that could help him in his quest to work in the rapidly growing fishing industry. And while he looks forward to rubbing elbows with the Larry Nixons and Jay Yelases of the world, he wonders if his chances for winning out of the back of the boat wouldn’t be better if he were paired up with someone perhaps a little less known.

“It would be an awesome deal to fish with some of the bigger-name guys, but I’m not sure if that’s the best way to go in trying to do well for yourself as a co-angler,” he said. “Some of these pros are awesome fishermen, and they catch everything biting, and it makes it tough for the guy in the back. I would love to make the top 10 and make that final day as a co-angler. I would love to make the top 10 when the big crowd is there. Just to be able to be there for that final weigh-in would be a dream come true for me. That’s what I’m looking forward to.”

With two major tournaments – the TBF National Championship and the All-American – under his belt and the biggest one just days away, Wells, as one who made it up the TBF ranks, is certainly qualified to dispense advice to anyone hoping to follow in his lucky shoes.

“Definitely join The Bass Federation,” said Wells, a 12-year veteran of the TBF. “Do well at your local and state events to move on to tournaments like this. That way you can still have your family life and work your 9 to 5 job and fish on the weekends to see how you measure up to some of the best fishermen in the country. I walked down there as a Federation member and won the championship at the All-American. Get in a Federation club and see how you can qualify.”

The coming days will determine what fate has in store for Kevin Wells at the Forrest Wood Cup, but no matter what, he hopes to leave Arkansas having represented his roots well. After all, those roots are what got him there in the first place.

“I’m going to fish my hardest, and I look forward to representing the Federation,” he said. “There will be three Federation guys (competing), so the TBF will have a chance to cheer us on. I’m going to try my best to do them proud, and it would be awesome to stand there with my Federation hat on and hold up that check one more time.”