Playing Norman’s numbers game

Northern Regional Championship commences under picturesque fall conditions

HUNTERSVILLE, N.C. – FLW Outdoors frequently visits Lake Norman, the largest manmade lake in the Carolinas. But many of those events are held in the spring – either shortly before the spawn or soon after. The National Guard FLW College Fishing Northern Regional Championship is being held the first weekend in November. But surprisingly, the fishing isn’t all that different.

In April, Lake Norman’s water temperatures are in the upper 60s and low 70s. This week, thanks to warm sunshine, the water is clinging to the mid-60s. That means a good number of fish are still shallow – a sentiment several of the 20 collegiate teams can attest to.

“We’ve caught them shallow and deep,” said Virginia Tech angler Scott Wiley. “But we plan to stay shallow and skip docks all day. We’re finesse fishermen by nature.”

Wiley and his teammate Charlie Machek are one of the few teams with prior experience on Norman.

“Blacksburg (Virginia Tech campus) is only two hours from the lake. We’ve been here a few times before so yesterday we just re-hit the places we know. The one thing we did learn is that the fish are holding on the edges of the docks, not back underneath.”

Wiley and Machek described the bite as tough, not for numbers, but for keepers.

“We’re catching fish, a lot of spotted bass and some largemouth as well,” said Wiley, a landscape architecture major. “We’re aiming for 10 pounds today. But overall I think it will be tough. I’d be surprised if there are more than three or four teams with limits today.”



Shepherd University anglers Joe Pautler and Peter Rush echoed those feelings.

“We power-fished and finesse-fished yesterday,” said Rush, a mass communication major. “It was really tough, but we did get a couple – the biggest one was just over 15 inches.”

That lone keeper was caught while drop-shotting a bridge. With nothing else to go off of, Rush and Pautler will start their day at that bridge.

“We talked to several teams who caught 20 fish yesterday, but none of them were keepers. So we’re not discouraged, we’re excited.”

Lake Norman is by no means a big-fish factory, but the number of bass in the system is impressive. Many of those fish are just under the 14-inch minimum length limit. That means measuring boards will get plenty of use over the next three days. As always, the key to separating from the pack at Norman is finding a kicker largemouth.

In terms of tackle, many anglers will be throwing finesse gear such as shaky heads and weightless Senkos. The neat thing about Norman is that tactics pretty much run the gamut. In addition to the finesse stuff, swimbaits are extremely effective as are topwaters and crankbaits.

The top five FLW College Fishing teams from each of the four regular-season Northern Division tournaments gained automatic entry into the 2009 Northern Regional Championship at Davidson College. During the three-day regional event, 20 two-man collegiate angling teams will compete for a top award of $25,000 plus a 177TR Ranger wrapped in school colors and powered by an Evinrude or Yamaha outboard engine.

Teams slated to compete in the Northern Regional Championship are Chestnut Hill College, Fairmont State University, Hampden-Sydney College, Longwood University, North Carolina State University, Penn State, Shepherd University, State University of New York College at Plattsburgh, University of North Carolina – Charlotte, Vermont Technical College, Virginia Tech and West Point.

Logistics

Collegiate bass anglers will take off daily at 7 a.m. Eastern time from will take off from Blythe Landing located at 15901 Highway 73 in Huntersville, N.C. Weigh-ins will be held daily at Davidson Village Green beginning at 4 p.m. Takeoffs and weigh-ins are free and open to the public.

Davidson College will also host the Reel Life Festival in conjunction with the Northern Regional Championship. The free festival, located at Davidson Village Green, will feature a Battle of the Bands, the National Guard Warrior Challenge ropes course, rock-climbing wall, paintball range, geocaching and a variety of other activities and will kick-off Saturday, Nov. 7 from noon to 7 p.m. The tournament weigh-in will start at 4 p.m. On Sunday and Monday, Nov. 8-9, the Reel Life Festival will run in conjunction with the tournament weigh-in from 4 to 7 p.m. Reel Life Festival visitors can register to win iPod Nanos, which will be given away on Nov. 7-8, and a MacBook Air, which will be given away Nov. 9.

The top five teams from each of the five National Guard regional championships (Western, Central, Northern, Texas and Southeast) will advance to the National Guard FLW College Fishing National Championship April 10-12, 2010, on the University of Tennessee campus in Knoxville, Tenn. The winning team at the national championship will qualify for the prestigious 2010 Forrest Wood Cup.

Saturday’s conditions

Sunrise: 6:51 a.m.

Temperature at takeoff: 38 degrees

Expected high temperature: 68 degrees

Water temperature: 63-66 degrees

Wind: SSW at 9 mph

Max. humidity: 45 percent

Day’s outlook: sunny