College Fishing: A Different Format

Boater Miles Burghoff of Orlando, Fla., earned $5,632 as the winner of the Sept. 11-12 BFL Gator Super Tournament on Lake Okeechobee. Anglers: Miles Burghoff, Len Gordon.

June 7, 2011 • Miles "Sonar" Burghoff • Angler Columns

“This is what I do.”

“I got this.”

“You are the man!”

Could I get more confident? Maybe, but that was more than enough cockiness to land me my worst finish yet in a FLW College Fishing event at Lake Eufaula.

I guess my confidence bred a little too much complacency in that event.

Still Green

I am a confident competitor. I love to compete, and I have been doing it long enough now to be pretty comfortable in my own shoes as a competitor.

I have been fishing pro/am style tournaments, at many levels, for many years now, and have grown to understand how to be successful in them.

I even fished some team tournaments over the years, and had a moderate level of success.

So, when I heard about FLW College Fishing, I figured that I would be a shoe-in to be at the top of the leaderboard on a regular basis.

Because this is what I do, right?

WRONG!!

Yeah, I had a decent first season. My partner and I finished third at our first qualifier, and then finished fifth at the Southeast Regional last year to qualify for this year’s National Guard FLW College Fishing National Championship, which was held on Kentucky Lake this past April.

For the first couple events, I just was lucky to be fishing Okeechobee, which I knew well, and Monroe, which I didn’t know at all, but live close to it.

The next event, the Nationals, at Kentucky, is where I started to realize that I may not be as good as I thought.

I ended up catching two fish over two days, and ended close to the bottom of the field.

Then the Eufaula qualifier came around, and I caught ZERO fish in that event.

I still have a lot to learn.

College Fishing Education

After Eufaula, I really began to focus on figuring out why I wasn’t thriving in College Fishing. To figure out what I was doing wrong, I decided to look at Matt and Jake from Florida. They are by-far the most dominant force in FLW College Fishing history, winning at every level, and being the only team to win the National Championship.

It didn’t take me long to realize what I was doing wrong.

I was treating all the FLW College Fishing events like they were just regular pro/am or team tournaments. In regular events, you usually have ample practice periods, where you can dial-in on secret patterns or areas, and can eliminate unproductive water.

Conversely, in FLW CF events you get no practice immediately before qualifiers, and a single, shortened, practice day for Regional Championships and the National Championship.

What I realized is that in the College Fishing format, the key was simple: Catch a limit each day!

Figure out a way to catch a limit each day in these events, especially the Regionals and the National Championships, and you will put yourself in position to win or make the cut.

Since the practice periods are so limited, I found that really the goal was simply to find areas that have good concentrations of fish, but not exactly the quality that you would expect an Everstart, or even a Tour event to be won on. This may mean fishing community holes or release fish.

Of course it isn’t quite that simple. It takes a lot of time and effort to find those areas on a lake that you have never been to before.

In fact, I think one of the major things that the champions of FLW College Fishing, like the University of Florida, and Auburn, have in common, is their work ethic when it comes to doing their homework.

If there is one thing that College Fishing can teach you, it is how to become a better pre-tournament researcher, which is a huge advantage for any angler who plans on moving on to the next level.

Last Chance

I’ll admit it, I want to just hurry up and graduate, however I do wish I had more chances to make my mark in the FLW College Fishing tour, but 2012 is my last shot.

As disappointed as I am that I would let my own confidence get in the way of my only shot of making it back to the National Guard FLW College Fishing National Championship, I am eager to apply the knowledge that I have garnered from my recent lessons to next year’s competitions.

So as I head into 2012 with a new prospective on the College Fishing format, I feel pretty confident, and can’t help but think:

“This is what I do.”

“I got this.”

“You are the man!”

Miles “SONAR” Burghoff is a National Guard FLW College Fishing angler who competes for the University of Central Florida. To visit his personal website click here.