BFL St. Clair Aug 1st Journal

[Team houston]

I go to the meeting Fri night and get paired with Joe Balog. Everybody knows Joe is a great stick on St. Clair and Erie so I am a little excited already. He says he has been on the water the last few days and that we should do well. I get a little more excited.

Things go smoothly in the morning and soon we are running across the lake into Canadian waters to our first stop. After catching a couple perch I land the first bass on a d-shot. It goes about three lbs. Then Joe catches fire and puts a bunch in the boat.

He has a limit at about 8:30 but loses 2 real nice ones that he really needed. He is rotating between the d-shot a jig a  tube and a swimbait.  I keep plugging along and catch my 4th at about 9:30. Mine have come, two on the d-shot and two on a beaver style bait T-rigged. Two of mine are in the 4lb class.

I go an hr and a half with nothing, then I can do no wrong. From about 11 to 12 bam,bam, bam, bam, bam, I catch 5 all in the 4lb class all on the d-shot. In the mean time we catch 6 Walleye see some muskie swim by catch a bunch more perch and some smaller bass. Joe would still like to cull two fish he has in the 3.5 lb range.

Finally between 12:30 and 1:30 he picks up the two he needs. Our check in is 2:30 and with two good bags I would have like to left 45 min to get back, but we only leave a half hr. Now it was pretty windy in the morning and calmed down a lot for about two hrs in the middle of the day.

It has gotten very windy again and we have to go into the waves now quartering of the port side. Joe cant get up to the speed he feels necessary to make it back in time. Plus we have the cruiser waves on the American side to deal with also. My heart sinks a little. Joe starts to push it and the last five miles he gets on it good. He is a fantastic boat driver and we only hit hard once.

I should mention that he was an absolute  pleasure to fish with. I fished with Joe years ago at a BFL regional at Lake Chataqua and he hasnt changed. Just a great guy.

In the end we make it back with about 3 min to spare. Whew! Too close for comfort. What a great day in the end we both get the wins. I have 20lb 9oz and Joe has 21 lb 8 oz   It took me about 25 yrs but I finally get my first win, It feels good. Hope you enjoyed the read.

[Slipkey]

Congratulations!  Sounds like an awesome day on the water!  I've never fished with Joe, but I've met him a few times at the dock or in the parking lot when fishing for fun or in practice. He's always been really friendly and pleasant and seems like a great guy to spend a day on the water with and - even more so - in a BFL.

[YpsiBass]

Congrats on the win. Nice that it comes with a great story too. Glad you made it back in time (and safe)!

[Hollada]

Awesome day.  Awesome story.  Congrats on the win.

[LAPORTE]

Wow I'm very happy for you    I can't think of a better person to have won .... nice job.  now you can scratch that off your list...

[dartag]

Great job.  A day we all dream about.

[Team houston]

Thanks for the kind words.

[32eml24]

CONGRATS AWESOME STORY!

[djkimmel]

Don't think I ever congratulated you for this? Maybe. But in case - CONGRATULATIONS!

[Team houston]

Thanks Dan, Merry Christmas by the way.   lol

[djkimmel]

Better late (or early) than never!