Congratulations to castnblast

[MadWags]

I'd like to give a shout out to Greatlakesbass' own castnblast (Skip Johnson) for an awesome 4th place finish at the BFL Super Tournament on the Detroit River.
http://bfl.flwoutdoors.com/tournament.cfm?cid=2&t=results&tid=6300&tyear=2009&coangler=0

Way to Go!

[djkimmel]

First through 4th place boaters in the event are all GreatLakesBass.com members. Congratulations!!

[MadWags]

Yeah but I was only giving a shout out to cast n blast.
We have had to look at his ugly mug all year on the front page of this website.
Really congrats to all the GLB anglers who did well. (or Dan will pinch me)

[djkimmel]

Sorry if you want only a personal congrats to Skip here. Nothing wrong with that and no pinches coming. You can congratulate whomever you want.

Also no intent to take anything away from Skip. Always an accomplishment to finish real high on Lake Erie in a major multi-day event.

[MadWags]

I was kinda looking forward to a pinch.

[djkimmel]

I'm sure I can find someone...

[MadWags]

I guess it's just you and I in this room.

[VinceR]

And with that kind of talk, it will stay that way.

[MadWags]

LOL! Vince!
Pinch me I must be dreaming.
How the hell are you.
LOL!

[VinceR]

I'm good, Dave, but fishing sucked for me this year. I fished locally, mostly. My partners all had various commitments that took precedence over tournament fishing, so I didn't do much outside of the Lansing area.

I fully intended to fish the DK Open at White Lake, but it ended up being on the same day that the Lions (don't laugh) played the Vikings. I went to the game because that would be the only chance that I would get to see my nephew (he's on the Vikings coaching staff).

I did get over to St. Clair a couple of times this summer, and will probably go a couple more times if the weather doesn't skip right into winter.

[djkimmel]

Don't feel too lonely (still no pinch though ). I don't think you, me and VinceR read this 342 times!?! Some people are just more shy than you...

[motocross269]

Way to go Skip.....

Great job as a last minute call up at the Regional....

[Skip Johnson]

thanx guys, sorry I havent been online its been hecktic especialy getting called 2 days before Ft Madison and having no practice time for it, Ive spent the weekend in bed recovering from a very rough trip.
Ugly mug huh ? lol, I'll take that as a compliment coming from you Dave 

[Mark117]

How was that trip to Ft. Madison? I heard you had to DQ someone because you had your anchor down and they wanted to fish your spot? Maybe Heath should have put his anchor down and you would have sucked like the rest of us? Costing someone a chance to fish the ALL-AMERICAN is not cool! You should be banned from fishing!
Get a clue Bond Jr.?!?!? Its not all about skip?

                  Looking out for my boys,
                               
                       jj sniper "always packing the heat"

[Skip Johnson]

How was that trip to Ft. Madison? I heard you had to DQ someone because you had your anchor down and they wanted to fish your spot? Maybe Heath should have put his anchor down and you would have sucked like the rest of us? Costing someone a chance to fish the ALL-AMERICAN is not cool! You should be banned from fishing!
Get a clue Bond Jr.?!?!? Its not all about skip?

                  Looking out for my boys,
                               
                       jj sniper "always packing the heat"

your funny bro, you obviousley have nooo clue what realy happend in Ft Madison.

[MadWags]

Just for those that may not know. An angler can not DQ another angler. Only the Tournament Director can DQ a competitior. They generally interview all parties involved with an incident before making any decisions. I am sure if a competitor was DQed at the Regional, there was certainly grounds for the DQ. I personally have no idea what happened and have not even heard of the incident until now.

[Skip Johnson]

Well Dave let me post what happend and you all can draw your own oppinion...not that I need re asurement I just hate rumors.

In practice I found smallmouth in 2 places and I knew I was onto something good, on day 1 I stopped at the best of the two but the water was dirty from the rain so after 10 minutes I ran to the second spot, it is the cut on the right just before lock 18, as I was pulling in another boat got there before me but he was fishing the point and thats not where the fish were, I pulled up behind him hoping he would leave but after an hour he moved in deeper in the cut and I followed him in, I started throwing a green pumpkin pepper shaky head on 6 lb and cought my first fish, within minutes I cought another and then the other boat turned around and moved in on me and he cought a couple on cranks within casting distance of me, we did this for 5 hours side by side and we each cought 4 fish for 7-2 and were tied for 7th, its all good but a bummer none the less knowing if I wasnt being pressured I could have got that 5th fish, we never said a negative thing to each other and just dealt with each other like gentlemen.

On day 2 I had # 24 so I knew I would get there first and I needed to defend the spot to try to make the cut and ancoring was the only way to do that, it secures me 50 yds and the spot was 100 yards long.

As I was pulling up on day 2 after blast off Im pulling up to the cut and a boat is idling down from lock 18, he had just missed the lock gate and was killing some time before locking through, as he was idling 150 ft from the cut entrance I entered the cut on plane dropped off plane and I dropped anchor with the trolling motor up legaly securing the spot.

As were getting situated and throw out our first cast the boat that was entering yells "thats B.S." brings his boat up on half plane within 5 ft of my boat and swamped water over my engine, console and nailed my co angler in the back with a 3ft wall of water filling his rain gear he was wearing full of water on a very cold morning and filled his gear bag as well, in addition the waves pushed my boat up onto the rip rap and chewd on the hull pretty good with the rocking and bouncing.

A couple minutes later the same boat comes from the back of the creek going 50 MPH or faster at full trim and rooster tails on a sliding turn bareley missing us and dang near drowned us with his rooster tail, that wake wasnt nearly as bad this time but if he had hit the stump that was just up from me or slid 5 ft closer he would have lost control and killed us so definitley not a good situation to say the least, I was still on anchor so I could not move out of his way.
At this point my co angler is screaming at me to take me to that boat so he could rough him up, my co was 27 yrs old and 6' 5" and he defintley wanted to go get that boater, I assured him we could take care of it at the ramp by either talking it out like gentleman or filing a protest if needed.

My co waited at the marina for the boat to check in, he wanted to make good and sure he didnt get away and had his vehicle positioned at the exit to chase him down if needed.
My co gets a visual on the boat at check in and I asked him to be calm and let me talk to the man, I attempted to talk to him and his reply was "protest me" I said thats easy enough and started walking towards the tournament director, I got about 50 ft away and was like I realy dont want to protest this guy especialy since he says he has fish so I came back and asked to talk to him again and again he told me to go protest him.

At that point I had two options.
1. let my co have a whack at him as he assured me he didnt care if he was banned from FLW tournaments.
2. file a protest.

the decision I made was the best and wisest decision of the two, the man deserved it, Bass fishing IS NOT a full contact sport and what he did was definitley un sportsman like and defintley an endangerment to our lives.

If he would have been willing to talk about it I would have shaken his hand and put it behind me and Im sure that the co fishing with me would have as well, heck I woulda bought the guy a beer afterwords.

Now remember that dropping an anchor to secure a spot is legal and were fishing for a new Ranger Boat and Chevy Truck plus 6 spots to the All American to fish for $140K so being aggressive enough to drop an anchor to legaly secure a fishing spot when Im sitting in 7th shouldnt be a surprise to ANY good and knowledgable tournament Angler.
Also remember that he was boat 17 and I was boat 24, he got up there several minutes before me so if he wanted that spot he could have easily beat me to it.
I DID NOT cost him a shot at the All American, it was his decision to be wreckless and also I hear he was DQ'd from returning late becouse he got stuck at the lock not becouse of our protest so Jon your facts are not straight and you obviousley dont know the whole truth and P.S. Eric Bonds a pretty good angler and a friend of mine so if you meant to hurt my feelings with the Bond jr remark you gotta do better than that bro come on!

As far as Heaths spot goes Jon it would have been silly for him to drop anchor since I never fished within 50 yds of him and I had my own spots marked within 100 ft of him that I didnt go on becouse Heath was there, I didnt have Heaths rock marked but I had the beginning and end if it marked from a couple years back and theres many guys that could confirm that like Ryan Said and Chad Pipkins, I have dozens of spots within a half mile of that rock we all fish those same rock piles within sight of each other every season and by the way I did pinpoint and mark Heaths Spot and if you look at my GPS youl see I labeled it Heaths spot, your welcome to look!

Heath Knows it and knows I will never block him on top of that rock, I even thanked Heath for the spot that I used after he left, I didnt have to say anything on stage about fishing it or thanking him for locating that big school, I didnt have to thank him personely either becouse I cought those fish long after Heath was off the spot and heading in, like you dont fish a spot somebody else has that day or close to it plus I cast up to it instead of sitting on top of it out in 30 fow, I got 6 kept 3 kept my co off of it and left it early with the fish still biting becouse I hoped Heath could go back and whack them on day 2, I Just wanted to make sure I had 20 lbs to secure the cut, no big frickin deal since I seen Heath catch 30 fish on it.
I had fish in the area as I proved on day 2 so to say I would have sucked like the rest is a joke.

Ive never done anything to you Jon Jezierski alias Mark 1:17 alias "jj sniper" what business is any of this yours ? bud out !


Im over it, hopefully the other boater from Ft Madison is and we can move on, I understand its frustrating to get blocked by a guy anchoring but fishing is a sport, using an anchor to block is legal and were playing for real money, get over it.

[MadWags]

WTH! Talk about being dangerous! Skip I would not have been as calm as you in that situation.
As far as anchoring, nothing wrong with working within the rules of a competition. Alot of anglers do it, especially on that river system. I have seen it myself.

[MadWags]

You should be banned from fishing!
Get a clue Bond Jr.?!?!? Its not all about skip?

                  Looking out for my boys,
                               
                       jj sniper "always packing the heat"

I can tell you that these types of posts are not welcome here.
Go look out for your boys somewhere else.

[cantcatch20]

Thanks for all the interest guys, I would like to end this post.

I'm the guy who was driving that ran out of the creek.

I would like to make a couple points. Skip was correct I was idling across the sand point to the creek.Personally never have and never will run in and anchor up on some one like Skip did.

Maby our style is different you justified fishing Heaths spot by keeping your co angler off it. I backed my co on Burt up to every fish he caught and he cashed a check, more importantly he had a good time. My day one partner at at Fort Madison made the All American think he had a good time too.

Sorry about your co being upset, he must have been one of the three guys that walked up to my boat with you, although I didn't hear from him. You wanted to talk man to man as you say however when I voiced my views it became an argument. I thought it best to assertively suggest you protest me, as you were getting loud and a crowd seemed to be growing.

As far as no weight on day two, I made the lock ran into another shoot and was coming out and got hung on a stump. By the time I got off I knew I would be 10 min late. Dumped my fish so well never know how much weight I had. Bond  knows the quality of fish I was on.

Thanks Jon you've been good friend and always made me take the high road. Please let me end this one.

Skip I will never shake your hand nor will I drink a beer with you. I will however forgive you for the move you put on me and your Man to Man talk at my boat.

Please accept my applogy for my poor judgement, I should have given you the same respect I would like to have.

The real losers are two co anglers and all who read this.

Please let this be the last post regarding this matter.

Sincerely Kevin