Kentucky’s Bennington Takes Co-angler Title
Boaters Matt Stanley of Alexandria, Tennessee, and Greg Trobaugh of Rickman, Tennessee, each caught five bass weighing 20 pounds, 3 ounces, Saturday to tie for the win at the T-H Marine FLW Bass Fishing League (BFL) Mountain Division event on Dale Hollow Lake presented by Navionics. For their efforts, each boater took home $3,573.
Stanley said that he fished mid-lake grass edges with a Picasso School-E-Rig Bait Ball umbrella rig rigged with Xcite Baits Shadnasty Swimbaits in 8 to 12 feet of water. He used a 7-foot 10-inch iRod Genesis II Bama Rig Special Rod and caught around 15 keepers.
“I got a couple good ones early and that keyed me in on what they were doing,” said Stanley, who claimed his third career win in BFL competition. “There’s a lot of grass on Dale Hollow, but once I found the specific spots they were in I could pull up and fish it. Everywhere I stopped I used my Lowrance units to see if there was grass on the bottom and if there was a flat bank. After that it was pretty much game on.”
Trobaugh caught the bulk of his fish mid-lake as well, and used an umbrella rig with Keitech and Reaction Innovations swimbaits. He said his morning was slow, but the bite picked up as the day went on.
“I hit transition spots and caught 11 or 12 keepers. Some of them were relating to points, and a few of them were relating to staging areas,” said Trobaugh, who earned his first BFL win as a boater on Dale Hollow Lake. “I fished a local tournament on Dale Hollow last week and more fish seemed to be pulled up and catchable this time around. I think that helped me.”
The top 10 boaters finished the tournament in:
1st: Matt Stanley, Alexandria, Tenn., five bass, 20-3, $3,573
1st: Greg Trobaugh, Rickman, Tenn., five bass, 20-3, $3,573
3rd: Todd Beaty, Rickman, Tenn., five bass 19-7, $1,498
4th: Jimmy Gayhart, Sadieville, Ky., five bass, 18-11, $1,050
5th: Joe Rucker, Nicholasville, Ky., five bass, 17-8, $1,000
6th: Mike Casada, Stearns, Ky., five bass, 17-7, $825
7th: Keith Monson, Burgin, Ky., five bass, 16-10, $750
8th: Freddy Adkins, East Bernstadt, Ky., five bass, 16-9, $637
8th: Brian Wilson, Somerset, Ky., five bass, 16-9, $937
10th: Rusty Smith, Somerset, Ky., five bass, 16-8, $525
Matt Salmons of Somerset, Kentucky, weighed a 6-pound, 10-ounce bass – the heaviest of the event in the Boater Division – and earned the day’s Boater Big Bass award of $645.
Ed Bennington of Scottsville, Kentucky, won the Co-angler Division and $2,249 Saturday after catching five bass weighing 18 pounds, 2 ounces.
The top 10 co-anglers were:
1st: Ed Bennington, Scottsville, Ky., five bass, 18-2, $2,249
2nd: Jeremiah Williams, Livingston, Tenn., four bass, 14-13, $1,125
3rd: Joshua Jernigan, Rocky Top, Tenn., five bass, 13-7, $752
4th: Ben Stacy, Cincinnati, Ohio, five bass, 12-15, $525
5th: Cole Sowards, Salt Rock, W. Va., four bass, 12-11, $450
6th: Brent Clark, Bowling Green, Ky., three bass, 11-12, $412
7th: Shane Sparks, Allardt, Tenn., five bass, 11-1, $575
8th: Justin Davis, Cookeville, Tenn., five bass, 10-15, $318
8th: Alex Straubing, Mason, Ohio, four bass, 10-15, $368
10th: Billy Gardner, Livingston, Tenn., four bass, 10-12, $262
Gary Wallace of Albany, Kentucky, caught the largest bass in the Co-angler Division weighing in at 5 pounds, 14 ounces. The catch earned him the day’s Co-angler Big Bass award of $322.
The T-H Marine FLW Bass Fishing League (BFL) Mountain Division event on Dale Hollow Lake was hosted by Star Point Resort.
The top 45 boaters and co-anglers in the region based on point standings, along with the five winners in each qualifying event, will be entered in the Oct. 25-27 BFL Regional Championship on Lake Chickamauga in Dayton, Tennessee. Boaters will compete for a top award of a Ranger Z518C with a 200-horsepower Evinrude outboard and $20,000, while co-anglers will fish for a new Ranger Z518C with a 200-horsepower Evinrude outboard.
The 2018 BFL is a 24-division circuit devoted to weekend anglers, with 128 tournaments throughout the season, five qualifying events in each division. The top 45 boaters and co-anglers from each division, along with the five winners of the qualifying events, will advance to one of six regional tournaments where they are competing to finish in the top six, which then qualifies them for one of the longest-running championships in all of competitive bass fishing – the BFL All-American. The 2018 BFL All-American will be held May 31-June 2 at Cross Lake in Shreveport, Louisiana, and is hosted by the Shreveport-Bossier Sports Commission. Top performers in the BFL can move up to the Costa FLW Series or even the FLW Tour.
About FLW
FLW is the world’s largest tournament-fishing organization, providing anglers of all skill levels the opportunity to compete for millions in prize money in 2018 across five tournament circuits. Headquartered in Benton, Kentucky, with offices in Minneapolis, FLW and their partners conduct 286 bass-fishing tournaments annually around the world, including the United States, Canada, China, Italy, South Korea, Mexico, Portugal, South Africa and Spain. FLW tournament fishing can be seen on the Emmy-nominated “FLW” television show, broadcast to more than 564 million households worldwide, while FLW Bass Fishing magazine delivers cutting-edge tips from top pros.
By: Brian Johnson, FLW
