Texas Classic Bass Club April Tournament on Stillhouse Hollow.

I fished the Texas Classic Bass Club April Tournament over the weekend Saturday on Stillhouse Hollow. There was near perfect fishing weather if it wasn't for the 30+ mph winds blowing down the lake! Water temps in the lower 60s and water clarity was about 1 foot or less. The lake is about 4 to 5 feet high from flooding. I fished with a new guy checking out the club and he works for Dell, Lyn Parks.

The Tournament:

Lyn and I met at 5:00 AM at Whataburger and grabbed some breakfast. We downed breakfast and hit the road talking about how much fun it was going to be on the lake fishing in all the high wind. We launched at the Stillhouse Marina about 6:45 which was 15 minutes after official start time, but no big deal since it was just light enough to see and there were 4 foot waves rolling down the lake, so no hurry. We ran out of the creek and jumped a few good waves before reaching my first spot, two little pockets on the main lake that were protected from the wind. We started fishing on the point leading into the pocket and Lyn hooked into the first fish on a spinnerbait, but it was just short of being a keeper. We kept fishing into the pocket and both of us picked up keepers with in about 10 yards of each other in the back of the pocket on spinnerbaits. We started back out to the next point and picked up a few short fish on the way. When we made it to the tip of the point there were two other boats in the pocket. One anchored in the back and one on the other side working to the back. The guy fishing in the back of the pocket picked up two nice fish on back to back casts. We fished in a little and then back around to the pocket we started in and picked up two more keepers. At 8:30 we finished our limit of five keepers, we guessed the weight at the time being 9 lbs and just needed one good 3+ lb kicker to put us in 1st or second. I moved us out to a hump that was exposed to the wind to see if we could get a big post spawn fish, but nobody home or at least they didn't want to bite a spinnerbait or rat-l-trap anyway. We then ran up the lake jumping waves and taking spray over the nose of the boat to Dana Peak hoping to find an upgrade, but it was trashed from the flooding. The water was muddy and lots of logs have washed into the area from up the river. I was told a 6 lb fish was caught in the area the day before, but we couldn't manage a single bite there. We then moved to the opposite shore and around the other side of the point behind the island and fished the brush line on the bank that was slightly protected. That's where we saw Bryan Cotter fishing and as soon as he saw us coming down the bank he moved and anchored his boat to secure the area. We gave him room and went down the bank and managed to catch two bass, one being a bass that should have weighed 5 lbs, but it was very skinny and obviously post spawn, so it only weighed 3.54 lbs. I should have taken a picture, but didn't. We fished the back side of the island and ran back to the marina killing a few hours and decided to go back to our starting spot. At 3:49 I slung my 1 oz rat-l-trap out into 20 feet of water and declared last cast. I reeled it back into about 15 feet of water and a 2+ lb bass hit and culled out a 1.3 lb fish in the livewell. 3:50 now, so it was time to go weigh the fish and call it a day. Just seemed like a perfect day if it hadn't been for all the dang wind and waves bigger than I've ever seen on Stillhouse. Lyn learned the hard way on the ride back, wearing a waterproof jacket sometimes isn't enough. Wear water proof pants in rough water even if it's not raining, because we took a good sloshing over the side and he was soaked.

Tournament in Review:

We caught about 15 bass over the day. Most of the fish were caught on a white spinnerbait and a few solid keepers were caught on a 1 oz chrome/ blue rat-l-trap. Lyn and I caught our five largest going 12.89 lbs putting us in 2nd place. Congrats to Bryan Cotter and his buddy who won with 16 lbs.