How to Prepare for a Bass Fishing Tournament

Bass fishing tournaments are becoming more popular as fishermen seek an outlet for their competitive energies. Bass tournaments test anglers' skills against the bass, as well as other anglers. While most anglers fish bass tournaments for fun, there's pride - and money, oftentimes - on the line, so preparing beforehand increases a participants' chance of finishing well.

Instructions

1. Make sure you have a map of the body of water on which you're fishing the tournament. Consider your strengths as a fisherman, the seasonal movements of bass, and how much experience you already have on the water body. After taking those factors into account, consult with your map and use a pencil or marker to outline the areas you believe will hold sufficient numbers of bass for you to catch during the tournament.

2. Take your boat onto the body of water and slowly motor around the areas you marked on the map. If the water is deep, using your depth finder or other electronics will give you a better feel for the area. If the water is shallow, you will be able to see likely areas. Either way, note what you see in the water and decide what specific places might hold bass.

3. Probe the area. Once you have located a few likely areas, pick one of them, tie on a fast-moving bait, and begin casting around the area. Once you catch a bass or two, cast a slower-moving lure and probe around the area. This will help you determine how many bass are around, and how big they are. Repeat this process in each of the specific places you believe hold bass.

4. Keep to your plan. In most bass tournaments, the winner is the fishermen who brings the heaviest bag of fish to the scales at the end of the day. Consider what other fishermen likely will catch during the tournament. Based on your experience in each of the places you have found, this will help you further refine where you fish during the tournament.

5. Visit each of the spots you locate at different times of the day. Knowing when the bass in each spot bite best will determine the order in which you visit them during the tournament.

6. Motor around the shoreline of the body of water. Since there are nearly always bass in shallow water around boat docks and emergent vegetation, knowing where these areas are will help if your other areas do not produce.

7. Prepare the night before. On the night before the tournament, put fresh line on the rod and reel you plan to use. If you have multiple rods and reels, put fresh line on each of them and tie on the lures that produced for you during practice.

8. Visualize how you will react to different situations during the tournament. If someone is fishing on your preferred spot, for example, you should have a secondary spot identified.

Tips & Warnings

• Do not be afraid to experiment with lure selection. Sometimes, for no obvious reason, bass prefer one lure, or one color, over another.

• Do be courteous to your fellow tournament anglers. If someone is fishing in your spot, fish in your secondary spot until he leaves.

• Read tournament rules and regulations carefully before the event.

• Always wear a life jacket when the boat's main motor is running.