Singing in the Rain

It was one of the worst days for fishing conditions in the Bass Bandits history. With a cold front dumping rain into New Johns lake the night before the tournament, to thunderstorms passing through the morning of the tournament. The rain didn’t discourage the Bandits from fishing, however the lightening and gusty winds sent a few Bandits to take shelter in their vehicles. Once the rain and lightening passed the Bandits took to the lake to try and coax a few bass into biting. Coax and few are the two keywords in the last sentence, not to many bass were caught and weighed once again. As always there is someone who manages to catch a stinger of bass no matter what the fishing conditions are. That is exactly what Robert Reinbold and wife Jeanette did that day despite all of the odds against them. Not since winning the very first tournament in club’s history back on June 10th 2006 at Raleigh reservoir has Robert won a Bass Bandit event. Robert was able to catch and weigh in a 3 fish limit that tipped the scales at 7.03 lbs, his biggest bass weighed 3lbs even. If any of you know Robert you know exactly what he caught his bass on…..the tube jig.

Also turning in a 3 fish limit was Center resident Marty Mantz. Marty bagged three nice smallmouth bass that captured a 2nd place finish with a 5.15lb total weight. This was a big payoff for Marty because he put in a lot of hard work and preparation for this tournament. Last but definitely not least is Jeanette Reinbold who had only fished in one other Bass Bandit tournament prior to this one. That didn’t stop Jeanette from catching a nice 3 fish limit that weighed in at 5.08lbs. Since she was fishing with her husband Robert I am pretty confident that she was using a tube jig as well! 

All in all it was another successful tournament put on by the Badlands Bass Bandits, no matter what the conditions are there is one thing that cannot be beat. Fun. That is exactly what the club is about and always will be about. All of the club members would agree that the friendship and fun atmostphere that this club has to offer is better than fishing itself! At the end of the day the Bandits were able to catch a total of 17 smallmouth bass. The average weight of each bass was 2.04 lbs. The biggest bass caught during the tournament weighed 3.78lbs caught by Janine Wetzel which helped her gain and extra two points ahead of her closest competitors for the Angler of the Year race.

The next raid for the Bass Bandits will be located at Sheeps Creek Dam and Lake Tschida as they head for their annual Club Camping Weekend. On July 11th they will try to capture the big largemouth bass that Sheep Creek Dam has to offer, and then take a short trip north to Lake Tschida for some more smallmouth bass action! Stay tuned to find out who will be in our front page storylines. Until then tight lines!