Northwest Bass Championship Banks Lake
In the Pacific Northwest, Northwest Bass is the most prestigious tournament trail around. The team trail attracts the best teams during the season as they move their way towards the Championship that is held each Fall. The 2019 edition was held this past weekend on Banks Lake.
Willie Nelson of Nixon’s Marine was on hand this year as he has been for years and said the event went smoothly, plenty of fish were caught and that numbers were up this year compared to last year.
“Banks Lake can be a little tough this time of year for big fish, and my pre-tournament prediction was that around 15-pounds a day would win it. That was right on as the winners had 30.62lbs,” he said.
“Everyone I talked to said they caught plenty of fish and most everyone had a limit each day. There were some nice bags even with the Harvest Moon, changing weather conditions and rising water, on the second day,” said Nelson. “We had 53 teams fish this year compared to 47 last year.”
The winner’s prize package was a 2019 Ranger RT188 with a 115hp Mercury ProXS Four Stroke. It was equipped with Lowrance electronics, a Minn Kota trolling motor, and more.
READ RELATED: Berkley Big Bass 2019 Presented by Nixon’s Marine
The Winners
Taking the title this year was Paul Hall and Dave Ohl, who also won the event in 2017. They edged out the second-place team of Ron Mace and Tony Lind who were just 0.11lbs behind them.
Day 1
After the first day, Hall and Ohl were leading the event with 16.92lbs, and a 4.61lb largemouth anchored that bag. The rest of their bag was made up of smallmouth. Ohl said that the solid first day came together quickly.
“We a good limit in the first few hours, but it got tougher later in the day as the weather cooled down,” he said. “There were a lot of weather changes during the event.”
The duo targeted ledges and a hump and were forced to fish slowly for most of the day. “We were catching fish that we were locating on the graph and if you could find one they usually bit pretty quickly,” he shared.
They fished mostly deeper water but did catch some fish shallow. “We caught some smallmouth shallow with a Senko and then had a pretty good bag,” he said. “Then we decided to go to a largemouth area, and that’s where we caught the big one.”
After the first day, they led Mace and Lind by just under a pound.
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Day 2
While the first day went well, they had to work hard to survive the second day. They ended up with 13.70lbs of smallmouth, but it was not easy.
“We worked hard and were able to scratch out seven keepers. There was no rhyme or reason to it, and we went to every good spot we know on the lake,” added Ohl.
They spent the final day fishing “deep to real deep” as Ohl described it and caught them all fishing shallow on the bottom with soft plastics.
Their weight was enough to hold off the second-place finishers and take home another Northwest Bass Championship.
READ RELATED: NBW 2018 Championship Columbia River
Thankful Winners
Hall and Ohl have managed to win two prestigious titles in just three years fishing together and Ohl credits that with how well the two work together.
“We’ve been friends for over ten years but have only been team partners for three years. We have had a lot of success and work well together,” he said.
The team would like to thank their sponsors and the team at Northwest Bass for putting this trail together. Hall is sponsored by St. Croix Rods and Ohl represents Dobyns Rods.
“I’d also like to thank Willie Nelson for everything because he is such a standup and honest guy and has helped me quite a bit over the years. And, Paul, he’s been a great team partner,” shared Ohl.
Looking Ahead
Next year, Northwest Bass will again have four qualifying tournaments and a Championship to be held in the Fall. Nelson said they are actively talking to the anglers and getting feedback for locations of the events and the year-end Championship.
They will also be holding their annual Nixon’s Invitation on Moses Lake once again in May along with assisting with the Berkley Big Bass Tournament on Potholes Reservoir. The 2019 event was a massive success with over 170-boats, the largest bass fishing field in Washington state history.
Another year of Northwest Bass tournaments are in the books, and once again, Hall and Ohl are your champions. They will be one of the teams to watch in 2020 as a new season begins, just as it has every year since 1996.
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