Ryan Friend of Oroville, Calif. won the 2017 Wild West Bass Trail's Super Clean Showdown at Shasta with a three-day total of 40.54, earning $20,000 for the victory.
Oroville local, Ryan Friend rocketed to the top of the field on Day 1 with a full limit of 18.55, leading the field by five-pounds. His weight was cut to nearly half on Day 2 with five for 10.14; but he again hauled up the biggest stringer on the final day with 11.85, earning an event total of 40.54 and a wire-to-wire win at the WWBT Super Clean Showdown on Shasta – the 2017 Pro/Am season-opener.
He attributed his win to a good practice and a good game plan.
“It’s hard to break down a lake that size with two days of practice for a three-day event, so I decided not to do that and just rolled the dice on a couple of areas,” said Friend. “I learned those areas real well – the sweet spots within the sweet spots.”
Friend reported fishing main body areas in the morning until the wind died off. He then attempted to follow the wind, working his way up the McCloud arm. He returned to the main lake by day’s end.
“The water was falling about a foot per day and I think that affected the McCloud bite on Day 2; so on Day 3, I spent more time on the main body,” he said. “On the main lake, I was working steep walls and bridge pilings – clear water and mainly the darker type of rock as opposed to the mud banks.
“In the McCloud, I was primarily targeting flats that had current rolling over them – again in clear water. My afternoon spots (on the main body) had more color to them.”
Friend found his fish with a float-n-fly. His choice included custom-made or personally modified versions of the lure fished on a custom-made rod, created from a St. Croix rod blank and Sunline Sniper in six-pound-test.
“My float-n-fly varied back and forth between a 1/16- and 1/8-ounce, just to keep a fall rate,” said Friend. “I had some darker colors (green and green/brown) and some light colors – shad imitators. The color that I used was dependent on how deep I was fishing. In deeper water, I used darker colors and in clearer water, I stayed with more of a shad color.”
Friend explained that the float-n-fly technique requires much patience.
“It does frustrate a lot of guys,” he said. “It is kind of like watching paint dry. A cast could sit out there two or three minutes. Then again, it could be only two to three seconds.
“It’s a bobber-technique, basically a way to suspend your bait at a perfect depth of what you choose and you cannot really do that with many baits. You can try to rely on your retrieve to produce at a perfect horizontal depth; but the float-n-fly does that for you. It is just a perfect technique to target suspended fish, which are the hardest to get to bite.
“You can catch a fish a million ways and the float-n-fly is just another tool to do that. It is something that I have confidence in and am very comfortable using. If you’re throwing something that you’ve got confidence in, the expectation of catching fish is that much greater. Sometimes, I feel I can make fish eat it, rather than just wait for them to eat it. Just like anything else, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. This time it did.”
Friend’s victory earned $20,000 which included contingency dollars for Costa, P-Line, Yamamoto Baits, Dobyns Rods and a Big Fish award for a 5.76 on Day 1.
Friend thanked the WWBT for bringing the event to the West Coast.
“We’ve never had something like this before,” he said. “We’ve had FLW and other events; but nothing like this. These guys are really thinking outside of the box and making this as big as they can for the anglers and the advertisers. If there are any anglers that want to fish the West Coast at a high-level, this is the place.”
Read: Top-3 Co-Anglers Info
WWBT SHASTA Pro 2nd Nick Salvucci
Trailing Friend by two pounds was Nick Salvucci of Atascadero, Calif. His tournament total of 38.24 earned the runner-up position.
Salvucci reported catching all of his fish on a G Funk Baits G-rig with ¼-ounce heads and Kietechs in shad patterns.
“I had 3.3’s on the outer wires and a 3.8 in the center,” he explained. “I would make a cast and bring it back with a slow retrieve.”
Salvucci fished the Pitt River, targeting bluffs and points.
“There was a lot of bait fish where I was,” he revealed. “There was quite a few crippled, one-inch shad that the bass were feeding on. The majority of my fish came from 20- to 30-feet and they were on the bottom – not suspended. I got the bigger fish in two key areas – about a 500-yard stretch. I just kept rotating through. I would let them rest and then come back and hit the same area again.”
Salvucci sacked up a $10,000 payout for his time on the water.
“It was a fun event with a good setup,” he added. “The off-limits really levels the playing field.”
WWBT SHASTA Pro 3rd Dusty Khaler
Salvucci’s roommate, Dusty Khaler from Paso Robles, Calif. rounded out the top-3 with a three-day weight of 38.01.
The two anglers shared water and used the same G Funk G-rig, also with Keitechs.
“I had it rigged with four-inch, Easy Shiners in the clear water and the 3.8 FAT Swings in the stained,” he shared. “The color of the Keitech didn’t really matter. On the second day, I was almost out of the one that I was throwing; so I started using every color and it still didn’t matter. They were just eating it. At one point I caught seven fish in seven casts and they were all over two-pounds.”
Khaler reported catching upwards of 30 fish each day of the event.
“The Pitt arm had a better quality fish and those better quality fish were confined to a smaller area; so I didn’t have to run around as much and I got to utilize my time fishing,” he said. “The fish there were schooled up and each of the schools moved.
“One day I would catch ‘em further down and another day I would catch ‘em further back. The second day, they were quite a ways back and day three, I had to move back out to catch ‘em.”
Although the majority of Khaler’s catches came from the Pitt arm, where he was sharing water with Salvucci, he didn’t remain there all day, every day.
“I actually only stayed in there a short while on Day 1,” he said. “I was trying to manage my fish; so I ran around on the main body. With five minutes to go, I culled near the launch when I was fishing a couple of steep walls that were similar to what I was fishing back in the Pitt.”
Prior to this event, Khaler estimated that he hadn’t been to the fishery in two decades and was impressed with the lakes offerings.
“It is just amazing how fat the fish are and how they grow so fast,” he added. “This was an amazing event overall. I really like the format with the cos in their own boat. They get a huge opportunity to figure things out for themselves and as a pro, I don’t have to compete with anybody in my boat or worry about positioning for the co or them fishing behind me.”
Khaler claimed $7,000 for the event and has plans to look into “a boat situation” with the money.
The total WWBT Shasta payout for the pros was $108,800
The following contingency dollars were paid:
$5,000 Evinrude Roy Hawk (4th)
$3,000 Evinrude Jeff Michels (18th)
$2,000 Evinrude Richard Dobyns (19th)
$500 Run and Win with Lucas Tai Au (46th)
Ranger Cup
Roy Hawk (4th)
Dan Wells (5th)
John McClellan (7th)
Ryan Tripp (10th)
WWBT Shasta pro Big Fish awards of $1320 were paid to:
6.88 Sage Baker
6.24 Roy Hawk
6.06 Ryan Tripp
5.76 Ryan Friend
5.27 Ryan Cool
A special thanks to all of the WWBT sponsors – A & M Graphics, Dobyns Rods, Evinrude, Gator Guards, Gary Yamamoto Custom Baits, General Tire, Guards, Hydro Force Marine, Lowrance Electronics, Lucas Oil, Power-Pole, Protect the Harvest and Ranger Boats, Super Clean.
For 2017, the WWBT will conduct 16 events that include a Pro/Am circuit and two Teams circuits – one based in California and the other in Arizona. The Pro/Am circuit consists of five tournaments throughout California and Arizona and a year-end qualifying championship event. Each Teams circuit includes four tournaments and a year-end championship. For more information visit WildWestBassTrail.com and follow WWBT at Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram.
Advertising