Robinson and Stormant have been outliers in a subject stuffed with high-dollar bass boats and state-of-the-art electronics. Crappie Masters
Last 12 months, a pair of old-school crappie fishermen shocked the skilled fishing world by successful a Crappie Masters nationwide qualifying event on Florida’s St. Johns River. Randal Stormant and Bobby Robinson, who grew up fishing the St. Johns collectively, have been farther alongside in years than a few of the different rivals. And whereas the pair had entered a few novice tournaments prior to now, neither one had ever fished for a dwelling.
But it wasn’t their age or their inexperience within the professional fishing circuit that made their event victory such a shock. It was how they used cane pole strategies and no electronics to beat out a subject of roughly 100 different anglers who have been outfitted with the most recent and biggest sort out and expertise.
The Crappie Masters All American Tournament Trail has since hailed the Stormant-Robinson win as “one of the best crappie tournament stories of [2022].” The event group simply launched a YouTube video wanting again eventually January’s St. Johns event and the 2 characters who defied expectations and got here out on prime.
“We just fished with simple jig poles. There was no depth finder, no GPS, no LiveScope, nothing in the boat. There never is,” Stormant explains within the video. “We fished the same way we’ve been fishing for the last 30 years. We really didn’t do a thing different.”
No Batteries Required
The Garmin LiveScope that Stormant mentions is only one instance of a forward-facing (or “live”) sonar gadget. This expertise makes use of a sophisticated transducer and a coloration display to offer high-resolution, detailed photos of what’s within the water. It’s an extremely highly effective software that enables anglers to not solely see underwater construction, however to pick particular person fish and watch them reply to baits in actual time.
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Forward-facing sonar has its fair proportion of critics, who say that gazing a display eliminates the nuance and ability of studying and studying water. But the professionals who fish for a dwelling have all the time seemed to new expertise to assist keep an edge over the competitors. And the slab-hunting professionals on the nationwide crappie fishing circuit are not any totally different.
It’s secure to say that the overwhelming majority {of professional} anglers competing on the Crappie Masters All American Tournament Trail have forward-facing sonar and state-of-the-art GPS gadgets put in on their boats. Which helps clarify why a number of eyebrows have been raised on the St. Johns crappie event final January, when two old-school crappie fishermen confirmed up with an older aluminum boat that had no electronics aside from a easy trolling motor.
“If we ever figure out how to work them electronics, it might work good for us, but we don’t own none,” says Robinson. “We have jokes about it all the time, and I tell people I’m gonna find a big magnifying glass and put it up on the front. No batteries required.”
Fishing for the Fun of It
In addition to shunning the expertise that almost each different angler within the event was counting on, Stormant and Robinson had rudimentary rods that have been a far cry from the modern-day spinning combos most anglers use. Without reels or line guides, their 10-foot fly rods have been basically cane poles manufactured from graphite with 10-feet of monofilament line tied to the information.
Using easy jigs and cork bobbers, they outfished the competitors by focusing on lily pads and different seen construction on their residence river. Stormant and Robinson hauled in a 28.94-pound bag of crappies in two days of fishing. This was sufficient to finest the second-place workforce by greater than a pound, they usually took residence the $10,000 grand prize on the finish of the event.
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In doing so, the 2 fishermen proved that a long time of expertise and intimate data of a selected water physique are sometimes value rather more than a ship stuffed with electronics and high-dollar gear. But if you happen to requested the 2 at the moment, they’d let you know successful the event was by no means actually the purpose—and that they weren’t attempting to stage an upset or show some extent. They have been there as a result of, as Stormant explains close to the tip of the video, crappie fishing on the St. Johns continues to be simply as enjoyable because it was once they have been children.