This is how most of our day would go. We would cover huge areas of weed mats without a single strike, then suddenly hit two or three fish in a matter of minutes. While most of the fish were in the 2 to 3 pound class, I managed to nail a 6-1/2 pounder off a small weed bed near Lucerne and an 8 pounder near the State Park. The 6-1/2 came on a Snagproof Frog in the yellow-headed blackbird pattern and the 8 fell for a 6 inch Senko. Our total count for the day was 15 fish with our best five going 23 to 24 pounds.

While the crowds were quite manageable on Friday, it was another story on Saturday. Our plan for Saturday was to fish the deeper water on the south end of the lake. We were hoping to find a solid pattern either fishing crankbaits or plastics in case our shallow bite died off before the tournament.

On our way to the south end, we made a quick stop on the same stretch of weeds where I nailed the 8 pounder and hit a 4-1/2 pounder on my first cast. Just a teaser, though, because we didn't get bit for the next half hour. Sieg fired up his Stratos and we were off to the south end of the lake.

Sieg pulled up to one of his favorite crankbait walls and hit a 5-plus on his first cast with a crawdad colored crankbait. Unfortunately, this was another teaser because we cranked for another hour and caught numerous undersized fish, but no keepers.

Our next move was to an offshore ledge where Sieg had taken several quality fish on plastic worms last September. As we began working the ledge in 10 to 15 feet of water, we both noticed several fish breaking water inside a weed bed next to a small tule point.

We made our way over to the point and immediately noticed a small breeze had pushed a huge school of baitfish into the weed bed and there were 3 to 4 pound bass hammering the baitfish along the edge of the weeds. Sieg picked up his white frog and tossed it to a small opening in the weeds. One twitch and the water erupted as a 3 pounder inhaled the frog. Sieg nailed four more fish to 4 pounds on that white frog and I didn't have a single strike on the black frog. I finally tied on a Rico and nailed two fish, both around 3 pounds, before we decided to leave the school in search of better quality fish.

We managed to find two more weed beds with similar activity, and nailed several more fish from each of those weed beds. Sieg also managed another crankbait fish later in the day and we ended up with a total of 16 keepers with our best five close to 21 pounds.

It was not a bad trip, considering we were only hoping for a few early morning bites before the crowds got out of control. The funny thing is that we found our best action fishing right in the middle of the day with temperatures nearing the triple digit mark and a constant onslaught of water skiers, cruisers and jet skis buzzing within 50 feet of us.