BULL SHOALS, Ark. — Brandon Palaniuk may have $100,000 in the bank after his win today at the Bassmaster Elite Series TroKar Quest at Bull Shoals Lake, but that’s not going to change his lifestyle. He planned to spend Sunday night sleeping in his pickup truck, just as he has every night this week and during most other tournaments.

“It’s just easy,” said Palaniuk, who beds down in his covered pick-up bed near launch sites. “I’ve got power and a shower, and it’s close to the water. That’s all I need. And it’s free. A hundred thousand dollars doesn’t go as far as it used to.”

The 24-year-old angler from Rathdrum, Idaho, began the final round with a forbidding lead of 12-pounds, 13 ounces, after weighing in the heaviest five-bass limits each of the first three days.

Although his final string was much lighter than usual, his four-day total of 78 pounds, 6 ounces gave him a double-digit margin over Britt Myers of Lake Wylie, S.C., who had 66 pounds, 8 ounces. The rest of the field was much closer. Myers outranked Trussville, Ala., pro Matt Herren’s four-day total of 66-7 by just 1 ounce.

Edwin Evers of Talala, Okla., took fourth place with the day’s biggest bag of 17-11 for a tournament total of 66 pounds, and Brent Chapman of Quivira, Kan., was fifth with 64-7. Chapman took over the lead for Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year with his performance at Bull Shoals.

Palaniuk found his winning area in the west Sugar Loaf part of Bull Shoals Lake.

“The fish were only a couple of hundred yards away from where they wanted to spawn,” Palaniuk said. “It was a quick two- to three-minute swim from where they wanted to hang and where they wanted to spawn. I honestly had the best area in the lake.”

It’s a textbook structure spot, and one that other competitors in the Trokar Quest tried during practice. None had the confidence in it that Palaniuk did. The young angler found it on a lake map, and on his first cast to the spot in practice, he caught a 3 ½-pound bass on it. That validated his game plan and gave him confidence he could win, even before competition began.

Palaniuk fished deep-diving crankbaits – a Rapala DT16 in a blueback herring color and a Strike King 6XD in brown ghost craw. He fished them on an Abu Garcia Veritas rod with a Revo Winch reel in a 5.4:1 gear ratio. “The DT 16 series is my confidence bait,” he said. “I caught my entire 24-4 bag on Day 2 on that.”

A key to getting bites, he explained, was to hit the submerged rockpiles around the roadbed from precisely the right angle. The rockpiles were about the size of a boat deck, and a miss of 1 or 2 feet wouldn’t get a bite.

Palaniuk also praised his Hydrowave unit, an electronic device that mimicks the sound of baitfish, for triggering bites from bigger bass. 

 Myers’ key bait was a Rapala DT10 on 10-pound-test Berkley fluorocarbon line. He used a Pinnacle 6.3:1 reel with a 7-11 cranking stick.

Herren said a combination of the water clearing and the level falling caused him to lose track of the fish. Yesterday, with two hours left of fishing, the Trussville, Ala., angler located them again in the main channel. He followed up with that strategy today, pulling in 75 using the M Series green pumpkin jig.

Evers boated his 17-11 bag today by fishing any windblown point with a mudline, using a square-billed crankbait Xcs Excalibur 200 and 300 size.

Courtesy of BASS Communications.

CLEWISTON, Fla. (Feb. 12, 2012) – EverStart pro Randall Tharp of Gardendale, Ala., had endured three days of tough weather and wind and managed to lead the first three days of competition at the Walmart FLW Tour on Lake Okeechobee presented by Evinrude. All he needed was one more solid day’s weight to claim his first FLW Tour title.

Tharp caught a five-bass limit weighing 23 pounds, 2 ounces Sunday to win $125,000 with a four-day catch of 20 bass weighing 101-12. The catch gave him the win by a massive 23-pound, 9-ounce margin over John Cox of Debary, Fla., who caught a total of 20 bass weighing 78-3 and earned $35,000. Tharp’s margin of victory broke the FLW Tour record set by National Guard pro Brett Hite (20-4, Lake Toho, 2008).

“When I caught the first big one today and it put me at 19 (pounds) and I caught the second big one I didn’t say anything, but when I caught the third one I knew it was over,” Tharp added.

“It was not what you want in south Florida,” Tharp said. “We had a wind chill of 27 degrees this morning. The winds were sustained 20 (miles per hour) with gusts to 40. The style I was fishing is what you need to do under those conditions.”

And Tharp’s style of fishing just happened to be what he loves to do – use a big rod, heavy line and big weights to flip grass. Tharp fished the north end of the lake and threw a black with blue flake Bitters Baits B.F.M. paired with a 1 ½-ounce pegged sinker. Tharp said he boated eight keepers during the course of the day.

Overall there were 27 bass weighing 77 pounds, 12 ounces caught by pros Sunday. The catch included four five-bass limits.

Aymon Wilcox of Lauderdale Lakes, Fla., won the co-angler division and $20,000 Saturday with a three-day total of 15 bass weighing 44 pounds, 4 ounces followed by Spiro Agouros of Peterborough, Ontario, in second place with 13 bass weighing 38-0 worth $7,625.

In FLW Tour Open tournaments, pros and co-anglers are competing for valuable points that could help them qualify for the 2013 Forrest Wood Cup presented by Walmart, the world championship of bass fishing.

The Tour stop on Lake Okeechobee presented by Evinrude was hosted by Roland & Mary Ann Martins Marina & Resort, and was the first of 10 Walmart FLW Tour tournaments of the 2011 season. The Walmart FLW Tour on Lake Hartwell presented by Folgers will be the next tournament and will be held March 8-11 in Greenville/Anderson, S.C. The event will be hosted by the Greenville Convention & Visitors Bureau and the Anderson Convention & Visitors Bureau and boats will launch from Portman Shoals Marina in Anderson, S.C. For a complete schedule, visit FLWOutdoors.com.

Coverage of the Lake Okeechobee tournament will be broadcast in high-definition (HD) on NBC Sports Network when “FLW” airs March 18 from 1 to 2 p.m. ET. "FLW" is hosted by Jason Harper and is broadcast to more than 559 million households worldwide, making it the most widely distributed weekly outdoors-sports television show in the world.

For complete details and updated information visit FLWOutdoors.com.

Courtesy of  FLWOutdoors.com.

DEL RIO, Texas (Feb. 4, 2012) – Lamar University’s Danny Iles, Hemphill, Texas, and Justin Royal, Vidor, Texas won the National Guard FLW College Fishing South Conference event on Lake Amistad Saturday with five bass weighing 21 pounds, 11 ounces. The victory earned the team $5,000. The win also helped them advance to the South Conference Regional Championship.