Browning’s Red River Winning Pattern Deets
(Bassmaster.com photo)
Stephen Browning won the Red River Bassmaster Central Open this past weekend, but the reporting on the tournament didn’t have enough deets to satisfy our curiosity so we called him and documented his pattern for posterity. Some of the deets are here, in brief, all will shortly be in BassGold!
Stephen fished backwaters in the Sullivans area in pool 4. Why: “It’s just one of those areas that has a lot of history to it. It’s an area I like to visit when I’m down there – it just reminds me of the Arkansas River, the lower part where I grew up.”
He cranked laydowns in 3-5′ close to sandbar drops. He paralleled the laydowns and banged his crankbaits off the wood.
His baits of choice were unnamed squarebill crankbaits in sexy shad that ran 2.5′ and 3.5’…which means that they were Strike King 2.5s and 3.5s. Felt keys were using a Lew’s BB-1 with a faster 6.4:1 ratio to trigger more strikes, and 10-lb Gamma fluorocarbon, a heavier line he was confident to fish around heavy cover without breaking off.
He also credited his Triton: “I honestly feel – I’m not just saying this because I’ve been running a Triton – that there’s no doubt in my mind you can take a Triton over stumps, laydowns and things like that and it won’t hang up like on boat that has a flatter bottom. I never had to get on my big engine to get it over [a stump], and being stealthy was the biggest key to getting a few extra bites.”
Btw he did exactly what BassGold showed would work: fishing backwaters around wood. BassGold showed that Red River derbies this time of year are won on all kinds of baits, though mostly plastics and jigs…but as often happens in wins, Stephen did something different than most: he cranked.
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