Today was the Lake Stevens Kokanee Derby. Woke up at 2am, and headed out the door about 2:45. At 3:15, I realized I was about to pull a moronic move.... I had left my corn in the fridge. DANGIT! Headed back home, grabbed my corn, and back out the door I went. I had my lines in the water around 4:30. The launch wasn't as busy yet as I thought it might be, but the parking was already almost full.

Started my morning running a Reli Lures God Tooth spoon in 50/50 on 1 line, and on the other line the same set up except an orange top instead. Orange top running at 5 feet on the downrigger, 50/50 at 10 feet. Immediately got a fish on at 5 feet, but lost it. A few minutes later landed 1 on the 50/50. Maybe 10 or 15 minutes pass, and I get another one on the 50/50, but lose that one as well. From that point on until about noon, the lake went completely silent for me. I was trying everything I could think of, different depths, speed, lure choices, locations etc. You name it I tried it. In watching all of the other boats, it seemed like a tough day. This was confirmed by talking to people on the water and at the weigh in. Quite a few folks completely blanked, or got a couple. There were a few handfuls of folks that that did a little better, but that was definitely not the norm this morning.

At around noon I realized that in a Hobie, my time back to the dock and get weighed in is shorter than most. I don't get to where I am going real fast. So I decided to stay along the northern shore, and went back to the gear that has worked the best for me on previous trips, the Reli Lures God's Tooth spoons, 50/50 and orange. The folks from Reli Lures had given me a rundown of what had been working for them earlier in the week, and one of the things they had mentioned, was trolling in figure 8's. I normally do that, but for this last little bit I really exaggerated my figure 8 pattern, zero trolling in a straight line, not even for 2 feet. I constantly turned left or right. This was finally the ticket as the 50/50 started getting hit repeatedly at 15 feet. I had tried all morning from the surface down to 40 feet, and had been at 15 feet quite a bit with all kinds of different gear, speeds etc. Constant turning left or right seemed to be the last piece that turned on a bite for me. I made my way back to the dock so I could get weighed in. I docked at 1:45 and was one of the very last to make it before 2pm for weigh in. I wound up with 7 in the bag, all coming on the 50/50.

I believe there were about 190 entrants in the derby. My biggest fish was good for 46the place. Not quite good enough for the podium, but after the rough start to the day I was happy with how it finished. Big thanks to the folks at Reli Lures for the report on how the lake fished a few days prior.

Fun event, everyone goes home with something. I wound up with a nice gift bag of goodies, and won one of the 3 raffle drawings and got a $100 gift card.

Pictures are of my 46th place fish, and the goodies I took home.

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