Consistent Jones Takes Second At Amistad

03/16/09

BOOYAH/YUM pro Alton Jones hung out near the top of the leaderboard all four days of the Bassmaster Elite Series season opening tournament at Texas’ Lake Amistad by throwing 6-inch YUM Dingers to shallow water. His second-place finish is the result of a strong and consistent bite every day despite a cold front and super-high water.
Jones finished the four days of fishing with a bag weighing 87 pounds, 15 ounces. All of his weighed fish bit Texas-rigged 6-inch YUM Dingers weighted with a 1/8-ounce tungsten weight.
“I used two colors, Watermelon Candy and Green Pumpkin/Purple Flake,” he said. He made long casts to precise areas and worked the bait slowly and deliberately, but said the wind kept him off one of his most productive spots the final day.
"My main spots were long ridges that ran out sometimes a hundred yards into the lake," Jones said. "The ridges topped out at 2 feet with 15 feet of water on both sides. I set the Power Poles so my boat was on top of the ridge up close to the bank. Then I fan casted from the top of the ridge out to about 8 feet deep, and most of my bites came in water from 2 feet to 6 feet deep."
There was a lot of grumbling from competitors after dismal practice days. Heavy rains and a dam break in Mexico brought Amistad’s water level up 10 feet and scattered the fish. Then, Day 1 dawned with rain and strong winds. Air temp was down to the lower 40s.
“The fish I’d found during practice moved and it took some time to relocate them,” Jones said. “When I found them in practice they were up shallow.”
Despite conditions that made fishing hard on the anglers, Jones brought in a hefty 24-pound bag to sit in third place. Other BOOYAH or YUM pros placing high on Day 1 were Matt Reed, at fourth, Edwin Evers at 15th and Tim Horton in 20th.
The winds died on Friday, Day 2, and so did many of the patterns the tournament anglers were on. It was a typical day-after-a-front, but Jones responded with another good bag weighing 22-pounds, 4-ounces to remain in third place.
"I was down here in November for a charity event for the Lifeline Youth and Family Services," Jones said, "so I'd seen the lake since it filled up. I also got to fish with pro baseball players Torii Hunter and Eddi Guardado, by the way, which was really cool. The high water wasn't a surprise to me, but I didn't know exactly which pattern it would take to catch the big ones. Amistad is one of those lakes where high water makes it a whole new lake."
Jones had his fish relatively early, then left them to work other water. Other BOOYAH or YUM pros finishing the second day of competition in contention were Matt Reed at 8th and Tim Horton at 28th.
Jones pulls to the top of the leaderboard on Day 3 with a 22-pound, 7-ounce bag limit. His fishing focus was a travel area for bass where they went from deep to shallow water.
On the final day of competition, Jones brought in a 19-pound, 4-ounce bag, good enough for a second place finish. When the competition is the finest anglers in the world, second is nothing to sneeze at.
"I admit, I really wanted this one," he said. "Momentum is such an important factor. If you're in 16th and boost up to second on the last day you're really happy, but if you're sitting in first place and drop to second, it's frustrating. At Amistad, even with consistency you're always vulnerable to a giant sack. I really wanted to win in Texas, which I never have, so second place has made me very hungry for a win. We always need that motivation."
Jones is the 2008 Bassmaster Classic Champion, a title won on South Carolina’s Lake Hartwell. He used prototype Booyah A-Jigs and Pigskin Jigs to win that tournament. Jones used the YUM Dinger in the 2009 Bassmaster Classic on his way to a 14th place finish.

Alton Jones At Amistad