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Jan 30th 2010
FLW Win #4
Home sweet home: Scott Martin celebrates his first major win at
his waters Lake Okeechobee with his
 mom,
wife and the rest of his family. (Photo by Rob Newell) It’s
Martin in the ‘home’ stretch!
National Guard pro mounts last-minute charge to win at
Okeechobee
By Rob Newell - 30.Jan.2010
OKEECHOBEE, Fla. – If there is one thing Scott Martin of
Clewiston, Fla., has wanted in his fishing career more than
anything else, it’s been to win a major event on his home lake
at Lake Okeechobee.
He’s been close. There was a second-place finish, fourth place,
seventh place, eighth place and ninth place – all in FLW or BASS
competition – but never a first.
That all changed Saturday when Martin came from behind to take
advantage of a major stumble from three-day leader John Cox.
Cox carried nearly an 11-pound advantage into the final day. At
weigh-in, Martin
brought 20 pounds, 3 ounces to the scales for a four-day total
of 71-9; Cox brought just 7 pounds, 5 ounces for a four-day
total of 69-6. In the end, Martin clipped him by 2 pounds, 3
ounces.
“This is surreal,” said Martin, who collected $50,000 for the
win. “It’s been a long time coming. I’ve been on tour 11 years
and had plenty of opportunities to win here and could never get
it done. To seal it today here, in front of all my friends and
family, is really, really special. This puts me at ease, knowing
I can compete at this level on this lake.”
From the beginning of the event, Martin led his targeted win
like a marksman leading a clay pigeon. And today he pulled the
trigger to hit his mark.
“One of the hardest lessons I’ve learned here after getting beat
in the past is that sight-fishing will eventually burn you in
multiple-day events on this lake,” Martin said.
Martin contends that sight-fishing is double trouble. For one,
it’s way too easy to get bogged down on a big fish or two,
wasting a day on fish that just burn up the clock and then
leave.
“I made that mistake twice last year and swore I’d never do it
again,” he explained.
Second, continually taking nest-guarding males from a productive
fishing area day after day removes the incentive for new females
to move into the area.
“Colonies of nesting males on this lake are the very things that
attract females to an area,” Martin explained. “Take the males,
and the females move on elsewhere.”
 With
that knowledge in the back of his mind, Martin set a
tournament-winning strategy that revolved around catching big
females early in the morning on soft-plastic topwaters and
swimbaits.
“For about an hour, right at first light, those big females in
those nesting areas will crush anything that comes around them,”
Martin explained. “But once the sun gets up, they lock on the
beds and become uninterested in eating.
“Don’t get me wrong; I did sight-fish some, especially yesterday
when I missed a bunch of big bites in my morning feeding window
and had to resort to catching males off the bed, but there was a
method to my madness – I was very selective in leaving males in
certain places with hopes that they would keep pulling in
females.”
When today dawned cloudy and windy with an approaching front,
Martin’s long-term strategy finally paid off. While other
sight-fishing pros were running out of fish and had the “lights”
turned off from dark clouds and wind, Martin’s big females were
thrashing his topwater plastics reeled over the surface. He had
led his target perfectly.
All week Martin focused on the west and east walls of Okeechobee
and the Rita Island area. He targeted the thickest Kissimmee
grass he could find, knowing that the more open fields would get
depleted by other competitors.
His main weapons were both a Lake Fork Live Magic Shad
(watermelon-red) and a Reaction Innovations Trixie Shark
(June-bug). Both soft plastics were impaled on a large 7/0
Trokar hook, tied to 65-pound-test Lake Fork Hybrid Braid and
cast on a 7- foot,
6-inch Kistler Helium extra-heavy-action rod.
When he did sight-fish, Martin used a Lake Fork Baby Hyperfreak
creature bait (white) teamed with a tungsten 1/2-ounce weight.
He tied it to 20-pound-test Lake Fork FHP (Fluoro-Hybrid Pro).
Martin also credited his double Power-Pole system for his
success this week.
“There’s no way I would have won without the twin Power-Poles,”
he said. “Being able to stop your boat and hold its position at
any angle in any wind is an advantage that’s unbeatable. I can’t
tell you how many more fish I catch because I can stop on dime
and fish a hole or a bed or where a fish just blew up without
drifting all on top of the spot or having to blow the area out
with my trolling motor and spook the fish. Power-Poles are a
must-have in my book.”
In all, this is Martin’s fourth major FLW title. His other wins
include two FLW Tour titles on Lake Champlain and one on the
Mobile Delta.
July 2009
Thrice is nice for Martin
Florida pro wins third FLW Tour event
FLW TOUR Victory #3
By Brett Carlson - 12.Jul.2009
 PLATTSBURGH,
N.Y. – When Scott Martin came across a series of offshore rock
piles in practice, he stopped to investigate. These isolated
sweet spots, located on a Missisquoi Bay flat, were loaded with
largemouth bass hiding in a mix of healthy grass, and Martin
thought they could potentially go the distance. Clark Wendlandt,
however, had no intentions of winning the tournament. His sights
were set on becoming the first to win three Angler of the Year
titles.
Both pros had their game plans come to fruition on day four of
the Walmart FLW Tour event on Lake Champlain. For Martin it was
special because he was fishing with a heavy heart this week as
his maternal grandmother passed away the day before the
tournament began. He said he dedicated his third FLW Tour title
to her and could feel her presence with him on the water. After
weighing in four bass, Martin needed one more keeper to knock
off Anthony Gagliardi.
He looked into his bag, reached down for his fifth fish and
said, “She wasn’t just a top-10 grandma, she was a championship
grandma.”
The Clewiston, Fla., native later elaborated on the win.
“I have such a peace about this,” said Martin, the son of
legendary angler Roland Martin. “If I could keep
this confidence and peace the rest of my life, I think I could
win every tournament. What I envisioned this week was flying to
Oklahoma (site of funeral arrangements) with a trophy in hand.
Hopefully that will provide some joy in a sorrow time.”
Of Martin’s three victories, two have came on Champlain, the
other on the Pascagoula River. In 2004, the National Guard pro
sight-fished exclusively for spawning smallmouths. Since that
tournament, no angler has won a tour-level event on Champlain
with entirely smallmouths. He located some bedding brown bass
this week, but he caught and weighed only one of them. Instead,
smallies were a backup for his brilliant largemouth strategy.
Sitting in 5 to 8 feet of water, Martin’s postspawn fish were
gravitating to a healthy mix of milfoil and eelgrass. Martin
said the grass was critical because Lake Champlain and the
Adirondacks region have experienced a cool and wet spring. The
grass Martin found was about the best the northern portion of
the lake had to offer.
His three main baits were a Texas-rigged Berkley Chigger Craw
(green-pumpkin), a Lucky Craft Fat CB B.D.S. 3 crankbait
(Tennessee shad) and a Strike King Series 5 crankbait. On the
crankbaits, he tied 12-pound Trilene 100% fluorocarbon line and
he used the same line, but in 17-pound-test, on the creature
bait, which was pegged
 with
a 3/8-ounce Tru Tungsten weight.
During the two-day opening round, Martin said half the fish came
on the Chigger Craw and half on the crankbaits. On day three,
the percentage moved to 75-25 in favor of the crankbait, and on
the final he estimated it was 90-10.
“It seemed like the bigger fish wanted the moving baits as the
tournament progressed. I used the crankbait as a search tool as
a way to find them and get them going, and then I thoroughly
combed
through the area with the Chigger Craw.”
Martin finished the final round with a total weight of 36
pounds, 4 ounces – superseding his 2004 winning weight of 32-8.
The latest $125,000 check put his career earnings with FLW
Outdoors past the $1 million mark.
“They’re all special,” Martin said of his victories. “This puts
me in a class with only a few other guys.”
To read more details of Scott's Career stats, and
find upcoming tournaments, be sure to check out the rest of the
website.
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