D and R Sports White Lake 2026 - Practice

Hot was the theme of the week for practice. It was like fishing in a furnace. Little breeze and just sticky out, I drank a whole gallon of water throughout the day. My main mission for the day was to find some stuff that was more isolated, more out there, and something I could have to myself. There are plenty of areas on White Lake that I could just show up and fish but I really wanted some more needle and the haystack type stuff.

I began the day covering water, hoping some of the fish that were on spread out places would just show themselves. But I just couldn’t resist the sight of some topped out coontail patches and I got sucked into that early. It is never to early to pull out the flipping stick for me and it is much easier to spot that stuff when it is calm. What I found wasn’t really encouraging but every time I would swing the bat it was a good one. Spread out for the most part was the name of the game but that was fine if I could get a couple bites an hour in here and them all be over 3 pounds.

I expanded from there and found something specific they were keying in on. I could almost call my shots if I detected the right density coontail clump with my MEGA Live 2. Every time I found that it was good for a couple bites and every time I would set the hook it was a nice fish. Things were going well, too well. I expanded on that and got a good crankbait bite going, caught some nice ones on a chatterbait, and really just had an overall great day.

It just felt too easy, although I never caught a big one. I also wasn’t pressing any areas or setting the hook on every fish. I felt pretty good about getting a good weight after today though. If I could catch that and get a couple good bites, then things could be interesting. But I also knew that I just caught them on a day they were biting and this practice might not mean much and could go south fast. I knew better than to believe most of it when they are biting that good so i would also be keeping a very open mind during tournament day.