Muskegon D&R Tournament 2025
Things were starting off well on tournament day. We were boat number 4, much different than our 2nd to last boat draw at Hardy Dam. Our hope was just to get a big bite or 2 early since we knew catching a limit wouldn’t be hard. I knew where we needed to be although it was more of a gamble than where we were headed. Weather was incoming and who knew how that was going to effect things. It was probably going to make the fish less specific and more roaming around. But hopefully the right ones were still going to be on the good stuff.
We made the run to a coontail patch and it didn’t take long to put 2 keepers in the boat and miss another fish. It wasn’t nearly as good as expected and we had some boats around on the secondary stuff in the area. We fished around and it just wasn’t happening. We expanded a little bit shallower and picked up another 2 keepers on a swim jig. Nothing was worth anything though and we had squandered getting an early boost. 2 quick hitter areas in between the next spot produced no bites shockingly. You could see the wall of rain coming across Muskegon Lake so it was time to dig the Blackfish Aspire suit out. It was dark, rainy, and we were hopeful they would be chewing. We pulled in and right away we had 4 fish miss it and then Trevor caught our biggest fish of the day on a swimjig. We had one we could weigh in at least but then it just kind of died. We made some bait adjustments with the dark skies but just never got them going. I talked to a buddy later who was in the same area a couple hundred yards away and said that it was mostly over when we pulled in. I made some bigger circles hoping to get a clue or a direction and it just wasn’t happening. There was one other area that I really wanted to get in but there were just too many boats in that direction and none in another direction that I wanted to fish.
That section was more of the same. A combo of covering water with reaction baits and fishing slower in clumpy weeds. We caught a couple more keepers but if they helped at all it wasn’t by much. Our best stuff was yet to come and if they would keep biting culling most of our fish out wouldn’t be a problem. We did check one more area that you can get right in a hurry if it is on. The water was right there and no one was fishing it surprisingly. A couple small fish was all we had to show for what should have been a lot of fun. Things just progressed so slowly from there. We were catching them good enough to keep fishing isolated stuff but with every swing of the bat it was just another 2 pounder. We just needed 4 more bites and it can happen so fast fishing that way. Most places we were pulling up to produced a fish or 2. A couple of times they felt like the right ones only to be a big let down. We didn’t have any small fish, they just weren’t that big.
We went in to fish a seawall and fired a ned rig out to some wood nearby. We made a cull with a smallmouth there (that I thought was going to be a much bigger smallmouth). But it got the wheels turning that maybe we should fish some smallmouth stuff at some point. I never practice any smallmouth stuff inside Muskegon Lake but if it feels right we will gamble on it sometimes on tournament day. There was a lot of activity on the few smallmouth areas we had time for and also didn’t have other boats. We did end up losing a fish that would have helped but not enough to make much of a difference.
At the end of the day we weighed in 13.2 pounds, which sometimes isn’t too terrible on Muskegon Lake. Certainly not finishing in 34th place material for that lake. But it was an epic weigh in for the lake and guys just caught the crap out of them. It was one of those weigh ins where you just want to strap the boat down, spin the wheels out of the parking lot, and hammer home. We blew our AOY year lead and probably our chances at it with as good as this crew is. It was crushing to have a day like that and you just start to question a lot of things you could have done differently.
However, I know I appreciate it when guys stick around until the end. Even though we had a very disappointing day on a lake I have high expectations on. I’m still happy for all my buddies and other competitors who had great days and cashed checks. So as painful as it is sometimes, I’m going to be there until the end whether I’m waiting for a big check or if I’m wondering how I struggled so bad.
That’s just fishing though, sometimes there are just days that don’t go your way. We probably should have kept the trolling motor down and just fished more or went shallower. I’ll never know exactly what adjustments we should have made but I do know every time I searched for a different clue that I never got it.
But as rough as that was (and the next days salmon tournament debacle), there’s no time to dwell on it. All you can do is keep fishing and do your best to bounce back. Monday night was our next opportunity and we made the most of it. Starting the night out with a 4.25 and getting another good one a couple hours later with some solid filler fish. That put us at 14 pounds and finally got us the elusive Monday night tournament win. That division is especially tough this year since we get 30-40 boats every night. It makes it a lot of fun but also really tough. I think back to when I lived on the east side and how much of a struggle it was to get 20 boats on a weekend tournament. We have a pretty dang good tournament scene here on the west side.
Hopefully we can snowball that into some more wins the rest of the year. We’ve got a few Mondays left and 2 D&R tournaments. I’m going to miss this weekends White Lake HOTD tournament to take my nephews fishing. Calm seas forecasted and the potential for a lake flip could mean an epic first salmon trip for them and the girls. Looking forward to whatever adventure Saturday morning brings!