Twilight of a new generation, Bassin' Young Guns Shoot it out at Pardee
Date:
1/31/10
Location:
Lake Pardee, CA
Event Date:
Jan 31, 2010
Reviewer:
Zander
Introduction: It is that time again, the
annual media day hosted by Ultimate Bass radio talent Kent Brown kicks off the
season at Lake Pardee, and this year the “Young Guns” came out to join the hunt
for trophy smallmouth and quality largemouth at this premier Northern California
fishing destination.
An annual tradition:
TackleTour readers will remember that some of the biggest names in the business
came out for last year’s media day event including Skeet Reese and Byron Velvick.
Unfortunately last year’s harsh weather made fishing quite a challenge and while
many fish were boated everyone didn’t get the same quality that we witnessed at that
spectacular
first event.
The eagle greets us at Jackson
Rancheria, a great home base for those visiting nearby Lake Pardee
This year marks the third year that Kent Brown, with the help from the Pardee
Resort and Jackson Rancheria, put together
another memorable experience for all those involved.
Good morning Pardee, finally a day
of no rain in Northern California
Over the last ten days
leading up to the event the entire state of California was absolutely drenched.
While many lakes up and down the state filled up with so much rain runoff that
they turned "chocolate milk" in color Pardee remained clear. The lake is held at
relatively consistent levels and even 5 plus inches of rain over the course of a
few days does little if anything to alter the clarity of this lake. Thus the
event was on, but the team here at TackleTour wasn’t sure if we would make it
until the eleventh hour.
Taylor Parsons heads out to his
favorite spots. Taylor grew up fishing the lake and considers Pardee one of his
favorite destinations
Earlier in the week I had blew out my knee in an injury and Cal was trying to
recover from a nasty bout of food poisoning, talk about bad timing for the TT
Boys. On Thursday afternoon a MRI showed that there was no bone fractures just
some muscle and ligament issues to deal with. Cal had successfully fought off
the food poisoning and while neither of us was feeling a hundred percent there
was no question about whether we were staying or going, after all who are we to
mess with we tradition? With porch passes in hand we packed our tackle and
headed to Jackson Rancheria to meet up with the Pros.
Back in the river section its cold
and windy and takes a long time for the sun to rise over the steep hill
The calm before the storm,
a storm new talent that is: Jackson Rancheria is
just twenty minutes from the lake and would once again serve as home base for
the event. Dinner was served to all the media and pros that attended and Kent
officially opened the event by introducing everyone. This year there were many
familiar pros in attendance including Dean McDaniel, Mark Lassagne, Alan Fong,
Bub Tosh, Corey Fenske, RJ Bennet and Russ Graves just to name a few. What made
this year different was the number of new rising stars that came out including
Cody Meyer, Zach Thompson, Taylor Parsons, Matt Allen, and Chris Zaldain.
While it is brutally cold the bite
is actually quite good early in the morning
Just like in the prior two annual events we would fish in two sessions with each
outdoor writer fishing with one pro in the morning and another in the afternoon.
I would fish with 2009 National Guard Co-Angler of the Year Taylor Parsons first
then with Kent in the afternoon. Cal would fish with FLW Series National Guard
Pro Chris Zaldain in the first session then later with Dean McDaniel. The stage
was set and during the rest of the evening we enjoyed the good food and drink at
Jackson Rancheria. Entertainment was courtesy of the storytelling of none other
than Pro Angler and owner of Paycheck Baits, Bub Tosh. Suffice to say nobody
really got any real amount of sleep before the event started.
Taylors jigs up a few smallies,
this is his smallest of the day
