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By Ray Scott

Cold Front

Bass Tournament Blues

Nashville angler wins first Triton Owners Tournament on Old Hickory Lake

HENDERSONVILLE, TN – March 13, 2000 – A bass tournament angler’s worst nightmare. A fast-moving cold front arrives the evening prior to the tournament start.

The 117-two-man teams fishing the first Triton Boats Owners Tournament, March 11^th, on Old Hickory Lake woke up hoping it wasn’t a bad dream. Not so.

Air temperatures plunged from the mid-60s into the 30s and a gray-cast day turned into a cold, wet blast-off at the Sanders Ferry Park at the mouth of Drake’s Creek.

“Tough conditions?” asked weighmaster Ray Scott. “I’d been willing to bet my cowboy hat, there’d not be a limit caught,” said Scott, who as founder of the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society (B.A.S.S.), has officiated at more than 300 big-time professional tournaments.

TRITON TEAM TOURNAMENT CHAMPS – Weighmaster Ray Scott introduces the champions – Mark Metrick, left, and partner Dwayne Tidwell, right – as the winners of the first Triton Boat Owners Tournament hosted by Hendersonville Marine on Old Hickory Lake, Tennessee. Metrick of Nashville and Tidwell of Fairview weighed in 19.84-pounds to pace the 117 two-man teams and Triton owners from across the country.

Then, imagine Scott’s surprise when two five-bass limits over 19-pounds crossed the scales. “Believe me,” grinned Scott, “I figured I’d be up on the stage doing a soft-shoe shuffle, rather than weighing strings like that, to keep the crowd entertained.”

Early on, well-known local Triton owner, Mike Stubbs and partner Thomas Hunnell, in the first-flight, seemingly put the tournament out-of-reach. Their No. 37 Triton boat checked in with 19.44-pounds.

Up to that moment, the best creel of 7.68 pounds belonged to the Gallatin, Tennessee father-and-son team of Eric and Bob Moore. Most of the weight was due to a 5-pound, 3-ounce largemouth.

Boat number 77, with the team of Rodney Tidwell and partner James Dillon, moved into second place on the scoreboard with four bass and 13.08 pounds.

Clewiston, Florida’s Harlan Griggs teamed with nationally-known pro and guide, Chet Douthit weighed-in a five-bass limit and scored 12.76 pounds. The anchor fish – a 6.08-pound largemouth.

But, the party was only getting started. Triton owner, Mark Metrick from Nashville, in Boat No. 90, and partner Dwayne Tidwell of Fairview, Tennessee checked in with a load. They had to beat Stubbs-Hunnell’s score of 19.44 pounds to claim the big winner’s check.

With five bass on the scales, weighmaster Ray Scott called the total: “They may do it. It’s close. Mark it! 19.84-pounds. They’re the winners of the first Triton Team Owner’s Tournament.”

The difference of .40 of-a-pound. Credit two big bass in the creel—the heaviest at 6.22 pounds—for the win, but more to the point was the location fished by Metrick, who has been in a Triton hull for a year, and his last-minute guest and partner.

“My usual tournament fishing buddy, Randy Wick of Hendersonville, wasn’t available, and I asked Dwayne to come along. Turned out to be a lucky thing. He had a good idea where to find the fish active in these post cold-front conditions,” said Metrick.

With the bass moving shallow and the sudden cold-snap, water temperature played a hand in the winner’s decision. “We fished some pockets, near the Gallatin steamplant,” explained, Tidwell, “The water temperature there was up to 64 degrees. The fish were still active.”

For Mark Metrick, a hardwood flooring dealer, it was a day to remember. “Two days ago, I’d just got my new custom-made flippin stick from Roy Strube in Nashville, and I told Dwayne I needed to break it in good.”

About 10:30 a.m., Metrick flipped a Texas-rigged, five-inch tube jig into the shallows along a riprap rock bank, and the new rod took on the big fish, the 6-pounder. With time running out for the start of the 3 p.m. weigh-in, Metrick made a pitch along riprap in another pocket off the Cumberland River and nailed a bass over 5-pounds. “Then, we put my Triton TR-21 on the pad and made the 25-minute run to the weigh-in,” grinned Metrick.

“We didn’t get that many bites,” said Tidwell, “but they were all good fish. A three- pounder jumped off, that would have given us over 20-pounds, but as it turned out we didn’t need it. But, winning by tenths of ounces is too close. I held my breath at the scales.”

Tidwell, a landscaper by trade, fishes regularly on the Redman circuit, the B.A.S.S. Invitational trail, and credited touring pro, Basil Bacon of Missouri, with his pre-spawn tip. “I’d fished up there at the steamplant with Basil, during the B.A.S.S. MegaBucks here, and had a pretty good idea how-to pattern the fish.”

The watermelon-seed Strike King oversize tube was rigged with 17-pound test Trilene Sensor-thin line, a 4/0 hook and a 1/4-ounce Gambler screw-type weight.

Water temperature in the main lake, ranged in the mid-50’s, compared to the 64-degree reading in the pockets upstream. “It had been as high as 68 degrees in there,” said Tidwell, “before the cold front got here.”

The big bass of the tournament – the 6.92-pound largemouth – boated by the Stubbs-Hunnell team came on a War Eagle tandem spinnerbait with No. 4 willow-leaf blades, fished in about six-feet of water depth.

The special Triton Owners Tournament was sponsored by the Hendersonville Marine, located at 760 W. Main Street, with Crystal Turner as the tournament director. “We’d planned for a 200-boat field,” said Turner, “but for the first time we’re excited about having 117 Triton owners coming to Old Hickory from all over the country.”

As part of the tournament, the contestants toured the four-year old Triton manufacturing plant in nearby Ashland City, Tennessee and heard Triton president Earl Bentz explain the expansion plans underway at the facility, located at 15 Bluegrass Drive.

“We’re hoping to be ready to use the new expansion by May 1^st,” said Bentz. “The sooner the better. Right now, we’re at full capacity, and dealers tell us the economy and demand for new Triton bass boats is running strong.”

As founder of the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society in 1968, Ray Scott is credited with starting the bass boat evolution and fanning the worldwide interest in bass fishing. After building B.A.S.S. to a 650,000 member organization, Scott stepped away in 1998 to form his own marketing firm. Ray Scott Outdoors™ is a marketing-consulting group for fishing tackle and marine manufacturers. Scott serves as national spokesman for Triton Boats, Mercury Outboards, MotorGuide trolling motors and Sporting Lives, the manufacturer of SOSPENDERS, the Coast Guard-approved inflatable life vests.