Gottschalk brothers on their way to US
It was with great excitement that the top 12 teams from the Lowveld Bass Trail (LBT) headed off to De Hoop Dam for the South African Bass Angling Association (SABAA) team tournament on Saturday.
On the first morning, anglers were greeted with the promise of beautiful fishing conditions and after friendly chats among teams with a nice warm coffee and the singing of the national anthem, day one started.
One of the local teams did just that. Brothers Frank and Ben Gottschalk from Team Venom Lures Lowveld knew they had the correct baits at hand but that they had to change their approach, and it worked. They managed to weigh in a five-fish limit bag of 10,57 kilograms including a beautiful specimen of 3,29 kilograms, making them the winners of day one.
They were closely followed by Team Valet Storage (EBass), which consisted of Protea anglers Mike Matthee and Glen Naude who brought in a bag of 9,75 kilograms to the scale.
The second morning greeted anglers with windy conditions. They hoped that this would entice the fish to have a better hunting pattern. However, this was not to be and fishing turned out almost tougher than day one.02
Venom Lures managed a bag of 6,20 kilograms for five fish and Team Angling and Outdoor, Charl Carey and partner Hannes van Wyk managed a respectable bag of 7,15 kilograms.
However, Matthee and Naude managed to stay on the fish and brought a nice bag of 9,31 kilograms to end day two.The overall results after the two days were; Team Valet Storage with a total weight of 19,06 kilograms, followed by the Gottschalk brothers in second with a total of 16,77.
Cube Design Innovations’ Hennie Schoeman and Ruan Wahl placed third with 14,17 kilograms and in fourth place it was Joeys SK’s Ryan Swart and Ryan Thompson with 12,98 kilograms.
The top four teams have all qualified to fish in the United States as part of the Bassmaster Team Championships for the 2019 season. Dates and venues have still to be confirmed.
