Lake Despair anglers get dumped on

As the storm clouds rolled across Lake Despair and its chain of lakes on Sunday afternoon, most anglers fishing in the Castin’ For Cash bass tournament were frantically trying to catch one more fish–or their first of the day–before the skies opened up.
But not the eventual winners, Pat Cross and Keith Cates.
They’d caught the majority of their fish by 10 a.m., including the big fish of the day, and were merely culling their catch as the storm clouds roared closer.
“Because of the lightning we came in early,” said Pat Cross. “We could have fished another two hours.”
They had that luxury. Other teams did not.
For Bruce Ness and Brad Carlson, it was the lightning—or maybe just a visit from tournament emcee Lionel Robert—that turned their luck around. Shortly before the storm hit, Robert along with tournament host Bill Godin paid the team a visit.
Ness and Carlson explained that at that point they hadn’t caught much but after the visit and during the worst of the lightning they had the most success.
“They were most active in the most intense lightning” they said—a dangerous prospect when you consider their fishing rods doubled as pretty good lightning rods. For the twosome, though, it paid off for they bagged a larger catch than the first day.
Compared to Sunday, Day One of the tournament was a much nicer day. The sun was shining and the fish biting.
At the end of Day One, the tournament was led by the team of Randy Kirk and Dave Evans with a weight of 12.54 pounds. Second place was held by Jason Caul and Dallas Mosbeck with 11.62 pounds and third was held by Cody and Brian McKinnon with 11.50 pounds. There was a two-way tie for fourth between Leroy and Mike Wilson and Dale LaBelle and Jody Shypit with 10.76 pounds.
Cates and Cross had a Day One total of 9.48 pounds putting them in 14 place. Though not insurmountable, they had more than three pounds to make up on the leaders.
“We were kinda shooting for top 10,” said Cross of how they had hoped to place before the tournament began. “We hoped for 10 pounds each day. We knew we needed 10 pounds [on Day Two] to be in it.”
Though well back, the team of Mike McCormick and Terry Dolk caught the big fish of the day, and eventually the tourney, on Day One with a 3.60 pound hawg that netted them $300. Their total for the day was 6.66 pounds–which they would later blame for their bad luck on Day Two.
Most teams that saw any luck on Sunday caught fish in the morning, including the winning duo.
Cross and Cates caught the big fish on Day Two by 9 a.m., a 3.30 pound smallmouth.
“It was the fourth cast,” said Cates. “It was the first fish we got.”
Their success both days was attributed to their pre-fishing efforts this year.
“Our pre-fishing paid off,” said Cates. “We never knew the lake last year.”
He explained that this year they spent 6-8 days in the last three weeks pre-fishing and doing search patterns on the lake compared to the two evenings and one half day last year.
“We knew we had one spot that held big fish and went and worked it as hard as we could,” said Cross. He explained it was a spot they’d pre-fished and knew there were big fish to be had.
“We had a spot that was good,” continued Cates. “They’ve been there for a few weeks. We got lucky. We fished a school of big fish that stayed there.”
“We found the spot again yesterday and left them and hoped they’d be there today,” added Cross after being declared the winners on Sunday.
The two anglers caught about a dozen fish each day, allowing them to be choosy about what they brought in.
Other teams had to take what they could get.
For Chris Mutz and his dad Tim, the bass were elusive. They were skunked the first day and only caught one the second day–a barely 12 inch fish weighing 1.06 pounds. In the end it would get them a prize for lowest total.
The same scenario played for other father/son teams like, Brian and Cody McKinnon, who finished in 25th spot.
“I had a good day,” said Brian McKinnon, who’s birthday was on July 4. “I fished with my boy and just turned 50.”
Leroy and Mike Wilson–who had been in fourth place after Day One–came to the final day weigh-in with high expectations from the crowd, but when they reached into their live well all they pulled out were an old pair of soccer shoes.
“We had to pull out something,” answered Mike Wilson afterward.
They weren’t the only team to have a worse outing on Day Two.
Kirk and Evans, couldn’t find the fish on Sunday that netted them the first day lead, though they still bagged nearly nine pounds of bass.
“Something was working [Day One] and we kept on it,” they said while accept their fourth place cheque for $500. “[Yesterday] we were culling 15-16 inch fish. They weren’t there today.”
A similar fate was met by the returning champion from Sioux Narrows, Mel Giesbrecht who did climb the ladder on Day Two–from eighth to third to net $1,000–but couldn’t match his result from the day, or year, before.
“Sometimes you come in 50th, sometimes first,” said Geisbrecht, who was fishing with a new partner this year, Ed Colfer from Crystal Lake, Illinois. “You just get out there and fish!”
Second place in the tourney went to the team of Jason Caul and Dallas Mosbeck.
“We had a lot of fun,” said Caul. “We did well.”
They were the most consistent team of the weekend, bagging a total of 11.62 pounds on Day One and 9.26 pounds on Day Two. They took home a cheque for $2,000.
Cates and Cross would bag a cool $5,000–and an extra $300 for big fish on Day Two and a $600 GPS system for being the top Lund/Triton team using Lowrance/Eagle electronics–for their final day finish.
“I can’t hardly believe it,” said Cates of their comeback win.
The duo knew that their Day Two catch was better than most once they talked to a few of the teams after returning to the dock. But they didn’t think they had the win.
“I didn’t think we had 11 pounds,” said Cates of their catch. “Pat was confident we had it.” “I figured we were top three anyway,” said Cross. “There were a lot of good weights.”
“We did pretty good,” concluded Cates. “This is so much fun and there’s no pressure [in this tournament].”
This was the third year for the tournament, hosted by Lake Despair Lodge.
Fifth to tenth place teams received $300 meaning they got their entry fees back. Those teams were respectively: Dale LaBelle and Jody Shypit, Paul Jewiss and Dale Strachan, Gerry Elliott and Shelley Bruce-Allen, Wayne Howard and Jason Cain, Ted Heyens and Kalvin Caul, and Doug and Bill Witherspoon.