Sports
Rabroker and Guerra win Tightlines Bass Tournament
Sunday, 08 July 2012 by David Morris
With the air temperature over the century mark, contestants in the Tuesday night Tightlines Bass tournament gathered inside the Stillhouse Marina soaking up the air conditioner as they drew starting positions and shared fishing stories before the launch of the weekly tournament.
The club gathers weekly on Tuesday nights, beginning the first Tuesday after daylight savings and running the summer months until the fall savings period begins. "We do a championship in November, " tournament director Rodney Thompson said. "That's only if you fish 11 tournaments out of the 36 to qualify."
"I've been out here every week, for eight years," Copperas Cove resident Randy Fleeman said. "I compete from the beginning of the year to the end of the year, that's 36 tournaments." he added.
Fleeman recently broke the Centex Bass Hunters club big fish record with his haul of an 11lbs 11oz bass out of lake Amistad in Del Rio, breaking the previous record for the club by over a pound.
With a $40 boat fee, the marina of Stillhouse drew nearly 40 boats to participate in the weekly event, offering a first place prize of $450, a second place award of $190 and a third place finish earning $150.
Additional awards were for the big fish, where each boat paid five dollars into a jackpot. "We get guys from Harker Heights, Leander, Austin, Belton, Temple, Killeen and a few from Copperas Cove," Thompson said.
Gerald Barker, President of Lucky Strike Bass Club in Central Texas, enjoys the sport of fishing and has made every tournament since its beginning. "I'm retired military and a GSA employee, this is a way of releasing stress from my day job." Barker said. "The waters are warm so it won't take much to win this week," Barker said of the lake conditions for Tuesday evening. "With a three fish limit you have to go out there on the water thinking big fish," he added.
Jarrett Rabroker and his partner John Guerra of Belton hauled in the big fish of the week. Working his feness worm in about 24 feet of water, Rabroker hauled in the seven pound bass after three hours with a single bite of his bait.
"We knew the fishing was going to be slow, so we slowed down to smaller baits and waited till later in the evening when they were biting," Rabroker said. "We did catch a keeper early but the bigger fish came around later on," he said.
Rabroker and Guerra claimed the first place prize with a total weight of 9.96 pounds along with the big fish prize of $195 for their seven-pound keeper.
Claiming second with a total weight of 9.93 pounds for three fish was the team of Daniel and Adrian Barns, also of Belton. Rounding out the top three boats and claiming $150 in prize money were Dexter Thompson and Melvin Williams.
