With the divisional seasons in the book for 2019, 49 teams accepted the opportunity for a Last Chance derby on Truman Lake in preparation for the 2019 Joe Bass Team Trails Invitational coming up in October. With beautiful Bucksaw Resort and Marina as a backdrop, teams faced the typical Truman challenge; change. After days of consistent weather and water conditions, Saturday’s cloudy windy conditions culminated in torrential rains overnight followed by bluebird skies on Sunday. A quick rise and an influx of muddy water rounded out the changes.
Taking top honors was Ron Peek and Pat Deaton. Bringing a 17.31 limit to the scales is always strong, but it helps when it’s anchored with the Ozark Chevrolet Big Bass for the event, a 5.15 kicker. Pat shared their SportBoats USA Key to Success was fishing a variety of banks, both shallow and deep, with brush hogs. Ron added their spots had to be in close proximity to deep water.
Cameron Reider teamed with Mike Edrington to grab second place. Their 17.08 pound limit fell just short of a win, but proved their mettle on a day when conditions did a 180. Cameron succinctly described their approach which was based on working worms in depths of 10-20’. Their best areas were relatively flat banks with the bites coming away from the shoreline.
Rounding out the top three was the ever-strong team of David McCormick and Gary Shartzer. Straying from the soft plastics theme of the other top teams, David described their approach involved moving baits “super shallow”. They alternated between spinnerbaits and squarebills to amass a final tally of 16.75 pounds. Keep an eye out for David’s YouTube videos from the event to see the team in action.
Rusty Darnell and Timmy Newberry relied on a tie-breaker to wrestle the SportBoats USA Highest Finishing Skeeter award from Rich Cambell and Ashley Medley. The Joe Bass tournament director duo pitched brush hogs in less than two feet of water from Rusty’s ZX20 Skeeter to boat 14.40 of Truman Bass.
For qualifying teams, the 2019 Joe Bass Team Trails season will culminate with the Invitational on Truman Lake October 18th through the 20th. Bucksaw Resort and Marina will host the event, starting with check-in and a banquet Friday October 18th. Check-in will start at 3:00pm. Take off will be from Bucksaw Saturday and Sunday at 7:00 a.m. Keep an eye on the website for details!
Photos
Results
| Place | Team Members | Fish | Pnlty | B/F | TotWgt | Payout | |
| 1 | Ron Peek – Pat Deaton | 5 | 5.15 | 17.31 | $2,160.00 | 1BB | |
| 2 | *Cameron Rieder – Mike Edrington | 5 | 4.07 | 17.08 | $1,330.00 | ||
| 3 | David McCormick – Gary Shartzer | 5 | 4.16 | 16.75 | $950.00 | ||
| 4 | Sean Bowling – Brandon Brown | 5 | 3.27 | 15.71 | $600.00 | ||
| 5 | Tom Statler – Dillon Statler | 5 | 3.5 | 14.7 | $500.00 | ||
| 6 | Timmy Newberry – Rusty Darnell | 5 | 3.23 | 14.4 | $490.00 | Top Skeeter | |
| 7 | Rich Campbell – Ashley Medley | 5 | 14.4 | $200.00 | |||
| 8 | Bryan Baker – Darren Baker | 5 | 4.37 | 14.17 | $180.00 | ||
| 9 | Ricky Clemen – Phil McKinney | 5 | 0.5 | 14.1 | $160.00 | ||
| 10 | John Krewson – Tony Powers | 5 | 13.71 | ||||
| 11 | Shawn Crabtree – Reece Crabtree | 5 | 0.5 | 3.48 | 13.56 | ||
| 12 | Greg Snider – Rick Irvine | 5 | 3.59 | 13.53 | |||
| 13 | Jerry McCutchen – Kevin Smith | 5 | 13.48 | ||||
| 14 | Justin Hosler – Kyle McAdams | 5 | 12.92 | ||||
| 15 | Wayne Garrison – Robbie Plowman | 5 | 2.48 | 12.81 | |||
| 16 | Chris Bridges – Steve Prince | 5 | 2.59 | 12.36 | |||
| 17 | Jay Carden – Dustin Lowe | 5 | 3.57 | 12.14 | |||
| 18 | Jerry Roark – Jamie Edge | 5 | 12.09 | ||||
| 19 | Marty Watson – Doug Long | 5 | 11.91 | ||||
| 20 | *Harlin Husky – JR Shinn | 5 | 1 | 3.08 | 11.45 | ||
| 21 | Matt Gunter – *Terry Bradley | 4 | 11.15 | ||||
| 22 | Chris Callahan – Justin Wasmer | 5 | 11.14 | ||||
| 23 | *Nick Weisemeyer – Ival Hannah | 4 | 10.57 | ||||
| 24 | Bob Moore – *Steve Metherell | 5 | 0.5 | 10.53 | |||
| 25 | Mike Thomas – Jeff Lane | 4 | 0.5 | 3.6 | 10.38 | ||
| 26 | Lyle Armstrong – Cameron Armstrong | 3 | 4.63 | 9.61 | |||
| 27 | Larry Wright – Doug Wallace | 3 | 3.42 | 9.33 | |||
| 28 | Jerry Addington – Jasper Addington | 5 | 9.3 | ||||
| 29 | Corey Besgrove – Eddie Brown | 4 | 0.5 | 8.92 | |||
| 30 | Karl Schmidt – *fished aalone | 3 | 7.3 | ||||
| 31 | Stephen Smith – Garren Hunt | 3 | 6.73 | ||||
| 32 | Troy Hendrick – Chad Hendrick | 2 | 5.46 | ||||
| 33 | John Williams – James Brown | 1 | 5.06 | 5.06 | $200.00 | 2BB | |
| 34 | Chet Douthit – Bill Hendrick | 3 | 4.56 | ||||
| 35 | Mark Thompson – Jim Smith | 4 | 4.47 | ||||
| 36 | Brad Jones – Blaine Bair | 2 | 3.65 | ||||
| 37 | Stacy Howell – Robert Traquair | 2 | 3.39 | ||||
| 38 | Ben Elkins – *Bud Day | 0 | |||||
| Dan Hirstein – *fished aalone | 0 | ||||||
| Brad Jelinek – *Bret Reinkemeyer | 0 | ||||||
| Kevin Love – *Parker Love | 0 | ||||||
| James Macleod – Danny Johnston | 0 | ||||||
| Glen McCrary – Sondra McCrary | 0 | ||||||
| Sam Morton – Dennis Edwards | 0 | ||||||
| Troy Nogosek – Jeremy Fiedler | 0 | ||||||
| Randy Oliphant – Scott Oliphant | 0 | ||||||
| Mark Patterson – Brandon Patterson | 0 | ||||||
| Luke Routh – Tyler Weaver | 0 | ||||||
| Jason Weast – Scott Miles | 0 |
*alternate