My first retreat and what an awesome experience of fishing and fellowship it was. It was really great to meet all of you and put names to faces. I learned a lot from everyone and made some new friends along the way. With Hartwell being my home lake, some of the local guys think you have to lock certain baits in to effectively fish this lake but seeing you guys come down with specific skill sets and still executing really well made me realize just how versatile it is.

Thank you to everyone who helps put these together and BLat for being such a great coach and ambassador for this community. I’ll see yall at the next one!

Too bad there’s nothing for biggest striper 🤣 8.10 lb

Day 2 - 9:12 am

17” Spot

18” largemouth

Been a good February. Hartwell is staging up for the spawn, it’s about get fun!

I’m loving this jerkbait and crankbait bite when the winds too heavy to scope effectively. Been targeting every bit of riprap and rock I can find with em. This girl was hanging out on the backside of a bridge opposite of the wind where the current broke

Caught my first ever jerkbait fish today. And a slab from Christmas eve, he went straight to the frying pan

Minner shaking game has been improving drastically. It’s frisky but getting those reps in

That Zman elastic is the ticket!! 10 fish on one plastic and it’s still good to use. Weeded through a lot of hybrids but caught a couple nice spots that’ll help me in the classic. Only had three hours to fish so there weren’t high expectations but those always seem to be the best days

11 yesterday shaking a minnow, the conditions were perfect for it. A lot of dinks but one good LMB and a decent size speck! When the bite would die down, changing colors fired them back up. What a time!! Can’t thank yall enough for the knowledge shared in here, I’m improving every time I hit the water.