With spring rapidly approaching, it is once again time to clean the cobwebs out of the bass boat sitting in the garage. I am sure most of you have began your spring preparations; gave the engine a tune-up, charged the batteries, sifted through your tackle and re-organized everything a half dozen times. Making these preparations is vital to your on the water enjoyment and fishing success. But how many of you spend any time preparing the most valuable fishing tool you own? Your mind. Being mentally prepared for a fishing season is an over looked aspect of angling that can greatly separate the average angler from the most successful anglers. Mental aspects of fishing are no doubt crucial to any tournament angler, but are as equally important to recreation fishermen just trying to catch more fish. Things like toughing out foul weather, dealing with other tournament competitors, tough bites, formulating game plans, and gaining personal confidence are all important mental aspects of tournament bassfishing.

The primary mental preparation is formulating a game plan prior to your day of fishing. Formulating a game plan goes beyond just making sure you have gas in your boat and new line on your reels. Analyze the weather, time of year, past patterns, past results, and probable bass locations before you ever even launch the boat. Bass fishermen are more creatures of habit, than the bass themselves. We tend to do the same things year after year. We fish the same spots and use the same baits, particularly if we have had success on them. This is okay, as long as it works, but just because the bass busted on that shiny new spinnerbait last year at this time, doesn’t mean that they will again this year. So don’t completely set yourself up for failure. Be mentally prepared, and have second and third choices of patterns and baits to try. If you mentally put all your “eggs in one basket”, you will then be quickly discouraged and your success hampered when it doesn’t work the way you thought it would. I usually assume that the bass won’t bite what I want to catch them on. It isn’t always true, but this way I rarely get caught off guard without some sort of back up plan. By being prepared for initial failure I don’t get discouraged on the water, or waste time scratching my head. I simply go to plan B, and pull a different rod out of the rod locker.

This leads me to the most important aspect of mental preparations for bass fishing, which is confidence. You must always remain confident in your plan, and confident in yourself to execute it. If at any time you feel that you’re doing the wrong thing and you doubt that a bass will hit your lure, you may as well put the boat back on the trailer. Avoid these situations by having several pre-determined game plans, so you always have an adjustment you can make and have confidence in. It may not be the right adjustment, but that’s okay, it will still keep your hopes alive and your confidence high and that is what it is all about.

The toughest time to remain confident is when the bite is really tough. If you’re approaching a lake for a tournament, and you’ve heard the bite is really tough or you know this lake is notoriously tough this time of year, be prepared mentally. The first step is to realistically prepare your self to get fewer strikes. Lower your expectations and gauge your success based on one fish at a time. I like to mentally trick myself into staying focused by creating scenarios that challenge me. I will literally assume there’s only one fish in the whole lake, and concentrate all day on catching just that one fish. Until I catch it. Then I assume there’s only two fish. We’ve all heard the saying “take it one day at a time”, this is taking fishing “one fish at a time”. You will be amazed on days when fishing is really tough how this approach helps you keep things in perspective. Catching just one fish every so often is such an achievement that it keeps you mentally in the game all day. This will result in more concentration and capitalizing on the strikes you get.

No one likes tough bites, but as tournament anglers we don’t always get to pick and choose where and when we fish. So grinding through tough bites is part of the business, as is grinding through adverse weather conditions. Dealing with a tough bite is one thing, but dealing with a tough bite while it’s freezing, raining, windy, or even snowing can be down right miserable. These are the times I truly love in bass fishing tournaments. I figure the more miserable the weather conditions, the more it puts the odds in my favor. All of us have top of the line rain gear, boots, and gloves, but not everyone mentally prepares for dealing with foul weather and tough bites. If you spend more time thinking about how cold and wet you are, than you do about fishing, then you probably won’t catch much. Prepare mentally for a long tough day on the water and that way it won’t be any big surprise when you’re out there. Mama told me it wouldn’t be easy, and she was right. Rarely is it calm and 70 ° on tournament day. So whether it is extreme heat, wind, or cold rain practice your mental toughness to prepare for these times. This will undoubtedly give you an edge over the competition in these conditions.

As a tournament angler, the toughest thing to deal with mentally is often not the fish themselves, but the other tournament anglers. You have the endless “dock-talk”, anglers gossiping about who’s catchin’ em, and who’s not, other competitors fishing “your water”, and in draw tournaments you have a competitor in the same boat! All this can be very mentally taxing. Depending on your level of experience it can also be very intimidating. Tournament fishing is no different than any other competitive sport, getting into the psyche of your competition can give you a mental advantage. Don’t let “dock talk” or guys with lots of patches on their shirt “psyche you out”. Early in my career I handled this by removing myself from situations that I thought would mentally distract me. I stayed at hotels away from other anglers and kept to myself at tournament briefings and check-ins. Most people thought I was shy, or just not out-going. This wasn’t true, I was just there to focus on the tournament, and was turned off by all the other guys telling each other how great they were. Keeping to myself worked for me until I gained an extremely high level of confidence in myself and abilities. If that doesn’t work for you, then put 40 patches on your shirt and intimidate them. There is no right or wrong way to deal with distractions from other competitors. Being aware that it exists, and not letting it influence your decisions on the water is all that matters. For me it boils down to having extreme confidence in yourself to do your own thing. Make your best guess, and win or lose with your decisions. Be mentally tough, and mentally prepared.