07/14/2025
A couple of weeks ago, I caught my personal best Smallmouth at 21”. The whole experience was truly something special! .bryce (Bryce), (Shea) and I had been planning an Indiana Creek Crawl for months leading up to this, but, as things go, we didn’t decide where to fish until about 48hrs in advance. We knew we would stay in Indiana, and we knew we wanted to wade creeks. That didn’t narrow it down much, until the 2-day forecast presented us with our options. We selected sections of Sugar Creek & Big Walnut Creek to fish across 2 full days. Both days, we had the creeks to ourselves. Not another soul in sight. Just what my soul needed. It was mid-day on our first day, and we had all had great success up to this point, but the fish were mostly average sizes. A lot of fun, no doubt, but nothing worth telling stories about. Then it happened. My fly line tugged something fierce and I burned my finger on the line as I set the hook. Fish on. I knew immediately this was a chunker, because I’d never felt a bass pull this hard. It jumped in a rage, and all of us got a clear view that this was the fish of the day. For me, my life. I didn’t say a word. My ability to speak ceased to exist, and 100% of my focus was dedicated to getting this fish in the net. I may not have been speaking, but I was listening as Bryce & Shea traded exclamations and coached me on what to do throughout the fight, until Shea was finally able to step in with the net. My heart was pounding, my pride was swelling, and my tongue finally untwisted itself. “That’s a PB”, I said. Shattering my previous record by 150%. I’ve never claimed to be a “good” fisherman, but this was my first Smallie that I could be truly proud of. It felt friggin great!! And how awesome is it that I got to share that experience with some great guys?! It sure wouldn’t have been the same without them there. It’s definitely a core memory. We spent a few minutes snapping quick pics, between keeping the fish in the water, before releasing it back to the creek. And then I spent about 20 minutes sitting on a nearby sandbar while my nerves calmed down and we all chatted and joked about what just transpired.
