Travis Loyd doesn’t want to think about carp when he goes bass fishing, but sometimes he can’t help it. At the Walmart FLW Major at Beaver Lake a couple of weeks ago, visions of Asian carp leaped into Loyd’s mind even as he was trying to win the event. He wound up finishing 35th, about a pound and a half out of making the Saturday cut but good enough for a $10,500 check, and perhaps he would have done better had he not been preoccupied with thoughts of carp.

When Scott Steil isn’t thinking about the weight he needs to win a walleye tournament, he’s thinking about the weight it will take to win the world championship in his other favorite type of competition. The magic number is 2,000 pounds – not as in fish, as in pumpkin.

From now through Easter, it’s FLW Week on eBay, where several autographed jerseys worn by FLW team pros are being auctioned to benefit the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis. According to organizer Paul Strege, a freelance contributor to FLW Bass Fishing Magazine, he hopes to beat last year’s total of $8,400. Original owners of the jerseys being auctioned off include:

If I hadn’t seen it, I wouldn’t have believed it. In the parking lot of Breakaway Lodge on the Apalachicola River one hot summer morning, Shag Shahid put on a casting demonstration. He stood a volunteer with his back turned and his feet slightly spread apart about 10 yards away. Then Shag asked the volunteer to hook his shirt pocket open with his right thumb.

It’s been said that dogs are the only creatures that get to see God without having to die first. That’s because, to a dog, its owner is God: good, kind, all-knowing entertaining, perfect – irrespective of the occasional baths and unpleasant visits to the veterinarian.

It was a question posed by a man whose familiarity with the White River country compelled him to ask it: Why can’t minimum flowage be maintained in the river below Bull Shoals Dam?

Tournament fishing can be a grueling sport, especially in the summer. The temperature ranges from hot to sizzling, and the humidity-laden air barely stirs. The only relief you get is when you run from one spot to the next. As tough as it is for you, though, imagine what it must be like for Adam Koch.

Lancen Halbert is going pro this year in the ranks of the Walmart FLW Tour, but not for long. It’s not because Halbert isn’t a good fisherman, because he is. However, a recent change of plans will force the South Carolina angler to put his fishing career on hiatus after this season.

Andrew Upshaw is 5-7, weighs 155 pounds and was an all-conference tight end in high school at Hemphill, Texas. That should tell you something about his determination to succeed. Because his team ran the ball “24-7,” as he puts it, the only way he was going to get any playing time was to become a lineman or a back. There was no shortage of backs, so Upshaw learned how to block. He became so good at it that he won accolades despite his lack of size.

Perhaps you’re a young, aspiring FLW fisherman steeped in bass-fishing history. Since you were a kid, you’ve followed the careers of all the greats of the sport, and maybe you pattern your fishing style after one or more of them. In fact, maybe you’re confident you could hold your own against any of them. Wouldn’t it be cool to have had the chance to fish against some of those heroes and role models from that first generation of professional bass fishing?

By his own reckoning, Alex Davis has caught no more than 15 bass or so on a spinnerbait this year, which doesn’t help explain his nickname: the Spinnerbait Kid.

Some things are pretty much a cinch: Green Bay will play in a Super Bowl, the Yankees will represent the American League in a World Series, and Adam Wagner will fish in a Walmart Bass Fishing League All-American.

Texas native Jim Tutt holds record for most events fished in FLW Outdoors history
Football has its Brett Favre and baseball its Cal Ripken – tough guys who hold records for consecutive starts in their respective sports. If there’s a parallel Iron Man in the ranks of FLW Outdoors, his name is Jim Tutt.

That’s how I remember Jack Wingate, that’s how I’ll always see him: black wavy hair and twinkling eyes, syrupy Georgia accent and happy-go-lucky. There are people and places that we store away in our memory, that are so special we won’t let time or the world touch them. Mister Jack is one of mine.

You’re 50 years old, settled into a pretty good groove with a wife and family and told by your doctor that you have from one to three years to live. What do you do now?

Summers can’t be more perfect than those that settle on Minnesota. The weather is mild, the fish are biting and there are ten thousand places to catch them – it says so, right there in the state slogan. This summer, however, Minnesota isn’t so cordial and inviting to anglers who haven’t gotten around to buying a license yet.

Fishermen choose to be co-anglers in FLW Outdoors tournaments for various reasons. Some simply enjoy the whole competition scene and they want to stay plugged into it. Some just want to learn from the pros, and become more equipped to solve various bass-fishing problems on their own. And still others aspire to become full-fledged pros themselves.

David Cosner can’t catch a break. During the last few years, he’s been whittled on, flunked and generally mishandled by life. Not that he’s complaining, mind you, but it does wear a body down.

For George Kapiton, 2010 was golden, a once-in-a-blue-moon fishfest. Last year should have been the year you got him to buy lottery tickets for you, or pick the winner of the Kentucky Derby. Kapiton had a phenomenal tournament season in 2010. As a co-angler, the 35-year-old Florida angler ranked first in the FLW Series Eastern Division (now Walmart Opens) and was 13th in the EverStart Series. In the Walmart Bass Fishing League, he wound up in 11th place in the boater division.