Wind isn’t relenting for RCL Tour finals at Devils Lake
DEVILS LAKE, N.D. – First, in the bad-news department out of the Wal-Mart RCL Walleye Tour event on Devils Lake: High winds have been strafing the lake for more than two days. Now, for the worse news: Thunderstorms are forecast by late morning.
That’s why the 10 finalists hope to get the fish early in spots with relative calm.
Going to the well one more time is leader Rick Walter of Casper, Wyo., who plans to return to a protected bay on Pelican Lake, a lake flooded with Devils rising waters, where he has fished eight hours over the first three days – Walter catches them there that quickly.
“I’m going to die in that spot today,” Walter says, “but I’m not keeping anything under 21 inches before 10 o’clock.”
And while the weather has thrown the game plans of other competitors into disarray – or eliminated them during the semifinals – Walter has some protection from the prairie gusts and hope for a victory.
“I think [the wind] will make it better, because the bay is out of the wind,” Walter says. “It was pretty good yesterday, and the wind has been the same.”
Seeking shelter after abandoning his top spot, Lund pro Mark Courts of Harris, Minn., is headed for a bay protected from the south winds. There, in keeping with his M.O. over the last three days, Courts plans to slip bobber.
“I’m going to a calm spot,” Courts says.
Then again, another pro, John Campbell of Marco Island, Fla., will have to hatch a plan all over again.
“I don’t have any 55-mph wind spots,” says Campbell, who finished sixth in the semifinals. “I don’t know where I’m going to go. Yesterday I made it to Pelican first thing in the morning, but I barely made it back.”
In Saturday’s finals, making it back, particularly with the storms forecast, is every bit as important as making it there. That’s another reason to get there and get your fish early.
The final-day weigh-in starts at 3 p.m. at the Wal-Mart, 210 Highway 2 West, in Devils Lake.
Saturday’s conditions
Sunrise: 5:35 a.m.
Temperature at takeoff: 68 degrees
Expected high temperature: mid-80s
Water temperature: 70-75 degrees
Wind: south at 18 mph
Relative humidity: 64 percent
Day’s outlook: partly cloudy; scattered thunderstorms from late morning on into afternoon; some of them may be severe
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