So hot it Burns

With help from an 8-pound, 2-ouncer, Rob Burns takes TTT Championship victory by a mile

KILLEEN, Texas – They say in Texas, everything is bigger. Therefore it is fitting that Rob Burns of Plano won the 2006 Wal-Mart Texas Tournament Trail Championship on a very tough Lake Stillhouse by a whopping 5-pound, 5-ounce margin, and with a stringer that included a monster 8-pound, 2-ounce bass.

Burns ended day one in the No. 4 spot with 12 pounds, 13 ounces, just a little under 2 pounds out of the lead. Sunday he brought in the heaviest stringer of the tournament by a mile, a 22-pound, 15-ounce limit that vaulted him past day-one leader Robert Collett and into the record books. When the dust settled, Burns’ two-day weight totaled 35 pounds, 12 ounces and earned him $15,000 cash for the win, $20,000 in Ranger contingency money and a fully rigged Ranger boat valued at $40,000.

Burns’ first career FLW Outdoors victory is also his first top-10 finish, and it fell into place because the conditions – tough for most everyone else – played right to his strengths.

“I didn’t necessarily expect to win,” he said. “I knew it would set up to what I excel in. I’m a crankbait fisherman. If we get in competition with that, I’m usually pretty good.”

Burns, who had never before fished Lake Stillhouse until he qualified for this event, began prefishing four weeks ago. A resident of the Dallas area, he made the six- to seven-hour round-trip drive once a week to practice and then prefished the two days preceding the actual event.

“I found what I was doing prefishing,” he said. “It was consistent. But I never caught anything close to what I had today.”

Indeed, Burns said that up until today’s 8-pound behemoth, the biggest Stillhouse bass he’d brought in probably tipped the scales at around 6 pounds. Knowing the big ones were there to be had – the general consensus this weekend is that the lake has not shown its true colors – he remarked to a TV cameraman that it was time for him to catch a big fish. Not 15 minutes later, he had an 8-pounder in the boat.

That one and pretty much all 10 of the bass he weighed in yesterday and today were caught on a DD-22 crankbait – his specialty. But even with his impressive winning weight, Burns admits that like most of the rest of the field, Stillhouse was a challenging venue for him yesterday. But that was yesterday. Today was an entirely different story.

“Yesterday was tough,” he said. “I came in with an OK amount. I had three solid fish yesterday and then they stopped. They were biting today. That first hydrilla point I fished, I loaded up the boat. That was 7:30 this morning. Then it was kind of slow.”

Later in the afternoon, Burns returned to the submerged hydrilla and caught the big one.

“I knew then that I should have it,” he said of the victory.

Burns said his prolific hydrilla point was found in 16 to 22 feet of water.

“That’s the depth I was looking for,” he said.

Burns was a TTT rookie in 2006 and entered the championship by finishing 44th in year-end points standings. The owner of a roofing company by day, Burns hopes to continue his burgeoning TTT and Stren Series career in 2007.

Collett improves weight but falls to second

Robert Collett of Zapata led day one with a 14-pound, 10-ounce stringer and even improved that weight today, bringing in another five that weighed 15 pounds, 13 ounces for a two-day total of 30 pounds, 7 ounces. That should have been plenty enough to win this tournament, but with Burns’ atypically awesome day, Collett settled for second place.

Even though his weight was heavier on day two, Collett said conditions were actually more favorable for him Saturday.

“Yesterday when I fished, things went really good because I had a north wind,” he said. “Today, with the wind out of the south, I couldn’t make the long casts. It got tough. We struggled until about noon, and then the fish turned on for us.”

Collett was throwing a Texas-rigged Senko with a 3/16-ounce weight. For him, the key was deep grass ledges.

“All the fish I found, any quality fish, were all deep,” he said, noting most of them came in 22 to 24 feet of water. “The shallowest was 12 feet.”

Like Burns, this was the first experience Collett had with Lake Stillhouse. For his second-place finish, he took home $6,000 cash plus $5,000 in contingency money.

Griffin takes third with another limit

Chad Griffin of Cresson slid into third place with a two-day total catch of 10 bass that weighed 27 pounds, 5 ounces. Yesterday’s No. 2 pro also improved his weight, going from 12-15 on day one to 14-6 on day two. For Griffin, that was a bit of a miracle.

“The fishing got tough this afternoon,” he said. “I caught my last keeper with 10 minutes left.”

Griffin was primarily dragging a Carolina rig in 20 to 23 feet of water, targeting isolated grass patches. He also caught fish dragging a 1 1/2-ounce Ezee jig.

“Today they were there, just not eating,” Griffin said. “I went running around practicing and fortunately caught a big one.”

Griffin earned $4,500 cash plus an additional $4,000 in Ranger contingency cash.

Combs, Herron score top-five finishes

Taking fourth is Temple’s Keith Combs with a two-day weight totaling 25 pounds, 14 ounces. He followed his day-one, 12-pound, 11-ounce catch with a day-two limit that weighed 13 pounds, 3 ounces. He earned $3,500 plus a $3,000 Ranger bonus for his fourth-place finish.

“I just had to fish a lot of areas that weren’t getting fished,” Combs said. “I chose techniques most people used – flipping grass. That was the key for me.”

Behind him in fifth is Michael Herron of Paris with 22 pounds, 12 ounces of bass over two days. Those fish earned Herron $2,500 plus another $2,250 in Ranger contingency money.

Herron was another top finisher whose day-two weight was an improvement, as he brought in 10-8 yesterday and followed that up today with a limit weighing 12 pounds, 4 ounces.

Rest of the best

Rounding out the top 10 pros at the TTT Championship:

6th: Dean Alexander, Florence, Texas, 10 bass, 20-5, $1,550

7th: Tim Reneau, Seguin, Texas, nine bass, 20-2, $1,150 plus $1,850 Ranger bonus

8th: Jacky Roberts, Georgetown, Texas, nine bass, 20-0, $750 plus $1,750 Ranger bonus

9th: Trent Huckaby, Fort Stockton, Texas, nine bass, 18-12, $600 plus $1,650 Ranger bonus

10th: D.L. (Bobby) Maynard, Eastland, Texas, seven bass, 18-3, $450 plus $1,550 Ranger bonus