From the Bass Pro Tour to the Phoenix Bass Fishing League to Abu Garcia High School and College Fishing, Table Rock Lake has hosted events at every level of MLF competition. It’s also served as the playing field for four FLW Tour events, the 2016 TBF National Championship and the 2021 Bass Pro Shops U.S. Open, a team tournament for amateur anglers in which the winning tandem earned $1 million.
All that to say, Table Rock has a rich tournament tradition. But one thing the southwest Missouri reservoir has never hosted is a tour championship. No REDCREST, no Forrest Wood Cup, no Bassmaster Classic.
That will change next spring. Major League Fishing announced Wednesday that Table Rock will represent the playing field for REDCREST 2026, to be held April 17-19.
The championship event will both show off the robust bass population living in Table Rock on its biggest stage yet and offer visitors a chance to experience the beautiful, history-rich Ozark region. The Bass Pro Shops headquarters campus in nearby Springfield, Missouri, will be home to a fresh twist on the three-day REDCREST Outdoor Sports Expo in an open-air, tented setting.
Largemouth, smallmouth and spots – oh my
Across his unparalleled pro career, Kevin VanDam has fished just about every waterway in the country that regularly hosts tournaments. He estimates he’s spent more time on Table Rock than any other lake, and he believes it’s overdue to host its first tour championship.
“With my relationship with Bass Pro Shops and Nitro, I’ve spent for sure more days on the water at Table Rock than any other tournament-type body of water in the country,” VanDam said. “It’s a really awesome lake, and especially for that time of the year.”
VanDam identified a few factors that make Table Rock unique. For one, it’s one of the only fisheries in the country where anglers can expect to catch all three black bass species – largemouth, smallmouth and spotted bass – on a given day. Add in the fact that Table Rock is a sprawling playing field comprised of three different river arms with myriad habitat options, and VanDam thinks it will make for a dynamic event.
“It won’t be the Top 10 guys all doing the same thing,” he said. “You’re going to see a really big mix of techniques, locations and patterns.”
Shane Bush, a fisheries biologist for the Missouri Department of Conservation who manages Table Rock, echoed VanDam’s prediction that all three species of bass should be well represented on SCORETRACKER® during REDCREST. He said the fishery’s spotted bass population “is at an all-time high right now.” Meanwhile, the number of quality largemouth has been steadily trending upward.
“We had some high-water events, most recently in 2020 and 2021, which has equated to some really big year classes of largemouth bass being in the system right now,” Bush said. “They should be, next year, in that 17- to 18-inch range. So, I would foresee there being good numbers of 2- to 4-pound bass.”
Pick your pattern
Both Bush and VanDam noted that Table Rock is ideally suited for the Bass Pro Tour’s every-fish-counts format. While the lake has been known to yield the occasional lunker, it’s typically a fishery where weights in the teens win five-fish events for much of the year. However, on a good day, pros might catch 50-plus bass over 2 pounds.
“Especially with the format, with every fish counts, and having the diversity that the lake has and having all three species and a really great population of all three, there’s going to be a ton of strategy to put up a game plan that’s going to put you there in contention on the Championship Day,” VanDam said.
VanDam and Bush highlighted the variety of patterns that can produce on Table Rock, especially in mid-April. Bush expects lots of bass to either be spawning or close to it – anglers will likely be able to find some fish on beds in the upper reaches of the creeks and river arms, while those in the clearer main portion of the reservoir are more likely to be staging in preparation for the spawn.
“I’d expect a lot of shallow fish during that time all throughout the lake,” Bush said. “The river arms will start first with the spawning. The water temperatures will warm up first in the James and the Kings rivers, and then the main-lake sections, down by the dam in the clearer water, those fish will spawn a little bit later there. So, if anglers are looking for shallow fish, they’ll want to go in the river arms to find those that time of year.”
As a result, expect to see a wide range of techniques. Some pros might sight-fish or flip and pitch for spawners. Others could target bass staging around transition banks or the lake’s many brushpiles (Bush said MDC has planted more than 900 piles in the lake and refurbished most of them two years ago). Think Ozark staples like jigs, jerkbaits and crankbaits.
Table Rock has also earned a reputation as one of the nation’s top fisheries to target suspended bass with forward-facing sonar, and that bite will surely be there – although given the Bass Pro Tour’s rule limiting forward-facing sonar use to one period each day, anglers will have to mix in other approaches, too.
“You can fish your strength there, because it’s got a population of all three species, and it’s very diverse in habitat,” VanDam said. “If you’re looking for stained water, you can go up the creeks or the major tributaries and fish shallow for largemouth, and that can be a player that time of the year. But on the lower lake, there’s lots of deep timber, and forward-facing sonar will play a big role in that. And you can also just go down the bank and power fish, too, throwing a crankbait or fishing a jerkbait.”
Attractions for the whole family
The Ozarks region isn’t only a prime destination because of the bass swimming in Table Rock. The area is rich with family-friendly attractions and bass fishing history. Fans taking in REDCREST in person will be able to find both in Springfield, the site of the first Bass Pro Shops location and current home of “the granddaddy of all outdoor stores” (the Bass Pro Shops national headquarters), the Wonders of Wildlife National Museum and Aquarium and the Bass Fishing Hall of Fame.
“There’s so many people that have had a huge impact on the history of our sport from that region, and it’s all based around those lakes – Bull Shoals, Table Rock and Beaver Lake,” VanDam said. “There’s a lot of history there.”
The first REDCREST on Table Rock will add a new chapter to that history.