Omori Rides 1-2 Punch of Buzzbait, Beaver to Elimination Round 3 Win

MOUNTAIN HOME, Ark. – Elimination Round 3 of the 2020 Lucas Oil Challenge Cup Presented by B&W Trailer Hitches on Bull Shoals Lake featured something you don’t see every day. Takahiro Omori dominated the first two periods, and decided to call it a day and skip the final frame.

His lead was big enough that he still won the round by over 7 pounds, thanks to a productive buzzbait and flipping pattern in Periods 1 and 2.

A Buzzbait & Beaver 1-2 Punch

With no practice for the event and the water being over 20-feet higher than usual, Omori said he started the morning by just going fishing.

“There was so much junk in the water: bushes, trees and bank grass,” he observed. “I just started going down the bank in the back of a creek with a buzzbait, targeting anything I saw in the water.”

Omori fished water less than 5 feet deep with a homemade buzzbait with a white Zoom Horny Toad. He fished it on his signature series 7-foot medium-heavy Daiwa Tatula Elite composite rod that he paired with a 9.0:1 Daiwa Zillion reel spooled with 45-pound Sunline Braid.

Omori said that the buzzbait bite died after the first period, and he switched to a flipping, pitching, and punching pattern.

“I moved back out toward the middle section of the creek and pitched trees and bushes,” he said. “Fish were in less than 5 feet of water, and with it being so clear, the fish were suspending near the tops of the trees.”

Omori’s bait of choice was a black-and-blue Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver that he rigged on a 4/0 Gamakatsu EWG Hook. He selected a 3/4-ounce tungsten weight and said it helped him punch through the cover.

“The bushes were green and hard to get through, so the heavy weight was needed,” he said.

Omori fished the rig on a 7-3 heavy Daiwa Tatula Elite rod with the same reel that he used for his buzzbait.

Looking back at the day, Omori said that he caught more fish flipping and pitching, and late in Period 2, he knew he would have enough to advance.

“I called it a day when we finished the period because I didn’t want to be seen,” he admitted. “The guys were starting to move around and look for areas, and I didn’t want to give them any clues to what I was doing.”

Lane Cracks the Code

Bobby Lane ended the day in second place, but his day started poorly before he figured out a productive pattern and made his move toward the top.

“I started off fishing a channel swing for fish that were suspending over 60 to 80-feet of water,” Lane said. “I caught a couple of fish early on the Berkley WakeBull wakebait, but that’s not my strength. After that, I ran to the bank and caught one more and then didn’t get a bite.”

At that point in the day, Lane was near the bottom of the pack but figured something out: “I found a point with deep brush and dropped into it and immediately caught one. That’s when I cracked the code and hit every point, fishing the way I love to fish.”

Lane was targeting deep trees on the old bank of Bull Shoals.

“I was seeing some of the trees on my Lowrance units and dropping right into them,” said Lane, who added that his boat was sitting in as deep as 25 feet of water.

He stuck with a Berkley PowerBait MaxScent Creature Hawg in green pumpkin and switched to Black Blue Fleck when it got cloudy. He rigged it on a 4/0 Berkley Fusion19 Flipping Hook and utilized a 1/2-ounce Flat Out Tungsten weight.

His gear of choice was a 7-6 heavy Abu Garcia Veracity with a 10.1:1 REVO Rocket that he spooled with 20-pound Berkley Trilene 100% Fluorocarbon.

“Once I figured it out, it went from a miserable day to a great day,” Lane said. “There’s no better feeling as a professional angler than to have a day where you are last and move up and advance to the next round.”