CLEWISTON, Fla. – David Fritts of Lexington, N.C., got off to a fast start Saturday, landing five bass weighing 17 pounds in the first two hours of competition to win $100,000 cash in the Wal-Mart FLW Tour season opener on Lake Okeechobee.
“I needed this. I didn’t think I had enough to win,” said Fritts, who became the only angler to win four FLW Tour events. “I tried everything but had success with an old wooden crankbait that I was throwing. I had my limit by 8:30 this morning.”
In 10 FLW Tour top 10 appearances, Fritts has won four times. His first three FLW Tour wins came in 1997. The win also boosted him to second place on the all-time money winner’s list with $481,000. Only Rick Clunn of Ava, Mo., has earned more money on the FLW Tour. He has $682,600 in career earnings.
Fritts qualified for the semifinal round of 10 competitors in 10th place with a two-day total of nine bass weighing 26 pounds, 6 ounces. He then advanced to the five-man final round in second place after landing five bass weighing 20 pounds, 14 ounces Friday.
All week Fritts, who is known in fishing circles as the “Crankbait King,” was able to cull quality bass from Lake Okeechobee despite low water levels that left many of the tournament’s 350 competitors looking for the right combination of lures and locations. A cold front earlier in the week caused many bass to move off the flats into relatively deep water.
Second place and $35,000 in the tournament presented by EverStart went to Kevin VanDam of Kalamazoo, Mich., who caught five bass weighing 16 pounds, 1 ounce during the final round. Kim Stricker of Howell, Mich., took third place and $20,000 with four bass weighing 12 pounds, 6 ounces, while Mark Hardin of Canton, Ga., finished fourth and collected $16,000 with five bass weighing 12 pounds, 6 ounces. Kelley Williamson of Purdy, Mo., earned $14,000 for his fifth-place showing of two bass weighing 4 pounds, 3 ounces.
Williamson won the Energizer “Keeps on Going” award for the greatest comeback during the event. He fought back from 34th place on opening day to qualify for the final round.
The $500,000 tournament began Wednesday with 350 hopeful anglers from 34 states competing in two divisions, pro and co-angler. Andrew Arnold of Princeton, Ky., won a year’s supply of CITGO gasoline and $15,000 cash Friday as the Co-Angler Division champion. He caught one bass weighing 5 pounds, 3 ounces during the final co-angler round, but it was enough for the victory.
A total of 51 five-bass limits were caught during the four-day competition. Nearly 100 percent of the 1,069 bass weighed in were released alive, including the tournament’s biggest bass, a 9-pound, 10-ounce largemouth caught on opening day by 1999 Angler of the Year David Walker of Cannon, Ky.
If Operation Bass, the world’s premier tournament organization, maintains at least a 98 percent live release rate throughout the 2001 season, Energizer will donate $25,000 to the Children’s Miracle Network.
The next stop on the seven-event, $4.4 million Wal-Mart FLW Tour is Feb. 14-17 on the Pascagoula River near D’Iberville, Miss. The tournament will feature another $500,000 purse.