COLUMBIA, South Carolina – Although all 24 anglers competing in the 2018 Challenge Select expect to fare well in the fisheries around Columbia, South Carolina, at least one of them is putting a little extra pressure on himself to win: Iron Cross pro Fred Roumbanis.

The California native has a little history to back that up. Roumbanis took home an Elite trophy on Murray in 2008, and was the tournament leader for two days in an Elite tournament that fellow MLF competitor Casey Ashley won in 2011.

“Man, I don’t know what it is about this area, but it’s a magical place to me,” Roumbanis admits.

Roumbanis’ 2008 win on Murray occurred in mid-May, when blueback herring patterns in the bottom end of the lake dominate. He had entered the week expecting to capitulate, and was prepared to stick it out in the lower end with topwaters and a drop-shot. That plan went out the window almost immediately.

“That tournament was almost like an MLF situation for me,” Roumbanis says. “I had located an 8-pound largemouth on a bed the last day of practice, but this gnarly storm rolled in that night and muddied the water up, and I spent the first three hours of Day 1 trying to locate that fish. I never did see her, so I ended up going into a mad scramble up the Little Saluda. Just like MLF, I had never even seen that water before. I was just trying to make something work. I ended up finding a little pocket of grass, caught one on a frog, and just rode that the rest of the tournament.”

Heading into the Challenge Select, Roumbanis is hopeful that MLF executive producer Randy White has chosen Lake Murray as one of the competition venues for the event’s Elimination Rounds.

“Randy is just so cagey about that, we might not fish anywhere near Lake Murray,” Roumbanis admits. “But I’d be pretty happy if we did, and not just because I’ve won there. Murray is a lake where you can dial in a pattern, and then cover a lot of water with that pattern. I think it would be perfect for the MLF format.”