Chapter 18 - Eleven Ounces
Final day began with ten anglers.
No forward-facing sonar.
No live communication except tournament safety.
Five fish.
One million dollars.
Eli trailed Marcus Vale by eleven ounces.
Victor Kane still stood on the tournament stage because lawyers had not yet charged him with anything. His company’s name still hung above the marina. His face still appeared on banners.
But the crowd booed when he walked out.
Victor pretended not to hear.
At takeoff, Marcus pulled alongside Eli’s boat.
“May the second-best man lose,” Marcus called.
Eli smiled. “Planning to?”
Marcus laughed and accelerated away.
The first three hours were brutal.
Bluebird sky followed the storm. Wind vanished. Water clarity improved. Fish that had fed aggressively the previous day became cautious.
Eli started with a jerkbait over a point.
No bites.
He dragged a football jig across rock.
Nothing.
He tried a Carolina rig.
One short fish.
Ryan, watching from the official media boat, could do nothing.
By 10 a.m., Marcus had three keepers.
Eli had zero.
Social media turned again.
The old man’s run was over.
At 10:17, Eli stopped fishing.
He sat down and ate half a peanut-butter sandwich.
A camera operator asked, “Everything okay?”
“Best sandwich I’ve had today.”
The operator stared.
Eli looked at the water.
Dragonflies hovered near shoreline grass.
Bluegill popped under shaded docks.
A turtle climbed onto a log.
The lake had gone quiet after days of chaos.
Eli smiled.
He ran shallow.
At the first dock, he tied on a wacky-rigged stick worm with no added weight.
Long cast.
Slow fall.
His line ticked.
Two-pound keeper.
Next dock, nothing.
Third dock, three pounds.
He changed to a Neko rig when fish held closer to bottom and needed a more nose-down presentation.
Third keeper.
Then fourth.
At noon, he still needed a fifth.
Marcus had a limit estimated near sixteen pounds.
Eli had twelve.
He entered a narrow pocket where overhanging trees created deep shade.
The water was only three feet deep.
Eli saw a single swirl beneath a branch.
He smiled.
“Shadow-Line Drift,” he whispered.
There were no grasshoppers on his coat this time.
He used a small weightless soft-plastic insect imitation, placed it beyond the shade seam, and let it drift naturally.
A bass sucked it under with almost no splash.
Five pounds.
Now he had seventeen.
At 2 p.m., unofficial estimates put him and Marcus nearly tied.
Both needed upgrades.
Marcus caught a four-pounder on a deep crankbait deflected off rock.
Eli responded with a four-and-a-half on a swim jig beside reeds.
The gap became impossible to calculate reliably.
With twenty minutes left, Eli’s high-end spinning reel failed. The bail spring snapped while he was trying to skip a finesse bait beneath a dock.
He grabbed another rod.
The line had been damaged earlier.
He cut ten yards off and retied.
Too slow.
Time disappeared.
A small spectator boat idled beyond the boundary. Caleb stood in it with Jenna.
He held up his taped twenty-dollar rod.
Eli laughed.
Tournament rules prohibited receiving equipment once competition began.
But the rod lying on Eli’s deck was one Caleb had given him before takeoff that morning as a joke.
“Emergency stick,” Caleb had said.
Eli had tagged it during equipment inspection.
Now he picked it up.
The cheap reel squeaked.
The rod blank was heavy.
Ryan, watching from the media boat, covered his mouth.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
Eli tied on a simple Texas-rigged worm with a light weight.
Seven minutes remained.
He pitched to a dock post.
Nothing.
Five minutes.
Second post.
Nothing.
Three minutes.
He saw one tiny flick of a bluegill beside an old ladder.
Eli pitched past it and let the worm fall along the metal rung.
The line stopped before the bait should have reached bottom.
Eli did not set the hook.
He reeled slowly.
Felt weight.
Then struck.
The cheap rod bent to the handle.
A bass surged beneath the dock.
Eli dropped the rod tip into the water to change the line angle and keep it from rubbing a bolt.
The fish turned.
He pulled it into open water.
Two minutes.
The bass jumped.
Five pounds or more.
One minute.
Eli landed it with both hands.
At the weigh-in, Marcus went first.
Twenty pounds, two ounces.
Tournament total: seventy-six pounds, ten ounces.
The crowd roared.
Eli walked onto the stage carrying his bag.
Victor stood beside the scale.
For the first time all week, he looked nervous.
Eli’s fish weighed twenty-one pounds, two ounces.
Tournament total:
Seventy-six pounds, eleven ounces.
One ounce.
For several seconds, nobody seemed to understand.
Then the marina exploded.
Ryan jumped the barrier.
Marcus laughed and grabbed Eli in a hug.
Caleb screamed from the crowd.
Eli stood motionless, eyes closed.
One ounce.
Twenty-five years.
Victor leaned near him.
“You think this fixes anything?”
Eli opened his eyes.
“No.”
He looked at the giant check.
“But it’s a start.”
At one point during the final, Eli lost a four-pound fish beside the boat when it jumped and threw the hook. He did not curse. He immediately checked the lure.
One treble point had rolled slightly after striking rock.
He replaced the hook.
The camera operator asked, “That calm after losing a fish that big—is that experience?”
“No,” Eli said. “That’s practice pretending I’m calm.”
He explained that sharp hooks mattered more than brand loyalty, especially with treble-hook baits where penetration could be shallow. He tested points lightly against a fingernail; if a point slid instead of catching, it needed sharpening or replacing.
Later, while fighting the last bass on Caleb’s cheap rod, Eli used the rod’s softer bend instead of overpowering it. The inexpensive blank lacked the crisp sensitivity of his premium gear, but once the fish was hooked, the softer action absorbed surges well.
Ryan understood the point immediately.
Cheap did not mean useless.
Expensive did not mean automatic.
May you like
A skilled angler adjusted to the tool in hand.
When Eli finally placed that fish in the livewell, he added fresh water circulation and checked its condition before racing back. Winning mattered. Bringing healthy fish to the scale mattered too.
