On the weekend of March 23-24, Sinclair Marina in Milledgeville hosted the Toyota Series and Falcon Bass Boat-sponsored pro, Brian Latimer, his Straight Up Fishing (SUF) school, and his SUF Classic tournament. It was a well-attended event with a lot of fun and good food.
Brian uses his SUF school and tournament for a unique purpose … to teach beginners how to fish. True beginners. I met people that day who had just started fishing a year ago, and all because they had seen Brian on YouTube or because of something that led them to find this sport so many of us love so much.
Brian gave back-to-basics lessons with humor and an understanding of how not to talk down to people. He was funny, informative, and engaging to all present, and to those viewing on his SUF site (sufschool.com). And refreshingly, in this day and time, he didn’t try and sell everyone tens of thousands of dollars worth of gear!
At one point he even had the gall to say you only need a strait tail worm! The audacity! I know I went home and apologized to all 200 lbs of plastics in my boat that evening for even being in attendance.
Your intrepid outdoor writer was fortunate to be able to work with Brian and his team on this event. Let me tell you, I have been watching Brian for years on social media and YouTube and he was even more fun in person and to talk to than he is online, and that takes some doing!
And I learned this about Brian: he views this as a mission and is truly passionate about teaching. He’s also just as big a fishing nerd as the rest of us! Matt Henry, Brian, and I spent hours one-day discussing old baits, the history of sonar tech in fishing, and the future of it all. In short, we just geeked out.
The school took place on Saturday and the tournament was on Sunday that weekend. It was a virtual tournament with a catch, photo, and release format for 80 anglers who qualified through the tournament season to fish the event. It was the second time Brian had held this tournament series and classic, with his last championship held on Lake Hartwell, where a young man named Bradford Van Denmark won.
Well, in 2024 he repeated this feat in the incredibly muddy waters of Lake Sinclair, proving Bradford is about as versatile a fisherman as you can get!
Bradford’s key baits that weekend were a ½-oz Z-Man Fishing Products Evo Chatterbait fished on the lower section of Lake Sinclair. He also noted using a hand-painted jerk bait as well. Bradford earned $5,000 in gear for winning the SUF championship, which includes a brand new Brooklyn Kayak Company PK12, MotorGuide Xi3 Kayak trolling motor, and $1,200 in fishing gear from ShopBlat.
In other news, Lake Oconee Striper Club member Chad Womack landed a 25-lb striper last weekend in Capt. Doug Nelms’ Derby. Now correct me if I’m wrong here, folks, but I am not aware of a bigger striper coming out of Oconee in the last 25 years, much less in the Derby!
Chad is an extremely dedicated striper angler and does more to catch, keep, and use gizzard shad, shad, and other live bait than anyone I know. The man is a mad scientist and a solid all-around guy to boot. So, here’s a big tip of the hat to Chad. And folks, this is a HUGE striper for our area, so that should motivate y’all to go out and wet a line!
Tight lines and following seas, y’all.