Brake and Fore earn Mercury Team-of-the-Year Honors
By Steve Weisman
GNWC Publicity Director

A fourth place finish by the team of Ron Brake and Jeff Fore from Petersburg on the Mississippi River at Albany on Sunday, June 8 earned them the title of Mercury Team-of-the-Year in the Illinois Circuit of the Grand National Walleye Cup (GNWC).

GNWC Tournament Director Dean Higgins praised the year-long efforts of Brake and Fore. "They were consistent throughout the season. They recorded a first, second and fourth place finish to sew up the title with 25 points. Congratulations on a great effort." Second place in the Team-of-the-Year race went to Bob and Jason Schine with 29 points. They took fifth place at Albany.

Winning the Albany qualifier and a check for $1000 was the team of Scott Roehlk and Jim Bonjour from Davenport with a six-fish limit weighing 18.09 pounds. Roehlk and Timmons also took home the Abu Garcia Big Fish Award and two Abu Garcia Linecounter reels for their 4.19 pound walleye.

Second place and a check for $125 went to Mike Heller from Clive and Rob Roush from Des Moines for their six-fish limit weighing 10.16 pounds.

Taking third place and also the Berkley Family Angler Award of $250 in Berkley product was the team of Mica Killinger and Steven Killinger from Hillsdale.

"It was really exciting to see the numbers and the quality of fish taken by the GNWC teams today. The real key was variety. We had fish taken on jigs, cranks, and live bait rigs. Fishing had been slow for the last couple of weeks, but these guys found ways to trigger the fish," added Higgins.

The winning team struck early and took most of their fish in the morning by trolling Wally Divers in 7-9 foot of water along sandy rock banks 2-3 miles downstream from the Albany Boat Ramp.

Heller and Rousch, meanwhile, fished the clam beds, trolling chartreuse and crawdad colored Fat Raps in 7-9 foot of water.

The Killingers fished only a few hundred yards from the weigh-in site and used a different presentation to catch each of their fish. One came on a crankbait, a second on a jig and the third on a leech rig.

The excitement continues to build on the Illinois Circuit with the Illinois State Championships on July 12-13 at Evergreen Lake. Evergreen Lake is one of the premiere saugeye fisheries in the Midwest, and the Illinois state record has been broken there twice in the last year. "We will be putting the final touches on the State Championship in the next week or so, and we will get the itinerary out to the media as soon as possible. It's going to be an exciting two-day tournament, and we invite people to come to the weigh-ins each day of the State Championships," noted Higgins.

Anglers can call 1-800-890-3474, email the GNWC at info@walleyecup.com or check out the official GNWC website at walleyecup.com for all of the latest in GNWC information in not only Illinois, but also in Iowa, Minnesota, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Major sponsoring partners for the GNWC include Ranger Boats, Mercury Outboards, Berkley, Abu-Garcia, The Sportsman Channel and UpNorthOutdoors.com.

Television viewers who do not have The Sportsman Channel and want to watch the GNWC's television series Walleye Wisdom, are encouraged to call their cable company or satellite television provider and ask them to include it in their package.