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 After leading the tournament for the first two days, Bill Shimota hung on to capture the first place prize of a brand new Ranger 621 powered by Evinrude, valued at $45,000.00!
On the co angler side, Mike Eiden, of New Haven, IN will be taking home the G-3 V185F aluminum boat, powered by a Yamaha motor.
The suspense of the final weigh-in started with the number 10 qualifier crossing the stage. With Shimota taking his place in the “hot seat”, it soon became apparent the tough bite the anglers faced all week was continuing on the final day.
There was little change in the standings until Don Marx, who started the day in third place, along with his co angler, Eldon Olson, took the lead when they weighed in the only 5 fish limit of the day, with a basket weighing in at 8.9 pounds.
Taking over the “hot seat”, Don anxiously waited while the last two anglers crossed the stage. Marx had been fishing in pool 16 also, but was long line trolling with 6# test Fireline, with jointed Shad Raps in natural colors. “Shad” was his best producer.
“I’m pretty nervous”, said Marx. “It would be great to win a new Ranger”!
Up next was Dan Krukow, who said he was just happy to be in the top ten considering he had only caught three fish the entire week he was here prefishing. He brought two fish to the scales, but would fall short of the lead by a little over three pounds, and land in third place. Dan was fishing in pool 16, using 18# leadcore with a 14# test mono lead, running jointed Shad Raps. Firetiger was said to be his best color.
Last, but not least, was young Bill Shimota, who at 27 years old, already has a win under his belt from the 2007 FLW Walleye League event at Bemidji, MN earlier this summer, along with top twenty five finish’s in the other two events held in Minnesota.
Bill brought his fish up to the stage in the black “National Guard Leader Bag”, so no one could see what he had. Don Marx was asked to stand next to him on the stage while Bill pulled his fish, one by one out of the sack. Bill would need just a little over 5 pounds to win it all.
The first fish was a skinny little 15 incher that went just over a pound. The second fish Bill lifted was a little bigger, and would add another pound and a half. The crowd started to make some noise…as he reached in for the third fish, he splashed around making the crowd think that he may not have anymore fish to put on the scale, but he finally produced a nice 2 plus pound fish. He would need one more fish to take the lead and win the tournament!
As the FLW Tournament Director, Kevin Hunt, talked to the audience and explained what Bill needed to win, Bill picked up a towel and started to dry his hands off. “Are you drying your hands off, because you don’t have anymore fish?” Kevin asked, “or do you have one more in there you can show us?”
Bill smiled and said, “I’ve got one more!”….the crowd erupted in cheers!
Bill pulled out a nice fat 21 inch Sauger that would put him 2.3 pounds over second place finisher, Don Marx.
Bill Shimota was fishing in pool 16, and was handlining with Rapala Original Floaters, in 10-15 foot of water. “I didn’t have any specific color working for me…you just had to put the lure in front of their faces. I had a series of dunes, right on the channel edge that held the most fish, and that’s where I got the majority of them today”, he said.
“What does this win mean to you?” asked Kevin Hunt. “Winning the new Ranger will allow me to fish the Tour level next year, I think. We’ll have to wait and see, but that’s what I really want to do”, said Shimota.
Join us here on Walleye Central again September 27th-30th for live coverage of the WalMart FLW Walleye Tour Championship in Cleveland, Ohio.
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