5 Life Lessons From Championship Bass Fishermen

"“It’s all about quick decisions.”"

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I arrived in Mooresville, North Carolina, to attend a bass-fishing tournament sponsored by Toyota (who was also the gracious host of my trip). I was, pun intended, a fish out of water, having barely touched a rod or a reel since I was about 7 years old, when I caught an eight-inch-long baby shark off a bridge in Cape Cod. (I couldn’t understand why my folks wouldn’t let me take it home and keep it in the bathtub as a pet.) So I had a lot of questions: What exactly was bass tournament fishing? Was it a lazy, lounge-y sport, involving snoozing under a tree with your toe tied to a line? Were the fishermen grizzled, wise old-timers with bait pinned to their straw hats?

As it turns out, bass angling is nothing like what I expected. It’s actually a high-tech sport involving incredibly fast boats (that go up to 70 mph), cool gadgets like portable sonar devices, crash helmets instead of straw hats, lots of physical endurance (you try standing on a boat casting lines for five hours in a row) and a whole lot of deep strategizing about just where the fish are going to be and how to lure them in. And they’re not old-timers -- most of them are in their 30s or 40s. 

But one of my assumptions did turn out to be accurate: They had a lot of wisdom to share, and their tips on fishing were surprisingly universal. You can apply them to all aspects of life, from love to business. Here’s some of the best life lessons I learned from America’s top bass anglers.

1. Be nimble

Kevin VanDam, aka KVD, arguably the top bass angler of all time (he’s won more money than any other pro fisherman and possesses four Bassmaster Classic titles), never stays in one place for too long. “Move around a lot,” he advises, if the fish aren’t biting. New Jersey-based champion angler Michael Iaconelli agrees: “It’s all about quick decisions.” It’s easy to get stuck in a rut, in angling and in life. The key is to know when to point your boat in another direction and find a new spot."

2. Don’t get caught up in the dock talk

We managed to overhear a conversation between KVD and an amateur fisherman who approached him for advice, and this was a point he emphasized strongly. “Dock talk” refers to the gossip and chatter that seems to surround every fishing event. In fishing, as in any high-pressure moment in life, it’s easy to get caught up in the opinions, the hypotheticals and the maybes. Go with your instincts and your strategy, and don’t worry about what other people think. Next Page >>