Patrick Walters' 1st Place Breakdown | Lake Murray

Techniques and Strategies Used

For recent Lake Murray champion Patrick Walters, timing was the key to his success. Patrick emphasizes the importance of knowing when to stay and when to move, using the Omnia Pro app to study lake conditions and strategize his approach. By examining water temperature, clarity, and wind conditions, he was able to identify the most productive areas of the lake.

Key Baits and Lures

Patrick relied on a 1-2 punch approach, primarily using a topwater bait and the Zoom Super Fluke. The Zoom Super Fluke proved to be highly effective on the herring fishery at Lake Murray, catching the majority of his weight. He also utilized a Carolina rig with a Zoom Brush Hog to target specific areas before moving on.

Video Transcript

Alright y'all, Patrick Walters here. We got the dub last week at Lake Murray here in Columbia, South Carolina. It was really great. We caught a ton of fish and ended up with 93 pounds and some change from start to finish. What a great week. I think the biggest key to my success last week was probably my timing. When to stay, when to go. The whole lake kind of fished okay in practice. It was actually pretty tough. The hardest part was really breaking down the fishery. I mean that's really where I use the Omnia Pro app to you know the lake's off limits for a month. So you can't really get to the lake. You can't see what the conditions look like. When you get to the water, it's time to practice. You need to know what you're doing when you get there. So what I was doing was fishing long, long gradual points with clay, rock and stuff like that. So I was using the Navionics layer really seeing where the contours are at. Seeing what section of the lake was good. Water clarity was another big thing. The blueback herring do not like dirty water. They will not spawn in dirty water. They don't really like that stained water. So you kind of want to find the cleanest water you can. And so I can look at water clarity and then water temperature. Make sure no areas are too hot. You know because usually if it kind of spikes up river a little bit, then you know, well the herring spawn is probably done up there. And that kind of shows you a region. So once I find the zones of the lake I want, that's when I'll apply. I'll look at the wind. I'll see what points I'm going to go fish and it's a no-brainer. I mean it's like I'm not going to say shooting fish in a barrel, but it really helps dial you in on where you're going to fish and kind of what you're going to do. And when I fished here this week, I had a, I'm going to say a 1-2 approach. I mostly caught them on a topwater and a Zoom Super Fluke. This is the new Rapala Joller. I love the topwater. Start out with the Joller in practice. That's how I found a lot of the areas. Fishing fast, fishing aggressive baits, finding those big schools. And that's really what you do is you would look for the schools of fish with areas that really had them. And then I throw the old Zoom Super Fluke. You cannot beat the Zoom Super Fluke. If you're on a herring fishery, anywhere in the Carolinas, whether you put it on a Carolina rig, you Texas rig it, or you nose hook it, that thing catches fish. That was what I caught the majority of my weight on at Lake Murray every single day. I was catching fish on it. I did catch some. Before I would leave a spot, I'd always throw the old ball and chain, the Carolina rig on there with a Zoom mid-sized Brush Hog. But those two baits are kind of how I found my fish. I was using the Omnia Pro App to really study the map, see the contours, see the wind, see the water clarity. And that's how I got the blue trophy with all in all. Great week. We got it done. Let's keep that ball rolling.

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