BASS PRO SHOPS BETWEEN THE SCALES - Brent Ehrler

[Music] my name is Brent aylor and I'm a professional bass fisherman I fish tournaments for a living I work with sponsors I represent sponsors and travel around the country trying to catch fish look at that one it is fun when you can get out there and put the pieces of the puzzle together and do well in the tournament here I feel like I have to be physically tough to be mentally tough you know the only way to do that is diet and exercise and challenging yourself ride a bike lift weights do something that challenges your endurance challenges your mental toughness as well I don't know that's all the stuff I try to do to perform out here to compete against these guys [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] so we are in Redlands California right now this is my hometown I was born and raised here it's a great little town college town this is home foreign Guntersville in Alabama I'll be heading there just in a you know a couple days here so this is my life before I head to my next tournament for the Bass Pro Tour welcome to my tackle shop the start of the season I redo everything I get all my stuff in line and in order for for the entire season being in California it's harder to prepare for the year all my tackle and my Ranger are sitting back there in Alabama so I have to pack that stuff in January before I even leave California I have to have all that stuff in my truck and boat ready for the entire season you know organize and Tackle this is my wall of the Lucky Craft right here that basically went from shallow to deep all my hooks are in here so I've got all my my gummy hooks in here it's a Gunnersville I have a feeling if they're on you know any kind of ledge bite right there I'm going to be throwing a 3.5 XD a couple trophies Cup trophy here some FLW stuff I'd love to take up more space with more trophies got some zombie apocalypse stuff here I've got the Firepower to be a prepper freeze-dried beef beans Trio with rice and then also coffee so we've got a big jug of coffee too so brand new Cabela's Liberty Safe I love guns I got a ton of them of course the mountain bike Gotta Have A specialized in here Bass Pro Bikes they're mountain bikes they've got the Ascend series of mountain bikes I've got those in here too here's Lola by the way this is this is our our big girl here we have a dog Lola who's a Great Dane my wife and son are are great both Kelly and Ollie are my world they are everything and there's so much that we do just being together that we love whether it's he's huge into Rubik's cubes and you know helping them with that he does competitionally times itself all the time 17 seconds there we go he just solves and the solves and solves them and in one year I still haven't solved it once a lot of stuff we do outdoors and you know just spending time as a family it's big for us being away from them is is the hardest part for me because I love being at home I love being with my family you know there was one time when my son was younger that I was traveling so much I was talking to him on the phone and he goes hey Dad where do you live that was so tough man it was a dagger to the heart that's the worst part for me is is traveling and being away from them [Music] my home routine is is kind of funny I uh I have so many things going on but I try to do at home trying to get this water as cold as possible in here [Music] so I try to do uh three minutes is the goal but every morning I'm trying to do this it's just good to kind of get your day going it kind of sets you right for the day [Music] oh that was cool bye you guys have a good day holly have a good day love you bye that is some cold stuff right there if you can do a cold plunge for 11 minutes a week that's where you show the true benefit so you know the nice thing about this is I get out I dry off and then make a good cup of coffee I laughed myself with these obsessions that I have you know whether it's mountain biking or shooting office one of them I'm what you call a coffee snob I'm very particular about the coffee I drink I actually just got this yesterday my signature Papua New Guinea roast from Bedrock roaster man that's so good you know it's just it's part of my morning routine I mean I I get up in the morning I do 200 push-ups every single day on you know boiling water and getting that going and brewing coffee doing push-ups drinking coffee doing push-ups and that'll get your day going right for sure [Music] I have a friend that's been training me in Practical shooting so I'll grab my pistol and we'll we'll run out there and do some some training and some shooting probably come back and maybe go for a mountain bike ride we're here to at The Prado Shooting Park in in Chino California we're going to run through some drills shooting steel targets there's Chad over there Carlson's my buddy Chad has taught me a ton about pistol shooting it's funny the first time we shot we were shooting and he goes man I think there's something wrong with your sights and he takes it and he he takes two shots and they're dead on and he goes you're good and hands it right back to me and I'm like gee thanks he's a big bass fisherman that's how I know yeah I talked to him about guns all he wants to do is talk to me about fishing it's hilarious we're doing the dueling tree I'm shooting the green his goal is to shoot all the orange and get them all into my side I mean that is is a good tool for training for Speed and accuracy it's also a good routine to just stay sharp hand-eye coordination a ton of fun man it's an absolute blast you know bass fishing you know you had a good day when your thumb gets torn up when you're out shooting when you get a black finger and thumb a little bit of sprayer paint on there you know he had a good day shooting all right here we are next stop of activities let's get out let's make a few laps you're riding the hills and having a good time and it became my obsession you know back in the early days of coven I would ride almost every day probably four or five days a week early on and so when I was fishing the Bass Pro Tour on my off days I would go and ride exercising you know really help me be a better fisherman everything was going great until we had a cup event in Texas and I went and rode and I go and there's one little Rhythm Section that I found I'm riding through it and I go off this jump and foreign [Applause] mountain biking can jack you up but uh you know what it's it's such good exercise I get out there I I have learned what I can and can't do now all right there we have it good little ride today you know last little hurray here at home before I head to Guntersville and it's all business trying to catch a fish here starting tomorrow I kind of got into bass fishing just on a whim you know it was one of those things where I love fishing it didn't matter what it was and when I first started it was whatever pulled my bobber under it didn't matter I loved it I loved it I loved Tournament Fishing but I wasn't going to do it full time I graduated from college and with a marketing degree and the first thing I did is I put on a belt and hammer and nails and went and sewing a hammer for a construction company because I wanted to be a general contractor I started to fish terms I started fishing nationally in o5 and 06 07 wall and 0607 the bass fishing scene started to do well for me I won the Forest Wood Cup Championship and right at that time is when the housing markets you know kind of Tanked so the reverse effect happened you know it was I was going to do construction to save me and pay for my hobby of fishing and fishing actually saved my my button construction so I remember first ever time I fished a Major League Fishing cup event you know here's these guys that you know I read about growing up and now I'm competing against them and and then I got lucky enough to win the tournament it was it was a really cool feeling [Music] welcome to Lake Guntersville here in Alabama picked up my truck and my Ranger and my game plan so far is to get all my tackle done stuff I want is as far down as it can go buried so in practice you know I want to have everything there I want to be prepared for anything that might come up you know I don't want to be wishing I had something in the boat that's in my truck you know and bad deal it could be a really good one right there a little bluegill colored bass tricks got my 3.5 XD that's going to be the first one I tie on for the Deep plugs and then I'll develop a game plan during practice and then on my off day I'm going to take some of this tackle out that I don't need you know it's process of elimination I'm going to eliminate rods and eliminate water and then hopefully develop some sort of game plan for tournament day two things I have left for the rest of the day is to work on my graphs make sure they're updated and then I need a food prep for the rest of the the week or at least for the next couple days I'm all about diet so I'll get there go to the market and you know cook up a bunch of food for the first couple days of practice that's looking done let me drain this now I'm going to add some butter to it because butter is delicious but a lot of salt I'll put a little bit of honey and that'll be a good snack in the boat for for lunch like I said with this tournament it's gonna be so hot that you know the whole time you're sweating you're losing sodium in your in your body and the only salt that I get is what I put on stuff there's nothing in anything I eat that has salt in it because everything I eat is whole so I over salt things just to get it I'll scramble four eggs and then I'll mix the ground beef with the four eggs so I have a little egg and ground beef and now I've got a mixture of ground beef and scrambled eggs so just high protein natural sugar get a little bit of carbs out of the sugar feels pretty good [Music] [Applause] and for me it's always a dark to dark you know day of practice you know I feel like I have to maximize my time out there to be competitive so here we are it's 5 20 in the morning right now we're on Lake Guntersville first day of practice for the Bass Pro Tour event here my first day at Lake Guntersville is going to be probably a two-part day we're in May to where they're still going to be fish up Shallow there's probably going to be a shot spawn going on so it's going to be that transition of deep and shallow and trying to figure out where I feel like I'm going to have the better chance of doing well in the tournament it definitely looks like there's some fish right here this is a standard issue Tennessee River ledge right here on the main Channel you know when the current gets up and rolling then they'll kind of group up on the point of one of these ledges main river goes right here but there's little secondary ridges that are out you know Ledges that are out on the side so I know for a long time until you find a school of them you find a school of them there's you know when the current's right you catch them every cast a couple real quick cash right here well that water's clear oh gosh jeez something hit it whatever it was [Music] Tennessee River system just has so much going on in it you know the big gizzard Shad there's crappy bluegill we're up in like nine eight nine foot right now casting up to about seven with that chatter bait just looking for some of those first fish heading out after spawning it's a Bay Point this is kind of like one of those first places that they'll get out on and you know I'm seeing fish out there but shoot I don't know what they are look at that my goodness two pound spotted bass those are fish that I could catch even better on like a jerk bait or crank bait something where I can wind it fast but man there's just so much debris there's that much debris it's almost easier to catch them on a vibrating jig because you can clear it you know when it gets a bunch of grass on there you can clear it so look at that that's just every cast you get that stuff on there just that floating eelgrass [Music] little ones that's what I'm singing down there the little ones and they're right on a little cluster of them another spot about a wacky rig senko up there I'm what I think are some brim beds and I catch a spot wasn't expecting that look at there it's a largemouth I don't think he's a scorable it's a shallow little hump that has it's real clean on top it has a few brim beds up there I couldn't tell if they're active or not but either way it's a good a good area for fish to be but apparently there's a lot of fish out there brim bed deal might be a little behind us now [Music] it's kind of under the impression that these fish are a little bit farther ahead of schedule just because spring is seemed early figure out where the fish are at right now right now I'm just spearing my wheels it feels like I got to figure out where a good bulk of the fish are hanging out you know what they're relating to you Ronald Point has grass up on top and it's clean and I can get a cast so [Music] baby Largemouth those fish are on their way out you know they've spawned the water's 73 degrees you know they should be heading out towards that main river maybe a little bit later this afternoon we'll probably go and start looking on Ledges but I'm going to fish shallow for a little bit now I've thrown everything right now I've been on top water I've thrown jerk bait I've thrown ChatterBait I've thrown sunbait I've thrown a worm a wacky rig drop shot Slim jig crank bait oh that's a good one I wasn't expecting that three pounder oh maybe not a three but look he's got one two and then mine was the third hook hole on his mouth there's probably an active bluegill bed right here that's a little bit deeper you know I can't see with my eyeballs but man there's some fish swimming around for sure right there we're kind of in that Mid Lake section and it just seems like it doesn't matter what time of year it just seems like a lot of stuff goes down in this mid Lake section so stuff like this you're really looking for 50 yard stretch 100 yard stretch where you get a bite or two and you can come back to it every day and catch one or two off of it every day you know if I run shallow and have 10 spots you know or more I can rotate through them and then if I find a couple out deep then I'll rotate through the Deep spots and then bounce up to the shallow spot and then hop out to the Deep spot and just keep kind of going back and forth cautious fish everywhere there's a bunch down there but they're probably all that size [Applause] it's a good staging spot it's a secondary point that leads into a pocket which is kind of what I thought the fish would be on a little bit but they're probably just all those little ones springtime fast spawn earlier then when they get done spawning they start to kind of swim around and feed up before they get out offshore when the bluegill get up there and start spawning man it's an easy snack you know they can sit around these active bluegills they'll be 30 40 of them in one little area and the bass can just sit off on the side and slide up get a snack and the bluegill are done spawning then they run out and get you know on that offshore stuff and start keying in on shad so right away I can tell it's healthier right here you know I've seen several scorables just right here in a matter of a few minutes non-scorable but boy he got it oh gosh you got it and I got one right there just in casting I've hooked some no big ones but I've seen some good ones and but at least this gives me a shallow spot to fish and maybe catch a decent one here or there just seeing a fish is just as important in practice is getting the bite so when you come back in the tournament you can catch that fish I just dropped two waypoints right there because I saw four and I saw another probably two and three quarter so we're kind of midday here I'm really not excited about anything I found I haven't been able to catch them in between I haven't really found many up Shallow the ones I have found are not just doesn't feel right to me so you're pretty quick we're gonna go and fish offshore I don't kind of on that main river well it looks like fish right there foreign look at that one well I'd say we need to be off the bank I mean first spot I fish on and catch a three and a half four pounder I guess we need to start fishing out off the bank a little bit more there's not a lot of them swimming down there but shoot I think that was the biggest one I've caught all day there's another one that's two bites on one spot right now is that right there that's a school of fish right there I should catch one right there that looks sexy there I got one First cast across it with that plug look at that oh yes oh that felt good buddy one cast that's all I need to do a couple more right there look at them all down there if I can see six or eight there's probably 30. that's all I need to see when I can idle over a school like that and catch a four pounder on my first cast with that crankbait I'd be stupid to do anything different oh boy yeah it's a real big one boogie There catching four Pounders now oh man oh that feels good right there is a electric craft 3.5 XD oh that one got it there spot anytime I fish the Tennessee River this time of year you know May June July I'm gonna fish main Ledges secondary Ledges where there's a creek Channel like this is the river channel right here it runs along along that River Channel I look for any irregularity that's down there a lot of butt time you know getting that console running around and trying to find those fish very little fishing in practice more just finding the schools so I can come back to them there's one oh gosh it's a good one too another four pounder okay so it's all about getting time in that console and driving you know that's really what it's all about is just putting the time in it takes time to find these groups but when you do it's well worth it I really want about 10 spots I can't imagine I won't have that you know I've got four this afternoon well we're about ready to call it a day out here a little bit more confidence now going into the the second last day of practice so we're gonna head in here in just a second and we'll be out at dark tomorrow morning [Music] day number two of practice with it this dark and and this uh low light I'm gonna run out and fish some shallow stuff a little bit then I'm going to get out and just start idling around and looking for more Ledges you can hopefully find enough schools to last me the week [Music] thank you practice is over it's six o'clock right now I just got off the water I never found a single school out deep today you know I ended up catching a few fish shallow a lot of small fish still but I did catch a couple decent ones so maybe it's the right pattern I don't know it's going to be an interesting term and I I think it's going to be one of those deals where if it looks good do it you know it's you kind of just gotta fly around by the seat of your pants and hopefully at the end of the day you have a strong enough limit to make that knockout round it's Guntersville and then cast can be a big fish you know we'll find out on the first day of the tournament I'm just going to kind of explore it and see what happens this is it everything leads up to this moment right here I've Got Deep fish I've got shallow fish some in between this is going to be one of those things where I need to just keep an open mind and let the day tell me what to do fishing is such a a weird sport you know if you look at any kind of sport mountain biking snow skiing or football basketball you go out and train and there's a direct correlation between working hard and doing well but with fishing you can bust your butt and still do awful out there I do it all the time you're trying to predict something that's unpredictable and bass fishing there's only one for sure thing and that's nothing's for sure [Music] [Music] so just finished up here at Guntersville and uh you know I feel like what I do at home really helped because it was a grind out there day one I went out I started deep and I didn't catch much only had one so then I ran up Shallow and I fished the brim beds and I only caught two fish doing that so I was out of it I was in basically last place I had six or eight pounds you know that's where I think being at home training and doing stuff that gets you mentally top you know cold plunge different things like that that makes you mentally tough so when you get in one of those positions where you're struggling out there it's not easy to catch them you're down and out there's an hour left you're in last place you stay focused longer you stay in it longer and it helps you push on through so the last hour of the day I caught a couple big key fish and moved up to 10th place I kind of got dialed in I told myself no more brim bed stuff fish offshore I went out on day two when I caught 23 pounds and moved up to Fourth Place Guntersville knockout round I caught him decent I had another 19 pounds but unfortunately just missed the cut I ended up in 13th Place they took 10. but man preparing doing what I do helped me out this week fun week great event so fun filming with Bass Pro Shops doing between the scales I hope we can do it again [Music]

Channel: Bass Pro Shops

Views: 18,183

Keywords: bass pro shops, bass pro, bass pro shop, bass pro fishing, bass fishing, Outdoors, fishing, Between the Scales, Brent Ehrler

Id: kyKmP6NWS_A

Length: 25min 27sec (1527 seconds)

Published: Fri May 26 2023