Every fishing season I have a set of goals that helps keep me focused and allows me to measure my performance. But, you know, I’ve found that it’s helpful to have goals for the offseason too.
A big part of this for me is making myself relax with family and friends. If you just fly by the seat of your pants all the time, you can never turn the switch off.
People don’t see that we go so hard, it actually takes you a while to get away from the grind of being on the go, go, go, go, go all the time. It’s hard to get back into “be still” mode where you’re not traveling and you’re not working all the time 24/7.
It’s not easy getting back into the groove of relaxing, and there’s nothing better for that than a vacation. Unfortunately, this year, I’ve had a setback in my plan.
Usually, we go to the South Carolina coast for vacation. We rent a house for the whole month of October, and I spend a lot of time in my Costa sunglasses, just relaxing at the beach. Unfortunately, Hurricane Matthew ended those plans. It’s a little disappointing, but my best wishes go out to everyone who was affected by that storm.
Right now I’m actually flying by the seat of my pants because I don’t know where we’re going to go for vacation. I’ll tell you this, I don’t care if it’s November or December, I’ll be heading to the coast at some time.
What’s complicating this plan is deer season. I love to hunt and the end of October is prime time. This is about to kick off, and I haven’t been to the beach.
Hunting is part of my relaxation plan, and I’m getting geared up for it. I’ve never killed a trophy deer with my bow, but I’m planning to hunt in Illinois this year with my dad. Hopefully one of us will tag out, but I’d rather it be him because I can do it any time.
Now here recently, my little boy who’s 3 years old was visiting me, and he said he wanted to go fishing. Whatever he says, that’s what I do. So me and my daddy got to take him fishing and caught about 30 spotted bass in two hours. Man, he had a blast.
A 3-year-old’s attention span isn’t very long. I mean you have it for about an hour, at most. You have to have a lot of action going on, so it worked out perfectly.
We caught them drop shotting — the easiest thing in the world. Mark ‘em, drop it down and they were absolutely loaded. You’d catch one and the graph would look like a sword fight. They weren’t big, pound-and-a-half to 2-pounders, but it was fun for my little boy.
That was the first time me and my daddy got to go fishing with him, so that was pretty cool — all three generations. That’s that kind of stuff I enjoy doing when I’m home.
On the business side, I try to get all of that done before the end of the season. And when it comes to pre-practice and visiting lakes in the offseason, I don’t typically do that. However, I think I’m going to do it a little differently.
Once January gets here and deer hunting starts to taper off in my area, I’m going to start doing some research and spending some time on some of the lakes — especially Toledo Bend and Rayburn. I’ll also practice for the Classic out in Texas because it should be a little warmer than it is here in South Carolina.
I’ve been to a few of those lakes, but we’re going there a different time of the year, so it’ll be a whole new ballgame. I want to familiarize myself with what I might want to fish during the tournaments, but I won’t necessarily be fishing as long and as hard as I will during the official practice period.
That’s part of the mentality I have to keep myself in during the offseason. It’s hard to get out of “go” mode, but it’s something I have to force myself to do. It’s good for the body, because you’re run ragged during a tournament season, but it’s really important for your mind.
I love fishing; it’s my passion. But you have to take a break, even from things you love. Stepping away not only allows you to rest, it makes you hungry to get back to it.