STURGEON BAY, Wis. – Without question, Lake Michigan’s Green Bay is one of the premier walleye fisheries in the entire country. However, thanks to an influx of alewives, the bite during the Cabela’s National Walleye Tour event was hit or miss. Further complicating matters was a lack of wind on day two. While the trolling bite died completely, those that were casting to specific rock structure were still managing a few fish. With a Rapala Rippin’ Rap as his key bait, local pro Daniel Woodke took advantage of the conditions and jigged up an impressive victory.

 

While the 2014 National Walleye Tour event on Bays de Noc was all about the Moonshine Lures Shiver Minnow, this year’s event was dominated by the Rippin’ Rap, a lipless crankbait. Each of the top three pros used the Rippin’ Rap as their main lure. Woodke also caught fish on the Lindy Darter, but the Rippin’ Rap caught the lion’s share. In addition, he managed a couple walleyes on a plain hair jig and a paddle-tail swimbait.

 

Woodke used a variety of Rippin’ Rap colors, including gold chrome, yellow perch and firetiger. In reality, he didn’t believe color mattered much, if at all.

 

“They weren’t hungry; there were plenty of alewives around,” said Woodke. “It was strictly a reaction bite. I don’t know why else they would bite. I think the key was literally putting that bait in front of their face and making them bite it.”

Woodke fished the bait on 20-pound Sufix 832 braid with a 14-pound Sufix fluorocarbon leader. After catching 36.71 pounds on day one, Woodke improved to 38.23 on day two.

 

“My first fish this morning was a 22-incher and I couldn’t let it go. My next fish was a very heavy 28-incher. Then I struggled for a while. I had two fish at 9:30, so I left and went to plan B. I ended up popping the last four fish within an hour of each other. I was done fishing at 12:30 p.m.”

 

In this event, culling was not allowed and anglers were permitted to keep six fish and weigh their best five. The 22-incher proved to be the smallest of the six fish and did not make it to the scale.

 

A native of Gillett, Wis., Woodke fished the familiar west shore. Each day he ran north and hit three or four spots – all big rock piles located in 10 to 15 feet of water. Woodke would cast his Rippin’ Rap out as far as he could, then jig it back with a conventional lift-and-fall approach.

  

“I knew the fish were in the area. I would cruise around with my trolling motor until I’d catch one, then I’d put my MotorGuide on spot lock.”

 

Woodke discovered this area approximately two weeks ago, but he wasn’t sure if the fish would stick around. He would periodically check on them and to his surprise, they were still there come tournament time.

 

A patrol officer by day, Woodke thanked his co-anglers, who contributed key fish each day.

 

“Mike (Bertrand) caught three of the six fish today; he picked up my slack later in the day. My co-anglers played a huge part in this. I give a lot of credit to them.”

 

For a two-day total of 74.94 pounds, Woodke earned a Ranger 620FS with a 250-horsepower Evinrude outboard, $15,000 cash and an additional $2,047 in Anglers Advantage cash for a total purse of $87,047.

 

“I’ve been thinking about this for years and I can’t really believe it happened. This is life changing. I worked so hard for this. There’s so many good anglers out there. To win at this level is huge. I’m very thankful at this moment – thankful for my family and thankful for the NWT. It finally worked out.”

 

Keenan satisfied with second

 

For the second consecutive day, Tom Keenan only managed five keeper walleyes. But once again, those five were huge – weighing a total of 32.21 pounds. Combined with his 37.02 from day one, Keenan finished the tournament with 69.23 pounds.

 

“One of my big fish was spitting up alewives like crazy,” said Keenan, who recently crossed the $1 million mark in career tournament winnings. “It contaminated the water and jammed up the livewell and three of my fish died. Thank God those fish didn’t cost me the win. I was a trainwreck worrying about it. I guess that’s a lesson learned on an alewife bite.”

 

Livewell issues aside, Keenan fished a clean tournament.

 

“I didn’t lose anything; I caught everything that bit. I did everything right; I just didn’t get enough key bites to win. I’m pretty happy with second. I had a really good tournament.”

 

Similar to Woodke, Keenan caught nine of his 10 keepers on the No. 7 Rippin’ Rap. His best colors were gold chrome, chrome moss back shiner and Helinski shad. Today, Helinski shad proved to be the top producer. The Rippin’ Raps were fished on 20-pound Sufix 832 braid with a 15-pound Sufix fluorocarbon leader. Keenan’s other keeper came on a 1/2-ounce VMC swimbait jig with a 5-inch Keitech Swing Impact swimbait. 

 

Fishing with teammate Chris Gilman, Keenan ran north each day and fished around the Chamber’s Island and Sister Shoals area. He would essentially spot hop from rock pile to rock pile. On day one, he sampled 15 spots and today he hit eight.

 

“Other than Gilman, I didn’t fish by another boat the whole week. I do believe I caught them on a spot nobody has ever fished before. I found a hump, a little tiny thing and I dropped the camera on it and it was full of fish.”

 

Keenan explained that he would first use his Side Imaging, then drop down the camera.

 

“You’re looking for clean rock. If it doesn’t have algae on it, that’s perfect.”

 

For second place, the Lake Erie champion earned $25,676.

 

“I want to give a shout out to Dan Quinn from Rapala. He overnighted me a bunch of the Rippin’ Raps and VMC swimbait heads. Without them, I wouldn’t have caught those fish.”

 

Przekurat rallies to third

 

Bone Collector-Hardcore pro Jason Przekurat surged up the leaderboard after catching a 32.22-pound stringer to finish the tournament third with 63.57.

 

“I’ve got to thank Danny Woodke,” said Przekurat. “He worked with us and he’s the one that found the fish; we just expanded on it. By the end of the week, we had seven or eight spots and we pretty much used all of them.”

 

Today, his first spot didn’t produce, but he eventually found other rock that was holding fish. Przekurat also employed the casting program with Rippin’ Raps.

 

“You have to find the key rock structure and you have to make repetitive casts. When the wind blows, you can really catch them. When it’s windy, I rip it three or four times. When it’s real calm, you have to let it sit on the bottom. Then you finally rip it up and the fish just whack it.

 

“This big boulder thing is something we wish we could have discovered 10 years earlier and kept quiet. But it’s here now and everyone knows about it. Years ago we used to try and troll over them. Now we know we have to jig over them.”

 

For third place, the Stevens Point, Wis., native earned $20,137.

 

Wenckebach fourth, Gilman fifth

 

Rounding out the top five are pros Karl Wenckebach and Chris Gilman. Wenckebach, the Lake Villa, Ill., pro, finished fourth for the second consecutive tournament. After catching 32.79 pounds on day one, Wenckebach demonstrated consistency and put another 30.12 on the scale today. His two-day total weight was 62.91.

 

Gilman, who at times fished near Keenan, took fifth with a combined weight of 58.99 pounds. On day one, he boated 32.01 pounds and today he managed 26.98. Gilman also employed the Rippin’ Rap program on shallow rocks.

 

Rest of the best

 

Rounding out the top 10 pros at the 2016 Cabela’s National Walleye Tour event on Green Bay:

 

6th: Jim Carroll of Minot, N.D., 57.28

7th: Joe Okada of Cambridge, Wis., 56.13

8th: Korey Sprengel of Beaver Dam, Wis., 53.80

9th: Nick Schertz of Tomahawk, Wis., 47.37

10th: Bill Sutton of Lindenhurst, Ill., 46.46

 

Niese claims co-angler title

 

Competing in only his second National Walleye Tour event, Dan Niese took home top honors in the Co-angler Division with a total weight of 59.76 pounds. On day one, Niese fished with fellow Ohio angler Randy Gaines and the two caught a limit worth 31.49. Today he fished with Illinois pro Bill Sutton and together they weighed 28.27.

 

“I couldn’t have drawn two better guys,” said Niese, the Louisville, Ohio, native. “This is my second event as a co-angler and I had a blast. It definitely won’t be my last.”

 

On day one, Niese caught his fish casting and jigging up north. Today, he and Sutton ran south and trolled crankbaits in the mud. Niese also pulled Sutton back into the boat after he fell out head first trying to grab a planer board.

 

Niese earned $6,500 for his win.

 

“This tournament was pretty much a dream come true. I just came up here to do some fishing and hang out. I never thought I’d win.”

 

Up next

 

The season-ending Cabela’s National Walleye Tour Championship is scheduled for Aug. 3-5 on Lake Oahe in Mobridge, S.D.