Rick Clunn "You Can't Handicap Knowledge" on MERCER-214

4-time Bassmaster Classic Champion, the legendary Rick Clunn finally returns to the show. But this time it’s with a very different outlook and approach than before. He has been following and studying the sport this year and he shares just a few of his many Clunn-Clusions and a big announcement.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Oh, it's happening. He is finally back. 32 time
Bassmaster Classic Qualifier, 16time Bassmaster winner, Four
time Classic champion, Former Angler of the Year Bass Fishing
Hall of Famer. The legendary Mr. Rick Clung
joins me today. I'm Bob Gobb for the Bassmaster.

(00:29):
Welcome to Mercer. Welcome on.
Welcome all friends, family, freeloaders, fishing freaks, and
of course you, my humpers. Happy hump day to all of you and
welcome into the Awkwardly Honest fishing podcast that goes
by my last name, which is Mercer.
This is the 214th edition of theMercer Podcast.

(00:51):
I hope wherever you're watching or listening from that life is
treating you well. It is a glory, furious time of
year. Finally the weather has broken
in the North Country and I'm shooting underwater footage
again, which makes me very happy.
And I'm actually fishing, which makes me very, very happy.

(01:13):
It is weird, my life. I love all the jobs I get to do,
but it is weird how all of this is around fishing and my plight
in life is just to actually get fishing and not talking about
fishing. I do love talking about fishing,
but but I'd rather actually fishand I get to do that over the

(01:34):
next few weeks while we have a bit of a break on the Bassmaster
Elite Series schedule. So I am thankful for all of
that. And in my time away, I'm going
to be doing a lot of fishing andshooting, a lot of underwater
footage, a lot of swimming with the fishes, and obviously

(01:54):
hanging out with my family because I do enjoy hanging out
with them. And I hope you're enjoying
whatever you are up to. And I hope you'll enjoy this
little bit of a reprieve from real life problems as we enjoy
this week's podcast because it is a very, very good one.

(02:15):
We have the legendary Mr. Rick Klund returning to the show.
Last year, he had a residency where you would see him once
every month. And then he retired from the
Elite series. I gave, you know, Rick his space
because that's got to be a weirdthing to go through.

(02:35):
And I always letting Rick know when you're ready to come back,
you're always welcome to come back.
Some of my favorite shows we've ever done are with Rick.
I love how you ask Rick a question and quite often his
answer makes you think totally different than what you
expected. He truly has an amazing mind.

(02:56):
The world needs more people likeRick Klun.
So I'm excited about this week'sshow.
But I did tease a big announcement.
I told you we have a very big announcement coming this week
and this is something that I'm excited about.
I hope you guys are excited about.

(03:20):
Let's hit a drum roll, keep it going.
I am so happy to announce that returning to this show, not just
this week but many weeks in the future, is the legendary Rick

(03:42):
Clung. That's right, we are kicking off
another residency with Rick Clung.
Rick Clung will be returning to this show after every Elite
Series event. He is retired from Elite Series
competition, but he still watches it and watches it
avidly. And now he's going to break down

(04:02):
the tournaments. What stands out to him from his
eyes as a fan? When you think about it, every
way that Rick's ever been part of tournaments, he's been
competing. So he's looked at it through a
competitor's eyes. But now, to remove himself from
the events and to look at it as a fan, look at it from, as they

(04:24):
say, a 30,000 foot view, with all of the decades and decades
of knowledge that he has. We're going to learn a ton in
this segment. And I'm excited that after every
single Elite Series event, Rick Clung will be coming on this
show to break down the tournament from his vantage

(04:45):
point. If you can't tell, I'm a little
giddy and a little excited. My only regret about all of this
is that we didn't start it sooner, but Rick Clung makes
things happen when Rick Clunn isready to make things happen.
And I think you will find from this first little teaser episode

(05:07):
that he is ready to return to the show and he comes out of the
gates firing. I love that we are going to get
inside his mind. This is such a unique, rare
opportunity and I am thankful for Rick and Melissa Clunn for
for allowing this to happen on this particular show and I can't
wait for us all to learn together with the legend that is

(05:32):
Rick Klun. I can talk for a little while
longer, but I think at this point you'd just rather hear
from said legend himself. Without further ado, the amazing
mind of the Master Rick. Klun.
Rick Clun, I have missed you. It is so good to have.

(05:53):
I mean, as soon, as soon as youryour image popped up, I'm like,
God, it's good to see Rick again.
Well, it is good. The I think the biggest fear of
most old people is you're knowing you're going to be alone
at some point in life, OK. Because I mean, you know,

(06:15):
parents, spouses, you know, leave the planet and maybe
you're you're you're alone. But one thing that you don't
want to be in it. My brother told me this
recently. He says I don't mind being
alone. I just don't want to be
forgotten. So so anyway, that's a little
too deep because I want to talk about things a little more

(06:36):
positive, but no, So I did. What do you want to do?
Because my wife and you've been kind of.
We did brokered the deal. Yeah, and explain to you what
you'd like to see first. Well, here's what I'd like to
see. Whatever Rick Lund wants to do.

(06:56):
I learned a long time ago that you are you are your own.
It's better to let you go the direction you want to go than
try to rein you in. So I guess we can look, I mean,
I think it'll be cool to look attournaments.
Like I think it's amazing that you're watching as much

(07:17):
tournaments as you are. And I want to hear what's going
through your mind. I mean, but I also have a bunch
of questions like what's the before we even get into?
What's this been like for you? I mean, you talked about
retirement reluctantly for a year and I know you're still
doing the Opens, but for all intents and purposes, the Elite
Series started without you for the first time ever.

(07:40):
What was that like? It didn't bother me as much as I
thought it was going to, becausethere's certain things about
tournament fishing that I never liked.
That's the part I don't miss. Getting up at 4:30 in the

(08:02):
morning, I hate leading everybody to the boat ramp.
I hate because you're sitting there in the morning all by
yourself and so, but there's butthen when you really, really
start watching them to fish, there's parts of it I really do
miss and I kind of see that in in all the events.

(08:27):
Of course, St. John's River was the first event
and I don't this is going to sound bad.
I apologize. Saint John.
I don't miss St. John's River because they put my
butt a lot more often than not whooped it.
And this year I knew the water was even going to be more
limited because they weren't allowed nobody to go into Rodman

(08:50):
and that always creates a different creature.
And when Lake George is still not come back due to the loss of
of, you know, ill grass used, then you start to see strange
places when the tournament and and not as much weight that
Saint John at times was producing.

(09:12):
And that's but it's so, but I did and I like watching you
know, Billy Loren do his thing and a lot of the old anglers and
Billy's one of them. Sorry Billy, but we he was he
had very we were specialist. OK, They go back in time.

(09:35):
If Denny Brauer won a tournament, you knew how he won
it. If Tommy Biffle won a
tournament, you knew how he won it.
If David Fritz won a tournament,you knew how he won it most of
the time. So we were specialist, OK.
And, and nowadays you're really starting to see the young
anglers come in and they're a lot more versatile.

(09:56):
At a high level, you can be versatile, but not necessarily
at a high level. But it was still good to see a
specialist win the tournament like Billy Loren.
And specialists can still win tournaments under the right
conditions. And Billy had the right
conditions and he's very good atwhat he was doing.
We all know that. So that was kind of a neat deal

(10:20):
for me to, to, to, to see. I enjoyed that part of it and
the fact that I got to watch himmaking minimum decisions about
the tide and which the final dayshould he change?
Should he change water, you know, and, and in my mind's
going, no, Billy, don't change water, don't you?

(10:40):
So I'm making, trying to help him make the decision, you know,
from afar. But and again, it's just I'm not
saying I was had the right ideasbecause, but at the same time
you have an opinion. If you're go Kylie, you're doing
that. Don't don't do that, Billy.
You're going to win this term. Just tell you where you're at.
You're getting better in there really kind of every day as far

(11:01):
as catching the limit and that final day, I knew if you just
caught one or two big fish and the limit, he's going to win.
So that's the kind of a fun partof it a little bit for me.
The and so and again, that's kind of what I and polar fashion
didn't play a huge role with theexception of Shane.

(11:25):
I think Shane LaRue was fishing the fry.
Yeah, it was fishing fry. So there was another advancement
of forward facing and all the naysayers need to quit being
Debbie Downers about forward facing.
It's it's here. It's going to be here.
If you want to stay in the past,fine.
You must stay in the past. It's OK.
It's you know, you do what you need to do, but it's it's

(11:50):
advancing. It's not, it's not going to go
backwards, but forward facing. It's going to evolve like every
technique that's ever evolved and the fish are going to adjust
to it and they're going to relate to it.
They're already doing it. So but watching him fish those
fry with the jerk bait fascinated me because I loved

(12:11):
fishing the jerk bait. Would I?
But I could have never done thatpower, that pattern because most
of fried people that used to fish fry was pretty easy.
You just look for them up there,you know, on the top and you
just threw a bait over there thinking there was a Garter
underneath. And half the time there was and
they weren't hard to catch. But he, he, he, he did it.

(12:34):
He advanced that technique by looking out in the middle of the
canals on low tide when the fireor that fishing pressure is
moving them out. So and then then you go on now
to the next tournament was like Okeechobee, right?
Yeah. Before we get into Okeechobee,

(12:54):
can I? Can I?
I just want to address. One thing.
I'm cutting off the comments 'cause I know what I'm going to
hear and and I just want you to answer it because every time
you've ever talked of a forward facing sonar, at some point
somebody says, well, his opinions bought and paid for.
That's why he's saying that. Rick, I don't think I think you

(13:16):
probably look back at drone career yourself and be like, if
I was more bought and paid for, things have been a little
easier. Tell me your opinion.
Are you bought and paid for in the in the electronics world?
No, I don't even have an electronic sponsor.
Never have Garmin just sent me an e-mail today, ironically,

(13:39):
that they're that they're dropping me because I, I don't
ever visit your account anymore.And that's ironic.
That's true. If you don't, if we don't hear
from you today, we're removing you from our whatever e-mail
they have there. That's OK because I don't ever
go in that area. And it's, and it's not about,

(14:00):
it's about historically how manytimes we could have handicapped
knowledge, how we could not. I've only done this for
knowledge. I haven't done it for, for and
that's why I continue to do it is I'm trying to understand and
figure out how, how much I'm doing wrong.
And now I've done a lot wrong. So there's always going to be

(14:23):
that I'm you're never going to escape that.
And I mean, it's, it's, it's it's one thing too, I've enjoyed
about watching this these young anglers this year, getting back
to watching anglers, watching the, the the tournament is how I
never totally people used to askme, Rick, why do you hang out

(14:45):
with the younger guys more than you do the older guys?
And I never could really give that a complete answer, but I
know that's an answer now because old guys, as they get
older turn into newspapers, OK. In a newspaper, you know,

(15:07):
you're, you're supposed to report what's going on in the
world. But to sell newspapers, they
report the negativity that's going on in the world a lot more
than they do the positive stuff because it doesn't sell papers.
And then and then you and peopledon't watch it on TV.
And I was reminded of that in 1977 when the we had the largest

(15:30):
contingency of giant newspapers there because George Bush was
there at the Texoma Classic. And I made that statement that I
do not read the news and I do not read newspapers maybe once a
week, but maybe if I do read them, I just read the sports
page in the cartoons. And they cornered me after that,

(15:51):
that press conference, and said,you know, you know, if you ever
say that again. And so I was recommending people
don't do that. And they said, said if you ever
say that again, again, you will never get another piece of ink
the rest of your life. And this is the Horsham papers,
the New York papers, the Chicagopapers, all the big ones, Los

(16:13):
Angeles papers. And I simply said, did I say
anything that wasn't true? And they said, no, no, you
didn't. And I said, all I'm saying is
why can't we be a more, a littlemore balanced and, and basically
that's why hanging around with the old, older anglers, they
get, they turn into that same thing.
They'd rather talk about the negatives of life than the

(16:34):
positives. Now I'm talking about the life
of fishing and, and it's just a natural thing.
I even recognized to myself occasional times and I had to
shut it off is that we see more reasons to fail to catching fish
then we see eventually then we have we lose the hope of that
anything might happen when we were young.

(16:55):
We had that when we were young. Is it accurate?
Maybe not, but hope and and thatkind of that's it.
It's it's amazing and and because it gives you positive
energy even on the worst day, next day you hope I think I can
yeah, I think I'm going to do better next day.
I see that in the and the old blue set.

(17:18):
And so that's unfortunately whatyou're seeing a lot now with
forward facing. It's just just people are
obsessed with negativity. They they don't.
And I don't want to get in it over over get into it.
But so, and that's again, one thing.

(17:41):
Watching these tournaments, I really noticed even bigger than
I thought, how positive these young anglers are.
I mean, they're super positive. It's not just OK, maybe.
And are they always it's just kind of AI don't know what to
use. This is just one of the

(18:01):
craziness of being young. Yeah, but that's good and it is.
And I really, I mean, this last tournament had Lake Forks,
especially them guys. And they're just not out there
to catch a fish. They're out there to win.
And whether they're consciously competent or unconsciously

(18:25):
competent, that is easy to see in them.
And and if they they're, they'rethere to win and they know,
they, they know how they put so much positive energy behind it.
There's there's not a sports athlete on this planet that
achieved excellence and that's perfection that didn't have that

(18:48):
in them. And and so I see that so much
with the young anglers. And but, and, and this is again
why I like Jimmy, you know, I mean Bill, Bill Lauren winning
at Saint John's, because you canstill win if you, if you totally
believe in yourself and he, he believes in swimming at jig, you

(19:13):
can still win. And, and, but all too often now,
so many of these anglers, all they can't, they forget about
what they're really good at and just bitch about what the four
facing guys are doing. OK, do that if you want.
That's fine. That's not the life I want.
So I, I mean, there's so much anyway, I'm going to shut up.

(19:35):
That was more more than you I think you asked me about.
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Now back to the show. No, no, I I think it's great and

(19:59):
I think it's, it's refreshing for me because I'll be honest, I
get down. It's real simple.
If we made this podcast and we titled it, I mean, I've been
through this a bunch of but if we titled it everything brick
hates about the sport, it'll getliterally 10 times the amount of
traffic. Then if we you know, then if I

(20:21):
title it, Rick Klun absolutely loves this support and.
The life that he's lived throughit and which is wrong.
It should be the opposite. But that's just the world we
live in. But to hear you say that like
this has been a thing in the 70sand the 80s, is it like it's
really easy for me to think, well, this is just because the

(20:42):
Internet. It's not.
It's just, it's, it's literally for eyeballs.
Well, it is magnified by the Internet, but it's just not the
first time I've seen this. We saw it with the the flippers
when they came West and everybody said that that the
they're not, they shouldn't be allowed to do that because the
rods are too long. Then, you know, the guy started

(21:03):
bed fishing. Well, that got as much
attention. That was his big negative
objectors out there and that butwe didn't have Internet, you
know, conjugation partners and didn't like it.
Locals didn't like it, you know,so, but again, so I've been down
this road before. So I and it what disappoints me

(21:24):
more than anything else in my fellow anglers or in in all of
us species called man. And Emerson said it best.
It's not man that disappoints me, it's the lack of man and man
that disappoints me. And that's what I see with this
fishing. Yeah.
Talk about it. Have your opinion about it.

(21:46):
Let's knock it back and forth, you know, like a ping pong ball.
But sooner or later, you know, let let's come to, you know,
reasonable conclusions. And there's nothing reasonable
about banning knowledge and banning this equipment.
I mean, it's just not. I mean, yeah, we need to limit
the extremes in it. And I think bass is trying to do

(22:09):
that. And it's and there's always
extremes. The pendulum swings one way and
then it swings back and somewhere in the middle is where
it eventually hopefully lands. So, and it's just again, you
know, back when y'all went, whenthey went to Albemarle Sound,
there you saw Welker using for fashion to kill those astronomer

(22:35):
to catch those fish better than anybody else.
And I know there's tons of complainers.
I don't look at them. They have nothing they're saying
is worth saying anymore. It's all been said.
But then you had Keith Combs fishing the old way, you know,
and yet the both of them made the top 10.

(22:56):
Basically, they're showing us how to better understand what
the fish are doing. And if you understand that going
dating back into time, then you're going to win.
You know, I was winning back in and I had, you know, I had
complainers coming at me, fisherman's wives going, you
know, it's time to let somebody else win.

(23:19):
The wives come up to me after I win the tournament, and I did.
And it would explore me and because something about the way
I, what I was doing to them wouldn't fare And and I just, I
didn't know it was sex. I didn't know it was supposed to
take turns. And so anyway, but but that was
what was kind of neat about the,the Albemarle sound.

(23:42):
We had the the kind of two two things going on there.
Also when polymic wanted Okeechobee, Okeechobee.
Yeah. Yeah, he was using a little bit
of both. Yeah, he was using, you know,
the big swim baits, the big crank baits.
Yes, he was looking with his forward facing.

(24:03):
He he was trying to improve who he was as an angler and it
worked, you know, and that's allany of these guys, these young
guys are doing. And then they go to the Sabine
River like y'all were last year and you see Japanese singlers in
two of them in the top 10 fish fishing and old saw.

(24:25):
So it's not like they can't do that.
They can do it because they're putting the same energy in it
and they're and they're using the same information they had to
the highest level for facing couldn't help them there.
So they had to look for another source to allow them to do well
and but mostly even then, it wasstill a positive attitude they
had. It just amazes me when I look at

(24:48):
that and even listen to Trey McKinney at Lake Fork, I was
blown away with the detail. He's taking apart a piece of
structure, the detail, the angles, you know, and, and, and,
and and the first person I ever heard in my whole career talk

(25:09):
about how important angles were,was David Fritz.
He could have one stump up there.
And he said, you'll have to findthe right angle to catch the
fish. And I heard that same thing
coming from McKinney. And I go, wow, you know this.
They think he's just sitting up there, you know, looking at him
and then throwing at him. No, he's doing everything else

(25:31):
you're supposed to do to figure out and then again lake Fort
you. I knew this was going to happen
from just watching it and watching the position of fishes.
These four facing guys were werethrowing at that other baits
were going to start to take holdand that's where the industry is
is. I mean, it's good for the
industry, but I knew what's going to happen.

(25:52):
It just going to take some time.We saw this, a bunch of big
strings called throwing big crankbaits.
Yeah, Hammer and him have been throwing jerkbaits and a lot of
guys with the forward fishing. But you're going to see that
expand back into like it did at Lake Fork, into hardbaits, you
know, into jigs, big jigs with, you know, jig and pick so that

(26:14):
they're going to learn how to use Lake Fork, but they're not
going to forget how to use theseother baits.
How do you make a fish strike? It's very difficult with the
baits they've been fishing. So they're going to learn baits
that's going to make them strikeat times better than those MENA
baits now. And it's all about any bait.

(26:34):
The lure is not a lure, it's a tool.
And you got to ask yourself what's the best tool to present
to these fish, what speed to present it at, what angle to
present it at. And those MENA baits don't do a
great job of that. They do their job, but these
other baits at times depending on if you need more speed or

(26:55):
whatever will do a better job. Big crank bait speed is so
critical, you know, and that's when I was forward facing
working mini baits fishing with Cody Huff and I said Connie.
I know if I can move this bait faster they would be hit better,
but I didn't know how. So this is, again, just, you
know, what I have really, really, really enjoyed about,

(27:18):
you know, watching these tournaments is picking up on
that and really understanding the evolution is not over.
And you saw it a lot this year with Ford facing and, and now
harder baits being being broughtinto the picture.
But a lot of these guys can. Don't underestimate these young
anglers and how much they, they really understand that.

(27:39):
I'll guarantee you a lot of the old anglers don't.
Yeah. Yeah, they had the attitude and
the work ethic and and I think also Sabine River did a pretty
good job of showing that for a lot of them.
I mean, Kya was probably 0% taken in fantasy fishing.
Just nobody but but not only to and you of all people would

(28:02):
understand this, but what standsout to me that amazes me not
only what he did to go from forkto Sabine to totally different
things. No forward faces Sonar in play.
And to overcome the fact that hehad a crushing defeat on Sunday,
like, I think it's way understated how amazing his
mental power is to go from what he felt Sunday afternoon, You

(28:27):
know, he was literally in tears backstage.
That's how much that defeat meant to him.
And to go and to be able to be in contention the next week,
regardless of the techniques andeverything is amazing to me.
Yeah, and you know, you've talked about hard work and
that's one of the things that you brought up that I that, that
people forget about. They they think.

(28:49):
And we're, we're, we're creatures that we use our eyes
and we're observing the physical.
We only sometimes get lost in the, you see a football player
and a basketball player and physically how hard they're
working. It's sometimes hard to see with
an angler. I mean, you just especially you,
you know, you see him up there. If he's not making 2000 casts

(29:09):
with a giant crankbait, that's then maybe you can see it.
But if when they're doing spinning rods and they're not
making a lot of casts and that, then that gets lost.
So where's the hard work? The hard work is up here and
it's a heck of a lot of hard work going on and and Cooper
down. I think it's Canadian, right?
He brought that up and he brought that up as Sabine and

(29:32):
that he even enjoyed it. He says I enjoyed this way of
fishing and not how hard you have to work and Kali, I mean
this that was I just it impressed me that he is seeing
that deep into what he's doing. He loves the fact that every

(29:52):
cast, he said like you the the drive to just stay focused.
And if you try to do that, like if anybody tries to do that like
a try. I thought I did.
We were on the live set this week.
We talked about it and I kind ofjoked and I in the media trailer
and I'm like, if you just focused on one thing, if I said
to just focus on that pen on thetable for two minutes, like just

(30:16):
focus on it. And really it's hard to do that
because you're there's distractions, but to just be
that focused with every cast andthat surgical that that says a
lot about you as a human. If you can commit to that and
and that you enjoy that. Avco not only makes incredible
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(30:36):
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Yeah. And that you, you, you have to
learn that it's easy to understand the flipper being
focused on what he's done because everything is right

(30:58):
there, you know, and it's, and Iunderstand me as a caster that I
have to be, I have to expand my focus to wide angle vision
because I am looking at everything, you know, where I
don't, I miss the detail that flipper sees.

(31:20):
You know, that crawfish hole. Exactly when did the fish hit
the bait? The brim suspended under the
dock, you know the limb that thefish came off from within the
tree fall and duplicate that he was in the darkest spot in the
tree fall. And now I go to the next one OK,
and and where I'm a caster wherehe when I might miss a lot of
that detail. I had to train myself to see it

(31:43):
because I'm not that's not what I do.
But the flipper on the other hand has to train himself.
I see that he could chasing menace down the bank 50 yards
across the other side. You know, I see it's a shad
flipping or a subtle strike in the weeds.
But you know, over here, I, I, Iwatch.
So my focus is a lot wide angle vision.

(32:05):
So that and so that so you get into the just the brain is
amazing and, and, and you're in everything you're taking in your
sensory abilities are trying to take in is, you know, ultimately
you have to you have to use all your sensory abilities at the
highest level. And what does that ultimately
accomplish? It accomplish accomplishes you

(32:29):
understanding what the activity the fish are doing.
That's number two. What does it accomplish?
That's number one, you become more alive.
That's the only thing that makesus alive anyway.
That's our sensory ability. So that's the side effect that
most people don't understand. And that's what Cooper
understood, even though he wouldnever probably state it that

(32:52):
way. So that's the that's the beauty
beside of expanding your sensoryabilities to a high, high level.
And this thing called fishing hits the vehicle for Cooper.
And most of the almost any good anger does that.
He may not be he he certainly wouldn't probably put it in
those terms. It's what my old friend used to

(33:12):
say, being consciously competent.
Now, you know, most of most of the anglers aren't consciously
competent in every area, but they're unconsciously competent
and that's not bad in itself. So it's one other thing.
I'm making some notes here. Excuse me.

(33:39):
I think that's kind of, I'm justtrying to cover these events.
I'm really worried I'm watching them because I'm discovering
this stuff. I'm starting to watch these
events more and most of it, it'snot stuff most people are
looking at. Yeah, I love the buzz bait bite
last week when Slopper, yeah, I can't say his name, thank you.

(34:02):
But he he that buzz bait bite, God, that was incredible.
Because that's determines that'swhat I miss most in my elite
tournament or that I'm not there.
It's when I'm watching him catchthose fish that last day in the
morning on the buzz bait, because again, I didn't invent

(34:22):
the buzz bait bite. I popularized it.
Nobody knew about a lunker lure until I won the best chance to
tournament at Percy Priest in 1977 on a lunker lure.
And then ever since then, like alot of things, it went
mainstream. And but watching that bite,
yeah, how I so missed it. And then some other guys, Tito,

(34:46):
I think, was burning a spinner bait and and actually there's
started in the same area. Tito and Patrick did back up
just real close to the Marina there.
But then he ran all the way. He thought a limit real quick.
And then he ran all the way to Taylor's, you know, to try to
catch a Penguin. And that was his plan.
And I'm sitting there going, Oh gosh, don't, don't, don't,
don't, don't leave and pour yourhat, you know, and but that's

(35:10):
just the way I was fishing. It's not certainly my way of
fishing is not always right and and and pollen.
And here's the thing about forward facing and I shut up
about it. My biggest thing I used to do in
term of fishing, if I followed aRobert Frost quote and you
probably know the quote, 2 roadsdiverge in the woods and I chose

(35:34):
the one on this travel and it made all the difference.
And in my career that is absolutely describes it to
perfection. But as time went by and we
taught English more and more about how we fish, that road
less travelled is is less and less available due to GPS, due

(35:57):
to social media, due to anglers following you during the
tournaments, due the coverage intournaments.
It's very, very difficult thoughmy style of fishing now to find
a spot that nobody's fishing, that nobody even understands.
Like when I won the classic in 1984, the guy that filmed me
with both the film crew to me everyday said Rick, he said it

(36:20):
was the final day of the tournament, the third day which
I had to over 75 lbs in the classic.
He said, Rick, I got to tell yousomething.
He said if I hadn't watched you those three days, I would have
swore you cheated because I had fished this river my whole life.
My dad's fished this river his whole life and my granddad's
fished this where you called them.
Nobody ever caught fish. We don't I said, he said.

(36:43):
And so that road that's traveledis how I found I was always
looking for some place that nobody else was going to find.
And now that seems pretty difficult, except with forward
facing. Now they're for for a while they
ever travelling abroad and that nobody was travelling and and

(37:03):
now, yeah, but there's more and more everyday travelling there.
So that's how long is that goinggoing to last?
But then you see, you know, and that's the thing that Paul and
Nick, he won a tournament where most people, even though the
year before Okeechobee, a guy tostay in the Kissimmee River.
But still, that was a road less travel Kissimmee River.
If you went to Okeechobee and the so he was he it's still

(37:27):
there, but you have to kind of it.
It may not be an unknown area, but the way you fish it may be
unknown. And then again, that's what the
Japanese are so good about. They're the best community ho
anglers I've ever seen because they go in there and it's
certainly not a road less travel, but they will figure out

(37:47):
a way to catch them that has notbeen used so.
That is true for for a lot of Japanese anglers that I've
covered over the years, like they as they, they seem to catch
more fish right at the bull rampthan anybody else.
But it's do you think that's just because they're looking for

(38:10):
they do different things or why do you think that is?
Well, yeah, I think because you saw it at first with Aaron
Martins. Where did he get it from?
Yeah, that's the California boyshad They don't have big lakes,
except with Mead. All the California lakes are

(38:30):
small. Everything's pretty much a
community hub. So you have to.
That's where Finesse really thenstarted to pay off.
Even though you know me, I'm a power angler.
And Finesse, I haven't, I haven't embraced, you know,
quickly. And so, but then Aaron really
did so much of the stuff he did had Japanese influence even

(38:53):
before you had these young super, super Japanese anglers
getting involved. So, so no, I just think their
attention to detail, and that's just throughout their culture,
their, you see anything they do,their attention to detail is, is
amazing by far better than most of us.

(39:16):
And that's again, now that that's transferred over into all
the young anglers too. They study that they study, you
know, what these, how, how they're doing it.
And so now it's, it's again, it's an evolution and it's,
it's, it's, it's, it's so neat for me to see because, you know,

(39:41):
it's, there ceases to be an evolution.
And I don't know, it would be a pretty boring world, so.
And fishing set certainly would be.
Do you know more about the tournaments now from watching
coverage than you did competing?Just because you're seeing other
people where you're not just focused on what you would

(40:01):
specifically do. I've known parts of it even
before watching the tournaments,but I didn't realize how
important they were. And it's really magnifying the
importance of certain elements in tournament fishing that
determine the winner. And that part now I'm going

(40:24):
slapping myself upside the head.Rick, you knew that, you knew
that you knew that. Why didn't you do it?
And there are just certain things that that is watching the
whole tournament emphasizes almost tournament after
tournament. Is there one thing specifically
or does that change per tournament?

(40:46):
It's one thing specifically right now, but it's there's more
than one. But the number one thing, and
the Canadians have showed me that, the Johnsons have showed
me that, the the Japanese have showed me that.
And now the young anglers, even though they're doing it two

(41:09):
different ways, they've showed me that.
And it is put yourself in the best area and stay there.
Figure it out. I don't care if it's like why?
How many boats were in Taylor Pile the first day at 8075?
60 to 70, I'd say, And that's probably being conservative,

(41:32):
right? But it's, it's the probably one
of the two best areas and by farthe biggest of the two.
And, and then when you factor inpractice 3 days and you start
doing the mathematics. And this is what I've been
guilty of a lot of times. OK, I know.
And so I stayed away from the best areas because of the

(41:52):
mathematics. Like I've never, I fished in
Taylor Bio, I think one day and,and all the tournaments that
I've fished here and it's because of the mathematics.
The mathematics are three days of practice, let's say 75 of
the, of the anglers era, becausethey all know that now all of

(42:13):
them know pretty much the best areas because we've gone back
and there's only one to 2-3 legsthat have more than one or two,
three winning areas. And if they practice in there
and let's say each one of them catches 5 bass in there 3 days
of practice, you're, you're hooking over them in the

(42:33):
hundreds of Bess. OK, you've already burned 100
Bess in an area. And then all of a sudden, and
that's true of the place where Patrick, the two biggest strings
since the being came from Patrick and I think Tito that
final day, 12 and 11 LB strings,that area is hammered, is
hammered every year and they're burnt like crazy in practice.

(42:56):
And yet they it was it was like nobody ever fished that area the
final day. They mean they were catching
them better. They even admit better than they
had in the past, in the past days.
Well, of course we know that's afunction of pressure.
But at the same time, that's thenumber one thing I know I'm I've

(43:20):
been in it so long. I know most of the best areas I
know out of say ever lake would go to the one or two areas there
going to be 1 and I avoid them because of that.
What I just said, a lot of it's in mathematics.
A lot of it is my early days that I love fishing alone.
You know, I didn't like fishing around other boats, but when

(43:41):
then when you think back on it, most ever terminal 1 is because
I committed to one or two areas and didn't try to fish the whole
whole, whole lake. So it's just yeah, I'm learning
a lot that I wish I could do. I, you know, I, it's, you know,
it's like when you come to tournaments in the year, these

(44:04):
young angers, one thing that really works in their favor is
they don't have a lot of spots. They're not the local that has
50 spots that the first day of the tournament, I got to fish
off 50 of them, you know, because I know, I know, I know.
It's hard, very hard for that's how locals were so easy to beat.
They're not as easy to beat anymore, but they were easy to
beat me every day. So a lot of guys said, how do

(44:25):
you, how do you come to a lake that I've fished my whole life
and beat me And because, and I said, how do you find the best
areas And I'll go, I beat you. I didn't beat you in the best
areas. I beat you because I got more
out of the areas I've found because I committed to you.
Try to fish all of them. Ain't no way you're going to

(44:47):
beat me if you try to fish everyspot, you know.
So it's again, it's committing, it's knowing the best areas,
getting in and figuring out how to outfish you, the guys in
them, what techniques that they're not doing.
When I won, Truman BASSI wanted the first day of practice.
And this is years and years ago,a first day of practice.

(45:09):
I pulled in. It's on a Sunday and there was a
bass club tournament going on and what I considered my best
bank and I and I kind of got mad, you know, and I can't go in
nowhere. And then I said wait a minute,
just sit here and watch. So I sit there and there was 3
boats going down my best bank. The guy in the front was

(45:30):
throwing a spinnerbait and the guy in the back and each boat
was pitching a Jew and I'm watching them and they go down
this what I consider my best bank and they don't catch a
single fish. So I know this area is good and
I've learned over time that areas don't get good, areas do
not get fished out. And so I said, what are they not

(45:51):
doing? They weren't throwing a big
square bill. So I went in behind them.
I picked up a boss of B3 square bill and I went down the bank
and the first log I came to, I burned down the side of it,
bounced off of them at 5, ate it.
Next log, same thing. And I knew I was going to do the

(46:12):
rest of the tournament. That's what I did.
So my point is, the best series,even if you're both serious, if
you can figure out a better way to catch them, you can win.
Yep, I enjoy watching the tournaments.
Yeah, makes me nervous commentating on the tournaments

(46:33):
knowing that you're watching now, Rick, I just discerned.
You, that's what I meant. You're seeing that though.
You're seeing past the obvious that we hear every, every
tournament and that, that, you know, and I wish everybody
could, but mainly because it's so much bigger than than music,
you know, going after and catching the fish.

(46:56):
I've run a Yamaha outboard for over 30 years.
It has got me home safe each andevery time.
If you enjoy this podcast, remember Yamaha supports it and
they care enough about you to make this ad read very short.
Now, back to the show. What do you mean?
I'm seeing past the obvious. Like I said, I'm uncomfortable

(47:18):
having this conversation live, but I also am very intrigued
when you say so. When Rick Klun says that about
you, I want to know what you mean.
Well, it's just like you pointedout the deal with Cooper Gallon,
you pointed out the and the and the hard work ethic every term I
watched. You will point that out as long

(47:40):
as you're not working with ex wrestlers, you don't like the
wrestlers. I didn't say I didn't like the
wrestlers. I just said that you're better
when you're actually pointing out things and, and it's been
one or two things every term. And I noticed when I'm watching
you that he didn't see that 10 years ago.

(48:03):
He didn't, he wasn't capable of talking about it because he
didn't see it. And now he's starting to see it.
And I don't, I take notes on, you know, I've written down on
the other English and what it really intrigued me about what I
saw in that tournament. But then I mean, I must start
taking notes on you. I haven't been so I can answer
your question more directly about what am I talking about.

(48:26):
Well, I'm just intrigued to knowwhat what you see because 'cause
you're freaking Rick Clunt and you're a big deal to me.
So we're going to do this after every event we're going to,
you're going to watch and take notes and then we're just going
to we're just going to break it down.

(48:46):
I like it. No, and like I said, it's just
my view. So I want to emphasize that to
people. Just my view and there's many,
many views on it. I I'm just looking at it through
my past eyes and my and, and because you know, and again, it
just shows me how much what I enjoy about it, what I didn't

(49:08):
like about it. And but and mostly it's I love
watching this, this youth and this and the and the the glass
is half full instead of half empty or half.
Which way which way is that work?
Kind of said that wrong but and they they discussed such was
just. The.
Positive way, mental attitude. Yeah.

(49:28):
Yeah, positive. Incredibly.
And there's incredible things happening.
You look at Easton, what Easton's done and no and it
everybody's gonna. This would have been his fifth
cut in a row, his fifth championship Sunday in a row and
he had a fish care penalty on day one and missed.
That by three oz. Or it would have been his fifth.

(49:50):
Yeah, I didn't know that. Yeah.
Oh yeah. But it's amazing to see there.
There is a lot of cool stuff going on.
But again, if we talk about other stuff, it'll get more
traffic. But some conversations are way
more freaking important than traffic.
And you are that, my friend. Yeah, and all of them young

(50:11):
anglers, they have to be careful.
Don't become old. But but do because it's good.
They do, but I mean, I mean, mentally don't become old
because it will hit them. They're they're, they're
gathering more knowledge. They're gathering, gathering

(50:32):
more reasons to fail and and they got to keep up with that
with more reasons to succeed andyou can't.
So what do you do about that? Did you become old throughout
your career at times? Mentally, sure, yeah, I even see
some young handlers that are becoming old, but they're
they're that I've had a talk with a few of them and I tell

(50:56):
them how to, hey, here's the here's the way Your awareness of
it is the first step. And then your awareness of of,
you know, health stay positive because that's not easy.
We, we live in a life every day that you can't turn on anything

(51:17):
and not somebody's not sick or dying.
And every commercial you see on tells you a medicine you can
take, but the 28 things that youthat's going to make it worse.
And then if the medicine worked,I mean, it's all that kind of
stuff and it, it wears you down.And fishing's no different.
You know you got you got more reasons to succeed but to fail

(51:39):
then you use to succeed. As you as you getting cold, cold
experience, how do you deal withthem becomes the real challenge.
Well, I got to be honest Rick, you brought the fire.
I mean I've enjoyed all our conversations, but I feel like
you you have been away. I don't know what happened but

(52:00):
in this time off you have got more fire and energy and I
freaking love it. Yeah, I do too.
And of course I've been struggling with, you know, with
that. And I and Melissa actually made
me start watching the tournaments.
This was her ideal, I think, unless you got involved in it

(52:22):
and I don't know about it, but it's the same time.
Yeah. I was in the middle of the game
for over 50 years. And the boy being in the middle
is it's it's, it's a very, it's like looking through a pinhole
at this sport. You know, when you're on the
outside, you know that then you get to see a lot more of it.

(52:45):
And I said that told you about that with the cast series.
All of a sudden I got I had gamefilm I could watch.
I know unlike any other athlete after a pro game or a college
game or even a high school game,he go back and watch the game
film and appreciate it at a higher level.
So that's kind of what I'm getting to do.

(53:06):
I look forward to it. My only wish is we started this
earlier in the season, but guesswhat?
Yeah, right. I know Melissa pushed me here
just a month or so ago and said why don't we do this?
And I don't know when she first talking to you and I I at first
I typical to me being again, I'mguilty of this old mentality at

(53:28):
times all too often. And I just said no, no, no, no,
no, I don't want to. I don't want to sit there.
And because here's the here's the here is the negative side to
this. I'm going to bring it, bring it
up. I, I don't know if I have his
name, but I think ever said St. John's no Albemarle sound.
Maybe you'll remember this guy, this young kid that swung, he

(53:51):
said I'm I swung A7 pounder. He swung a 7 1/2 pounder in the
boat. What's the what was his name?
Do you? Know.
Yeah, and I and I looked at thatand I saw myself OK a couple of
times. I'm going to swing that fish.
OK, I'm going to swing that. And to the tournament.
I won my career, I swung fish inthe 8 LB range and they come off

(54:12):
in the air and landed in the boat.
So I'm so bad when they tell him, OK, more bad thing.
And that's what I had to tell myself.
When they swung, when they fell in the boat, I said I created
the reason it came off by swinging him.
Fortunately, they came in the boat.
More bad things can happen when you're swinging A7 and a half
eight pounder than good things. So but when he said that, I felt

(54:35):
his energy and his enthusiasm, but I wanted to correct him.
OK, That's the that's the dangerof me talking about it.
I don't have the right to correct them.
But I wanted to say, come on here.
OK, let me tell you if you're going to do that, because I did
it my whole life. Here's a couple steps before you
do that and he probably doesn't.And then go ahead and swing.
But remember, see, I had a rule.I finally had a rule.

(54:57):
Don't swing anything, you know, over 4 lbs And even then make
eye contact where the hooks at. So they, they did it funny.
It was funny. It just intrigued me because I,
I knew exactly he did evidently told his camera guys and I'm
going to swing them. I'm going to swing them all.
I'm going to swing them all today.

(55:18):
I, I try to teach my kids and it's the same theory, but I say
risk verse reward like in everything in life, not fishing,
but if you're gonna do something, what is the reward if
it goes well and what is what are you risking if it goes
wrong? You know, and then.
I mean. I've many times put it in the
wrong side in the. Wrong.

(55:38):
I have a couple seconds to make that decision.
Not they, they have more hopefully, but.
But it's, that's a way to look at things.
But thank you for doing this. I'm excited, I'm excited.
I can't, I can't wait to, to do these after each event.
And, and I love having you in mylife, Rick.

(56:02):
And I think the world's a happier place when you're, I
mean, I'm happier anyways when you're in my life, so.
This gives. Us an excuse to do things.
Of course, the next ones won't be as long.
You know, we'll make them shorter.
And I will stay out of the out of the.
I don't know if I will or not. I'm not even going to promise.

(56:23):
Don't make promises you. Can't keep.
All right. Well, hey, and listen, I just
thought of it. Remember when we were trying to
figure out what to call your segment before and we ended up
just calling it Klunde because we never were happy with
anything. There was a suggestion at that
time, and neither of us liked itbecause you were about to retire

(56:44):
and it had a different connotation.
But the suggestion was conclusion.
And I honestly think that's a perfect name for this because
it's your conclusion from the tournament.
You're going to watch it, you'regoing to make some notes and
you're going to say, hey, this is what I.
Think that's no, that's definitely more appropriate for
what we'll be doing. Yeah, All right, Well, stay

(57:07):
tuned. Another conclusion coming up
after 10 Killer. That's right, next one.
Thank you, Rick. Appreciate it.
I'm smiling. Are you smiling?
I mean, I, I just, I get happierwhen I hear from Rick Klun and I
hope you guys are the same. He is truly an absolute gift to

(57:29):
this industry and I am so thankful to sponge off his
knowledge just a little bit. So stay tuned for conclusions.
That was just a little tiny babylittle sample of what it's going
to be like because we did some catching up.
We talked about, well, you know,we talked about a bunch of

(57:50):
different things, but he's goingto break down each event, after
every single event and we're allgoing to benefit from it, I
think. And I want to, Speaking of
benefiting from something, I want to say thank you to whoever
was that throughout conclusion back.

(58:14):
If you look over a year ago whenwe were doing the first Klun
residency for his final season on the Elites, his 50th season
of competition, I didn't know his final season.
Actually at the time, I knew it was 50th.
Maybe the fact that we both didn't like conclusion maybe
could have given us a little hint there, but I didn't want to
know regardless. But it was his 50th season and

(58:37):
we didn't like conclusion at that time.
But I think conclusion works perfectly for this segment.
So thank you very much. He is going to give his his
conclusion after 10 killer afterwhere we going next, Oh, St.
Clair and then we're going to lacrosse.

(58:59):
So the final three events of 2025 and hopefully for a long
time in the future. I hope you enjoyed this
conversation half as much as I did.
And I know people say that, but I honestly believe it.
If you enjoyed it half as much as I did, then I know you
enjoyed it a lot. Have a great week, Kate.
Do me a favor. Let's all welcome Rick Klund

(59:20):
back to the show. Let's hear it in the comments.
If you're excited to have Rick Klum back on the show, let me
know in the comments. Make sure you like, comment,
subscribe, do all of those things that help stroke the
algorithm and help keep the growgoing for this particular show.
Have a wonderful week, enjoy being, and until next time, Bob

(59:43):
Cobb, take it away. Thanks for watching.
Please like, comment and subscribe because Bob Cobb of
the Bass Masters told you to youhere.