The team of Brown and Long top the field on the Nanticoke River
The 3rd tournament of the MBN Trail events took place on Sunday, June 28th on the Nanticoke River out of Sharpstown. Weights would be low and tight except for the top few finishers in the event.
The team of Vic Brown and Donald Long ended up winning the event with a total of 10.60 pounds for their best 5 fish limit. They also caught the big fish of the tournament coming in at 4.14 pounds. This was a very well-deserved win for this team considering the nightmare road trip they had driving to the event that morning. The events that happened on their drive to the tournament is something that you just can’t make up.
Vic was getting on the road and said, “I stepped on the gas to get up to high speed, and I felt a slam like a really bad down shift, something didn’t feel right, looked back and part of the trailer is in the other lane.” “When we pulled to the shoulder to stop, the trailer tongue was under the truck.” A tow truck comes by and asked them if they needed some help ( for a fee of $50 ).” I said yes and Don and the other 2 guys pick the tongue up and set it back on the ball.” While checking the damage, Vic noticed the spare tire broke off the carrier. “We started looking for it, It’s 50 feet behind us gently standing against the guardrail like someone sat it there.” After a quick stop at the Wawa, “we realize the trailer won’t back up, surge brake would engage.” “We lock the surge brake out and it’s fine so we’ll just do that at the ramp.” Vic figured, “we still have plenty of time.” “Coming down Eldorado Road – not 10 minutes from the ramp, all the sudden everything went black for a second and it felt like we had gotten T-boned.” Vic’s partner Don said at the very last second, he has seen a deer. Vic said, “the air bags deployed and I forced the door open and got out.” Vic gets on the phone and started making an insurance claim while Don looked for the deer. “I go through 20 minutes of questions from the insurance company and send pics of everything.” After all that, Vic says, ” let’s go fishing, nope, truck won’t start.” Vic said the battery died from sitting with the hazards on for so long. “Thank god, I had a jump box in the boat.” They made it to the tournament and finally get to go fishing.
Vic’s plan for the day was to run straight up towards Seaford. They ended up at the draw bridge at 7am and it’s not moving. Their plan was to start at the train bridge anyway. Don flips in with a bitsy bug. “I think I’m getting a bite, I think this is a fish.” “Don sets the hook, I go for the net and that was what ended up being lunker caught around 7:15am.” After a short time, they ran up to catch the first opening of the bridge and hit a wood bank that Vic said he was catching fish on the previous weekend and nothing. Vic said, they went further up the river to hit some docks. “In my head it’s, here we go, this big one is the only fish we’re weighing in.” Just before 10:00, Vic cast under a dock with a senko and caught a 2 1/2 pounder. “We go to the next dock, spend 15 minutes and nothing.” “I decided to throw a ned rig and pulled 3 keepers off the same dock, that’s our limit.” Once the tide was almost completely out, they returned to a bank they had previously fished and Don catches one around 15″ which ended up being a great cull. It’s now close to 1:00, “not knowing how long the bridge would take to open, we decided to run back.” They ran back towards the weigh in to possibly upgrade some fish. Vic said, they knew they had a decent limit so they didn’t want to push their weigh in time and decided to call it a day. Their total weight came in a 10.60 pounds which was the only double-digit weight of the day and they had big fish of the day at 4.14 pounds. Vic said, “it was the best worst day I ever had.”
The team of Brett Winegardner and Craig Winegardner would take 2nd place with a total of 9.82 pounds. Brett said that after practice with only a few small keepers, they decided to fish north of the launch. Craig caught 2 fish early in the day on a frog in the pads. Then they ended up chasing the falling tide, fishing wood all day. They ended up catching about 8 keepers total.
After 3 events, the team of Mike and Richard Roselle is leading in points while Brett and Craig Winegardner are second. Justin Bronson and Thad Loor are 3rd and Ken Eng and Kevin Maccallini are 4th. Vic Brown and Don Long jumped to 5th in the standings with their win and are tied with Michael Stegman and John Burdette.
Stay tuned for the last trail event which takes place in October at Deep Creek Lake.
