Men's Journal

Mike Iaconelli Photo credit: Courtesy Michael Engelmeyer

For Mike Iaconelli, a fixture on the pro circuit for nine years, a fanatical attention to detail lands the biggest fish.

by Zach Braun

”It’s easy for people who don’t fish to stereotype,” says Mike Iaconelli, former Bassmaster Classic champ and 2006 Angler of the Year.

“They say, ‘Oh, fishing? What’s the big deal? You throw the bait out and you just sit there.’”

Don’t say that to Iaconelli. Even after 23 years of fishing, the sport still drives Ike crazy — but it also keeps him sane, keeps him awake at night, rocks him to sleep, inhabits his dreams, and dictates his agenda during daylight hours.

“What people don’t realize is what I love the most about fishing: figuring out all the variables on the table.” There’s the size of the fish, how to mimic the forage, the clarity of the water, its temperature, its depth, the wind. “Once that fish bites, that’s the puzzle almost solved, then comes the fight” Iaconelli says. Letting a big fish play and tire itself out. And once you net that fish, that’s the actuality of it all coming together.”

But at the end of the day it’s all about trying to find, then fool, an animal that doesn’t follow rules. And it’s this hunt and chase that both drives Ike crazy and keeps him sane.

Go Where the Wind Blows

Other sports push you into an arena, an enclosed space. In fishing you have to adjust to a living, breathing, sometimes unpredictable environment.

And sometimes that means running for cover. “I was fishing Old Hickory Lake, outside Nashville,” Iaconelli remembers. “Suddenly the sky got green, the wind picked up, and a tornado came off the hill just a few hundred yards from my boat and started sucking up the lake water. It was heading right in our direction. We scampered to the nearest bank, beached the boat, and just watched the tornado go right past us.”

But even on a perfect day, there’s no variable more important than the weather. “With a falling barometer, fish feed; when it’s rising, they don’t. Or if a storm’s on the way, they’ll feed like a mother, because they know bluebird days are coming,” he says. His first year as a pro, Ike competed in a tournament in Manning, South Carolina. When he arrived the weather was cold. “I had an amazing practice, but I was only practicing for one pattern. Over the course of three days, it got warmer and warmer, and on the last day I didn’t boat a single keeper. It taught me that you’ve always got to have a plan A, a plan B, a plan C.”

Seek the “Thick Stuff”

“When I first get to a lake I’ve never been to, I can see that area off the bank that’s worn down a bit,” Iaconelli warns. “I know that’s where everybody stands and fishes.” That’s the last place Iaconelli wants to be. “The thing about big fish is that they’re old fish, smart and elusive. So I go where you’d never think in a million years of casting a lure, in the ‘thick stuff ’ — weeds, matted vegetation, lily pads, under a dock, or in a tree that’s fallen into the water.”

There’s a reason most fishermen avoid debris like it’s diseased: It’s a recipe for disaster and lost tackle. So Iaconelli uses a method he calls “punching,” where he puts a tungsten weight on the head of a plastic worm and pays special attention to his line (“the one piece of equipment that gets overlooked”), using a braided line, more like a thin rope than regular nylon. “Lob it up high to gain momentum, and it’ll come crashing down through that thick cover,” he explains. But some debris requires a different approach. “I grew up outside Philly, doing a lot of urban fishing,” Iaconelli says. “I’ve caught some real good fish right out of shopping carts and sunken cars. Fish like to hang around cover for comfort, shade, and protection from ambush. If you stick people in a room they’ve never been in, and there’s a chair or a bar to lean on, all people will go to the objects.”

A Lure for Every Fish

In a sport that lends itself to body shapes on the rounder end of the spectrum, Iaconelli’s lean frame is a result of a regular fitness routine of sit-ups, push-ups, and free weights. Why bother? “I’ve had guys count how many casts I throw in a day — one guy from The New York Times clocked me at 2,500 casts in one day.”

It’s not all about power. “A long cast is just one technique — you have top use the right one for the situation.” His repertoire also features the Exact cast, the Flip, the Pitch, the Skip, the Pitch-Skip, the Overhand Roll, the Side-hand Roll. “In deep water, my favorite technique is ‘drop-shotting,’ using a fluorocarbon line with a weight below the bait to get it down to the bottom,” Iaconelli says. “You really don’t even need to cast, just toss your bait over the side of the boat.”

But it’s lures that really allow him to diversify. “We carry lures as tools, like a mechanic carries different-size wrenches,” Ike says. To cover all the zones from top to bottom, Iaconelli relies on five or six different basic types (see below).

“Someone just picking up fishing can be overwhelmed by the variety of colored baits. The golden rule is ‘match the hatch’ — look around and pick the color that mimics the forage. So if there’s a lot of crawfish, use greens and browns and oranges, like lobster colors. The clearer the water, the more natural or translucent your bait should be. The muddier the water, the more you want brightness or contrast, so the fish will pick up on it.”

But preparing for everything a tournament can throw at you is a whole different animal: “I’ve got 1,000 pounds of lures and 35 rods and reels in my boat,” Iaconelli says. “The average guy may not need that, but I’m trying to dial in to what the fish are doing. I like leaving as little to chance as possible.”

Sometimes that means making your own modifications. “Big fish don’t want a small meal. They like a big presence, so sometimes I’ll ‘pork’ the lure. That’s where I add two pieces of pork rind to the lure, the fat side facing up at one end, facing down at the other.”

The One-Hour Rule

For Iaconelli, as for all fishermen, there are still those “goose egg” days when nothing bites. “It’s easy to get frustrated,” he warns, “trying to figure out if they’re not biting because you’re in the wrong place, or if you’re using the wrong lure. I have an ‘hour rule’: If they’re not biting after one hour, you either move or change the bait. If you were trying to catch them in 12-foot water without a bite, it’s the heat of summer, and a cold front’s coming through, go deeper. If you’re in 10-foot water in spring and it’s cloudy and rainy, go shallow.”

Above all, don’t get frustrated. “The really nice thing when you fail is: You’ve acquired new knowledge. I’m 35 years old. When I’m 45 I’ll be that much better an angler because that’s 10 more years of fish behavior I’ll have logged.” And, yes, he means logged. Iaconelli has a devotion to disciplined preparation that makes OCD look spontaneous. It started with keeping exhaustive fishing journals as a teenager. “I still keep a record of everything, good or bad, that happened in a tournament,” Iaconelli says. “Which guys did well, what they did, what the guys who didn’t catch fish didn’t do. I make zipper folders on every lake — with my past experiences, physical maps, old articles on the area, historical information from state agencies — and I just keep adding to that. You start to see patterns over time.”

And once you see the patterns, everything else falls into place. “There are some days when you master all elements,” Iaconelli says. “I won this tournament in Lake Seminole a few years ago. By the fourth day I actually knew before the fish would bite; I just knew. What was happening was: As the fish went by my crankbait lure, it would create a small draft. I was so in tune with everything, I actually started to feel the draft against the bait underneath the water. I still get goosebumps when I think about it.”

Mike Iaconelli’s Five Essential Lures For All Depths:

• Jig: A great imitator of crayfish, it can be fished through thick cover. Ike uses a 1/2 ounce Mann’s Stone Jig.
• Spinnerbait: Imitates small-school bait fish and covers a lot of water. His fave: 3/8 ounce white Stanley Wedge.
• Worm: Can be rigged with or without weight. Ike likes the Berkley Power Worm in blue fleck or black.
• Crankbait: Rattles and wobbles, luring bass even in dirty water. Ike’s choice: Berkley Frenzy Floating Flicker Shad.
• Topwater: Floats like it’s wounded or in distress. “Most fun lure in the world,” Ike says. He likes the Rebel Pop-R.

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