“I am sure it’s going to be a tough one. The water has been up, but I just checked and for the past couple of days it has been falling. I was kind of hoping for high water so there would be a bush bite. That’s how guys caught them in the PAA on Table Rock a few years ago.”

He expects there will be a shallow-water bite for largemouths next week and a deep-water bite for spotted bass and smallmouth, although the smallmouth probably will not be much of a factor.

“You might catch one accidentally, but they are not something to target because they move so much. They are here one day and gone the next,” he said.

Arey also predicted it will not be a heavy-weigh tournament.

“I think if you can catch 10 to 15 pounds a day it will be a big factor. It’s a phenomenal fishing lake and they weigh in 20-pound bags out there, but it’s fishing a lot tougher right now. We’ll be there for the worst week of the year, but that’s typical for Labor Day about anywhere you go in the country.

“And it’s the same for everybody. That’s what I love about competitive fishing – figuring them out.”

Arey is coming off a good, if not spectacular year on the FLW Tour – finishing 22nd in the points standings and 18th in the Forrest Wood cup on Louisiana’s Red River two weeks ago – is hoping to hold his own in the PAA standings at Table Rock. He is ranked No. 5 going into the Table Rock tournament after finishing 9th in the PAA Series tournament on Douglas Lake in March and 12th in the PAA tournament on Fort Loudon-Tellico in May.

“My goal is to stay in the top five in the points so I don’t have to worry about going to Grand Lake,” he said.

Since anglers are allowed to drop their lowest placing tournament, Arey is already qualified for the Toyota Texas Bass Classic (TTBC) to be held October 4-6, 2013 at Lake Conroe in Conroe, Texas, but this is a split year on the PAA circuit with double-qualifying set up for anglers to fish the 2014 TTBS next May at Lake Fork in Alba, Texas.

If he manages to stay in the top 5 in points through the Table Rock tournament he will also qualify for the 2014 TTBA. However, if he slips, he would have to travel to Grand Lake at Grove, Okla., Nov. 8-10, to fish the final qualifier for 2014.

The TTBC takes the top 15 anglers from PAA, B.A.S.S. and FLW for a shootout of the best of the best each year.

Arey said he is already feeling some excitement for another major championship – the 2014 Forrest Wood Cup, which will be held on Lake Murray near Columbia, S.C., next Aug. 14-17 – because it will be just a short two-hour drive from his home in Shelby.

But he is not allowing that excitement to get him too worked up at this point, he said.

“I’ve never fished Lake Murray past April before, just pre-spawn and spawn, so I’ve never been down on the lake in the summertime. The last time the Forrest Wood cup was held on Lake Murray was in 2008 and I only fished half the FLW season that year so I did not have an opportunity to fish it,” Arey said.

“I’m extremely excited, but I told my wife when we left Louisiana (after the Forrest Wood Cup on the Red River) that I don’t even want to talk about it until after June next year. The last Tour event next year is the last week of June so I will basically have a whole month to fish Lake Murray.”

 

Professional Anglers Association (PAA )

Sept 5-7, 2013

Table Rock Lake

Call 270-527-2030

www.fishpaa.com