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By John Hartsock
jhartsock@altoonamirror.com
After winning a Pennsylvania state championship this past April, a pair of young bass fishermen from Bedford County have gone on to place third nationally in the Bassmaster Junior National Championship for fishermen ages 13-and-under.
Alex Fitzpatrick, who will be a ninth-grade student at Chestnut Ridge High School this fall, and Ander Cowan, who will be an eighth-grader at the Everett Junior High School, teamed up to place third in the national event held July 29-30 on Tennessee's Carroll County 1,000 Acre Recreational Lake in Huntingdon, TN.
In the two-day event, Fitzpatrick and Cowan caught a total of eight largemouth bass - four each day - weighing a total of 17 pounds, two ounces.
A total of 65 boats and 130 fishermen were entered in the competition, which was won by the Texas team of Mark Cerja, Jr. and Gus Richardson, who caught 10 bass weighing a total of 18 pounds, five ounces.
The Tennessee team of Owen Ray and Camdyn Cranfill, with eight bass weighing a total of 17 pounds, 3 ounces, finished second.
Fitzpatrick, who is 14 but was eligible for the tournament because he won't be a ninth-grader until this fall, and Cowan, 13, earned $500 in college scholarship money by finishing as the event's third-place team.
The first and second-place teams earned $2,000 and $1000, respectively, in scholarship money.
Fitzpatrick and Cowan fished out of a Ranger bass boat that was commandeered by Fitzpatrick's father, John.
"We wanted to finish among the top 10 teams - that was our goal,'' John Fitzpatrick said. "The kids did very good. They were patient, they fished slow, and they didn't give up.
"They fished their hearts out, they were determined to do well, and that's what put them over the top,'' John Fitzpatrick added.
The team's game plan was to fish in the deeper water of the lake.
"We fished off the shore, kind of in the middle of the lake, because there was a lot of fishing pressure along the docks near the shore,'' Alex Fitzpatrick said. "Being in the middle of the lake helped us to catch bigger fish.''
The teams had three days of practice on the lake leading up to the two-day event. The weather was very hot, especially during the practice sessions, Alex said.
"The heat bothered us a little bit, definitely in the three days of practice leading up to the tournament,'' Alex said. "But over the three days, we had time to get used to the heat.''
John Fitzpatrick said that the air temperature reached 100 degrees, and the water temperature reached 87 degrees - making for some slower fishing.
Using a rubber worm, Cowan fooled the biggest fish caught by the team -- a bass weighing 7 pounds, 1 ounce -- in the final two hours on the second day of fishing.
"I was very thrilled,'' Cowan said. "It was the biggest bass that I've ever caught in my life. As soon as we pulled it into the boat, my legs started shaking.''
A productive day of fishing on the second day pulled the Fitzpatrick-Cowan team up from seventh place to third.
"I'm very happy,'' Alex Fitzpatrick said. "I didn't expect to do as well as we did.''
The two fishermen are currently also competing in the high school bass fishing series, and hope to qualify for the state tournament in that division at Lake Raystown this October.