The Mississippi River Anglers Association conducted its fifth 2018/19 Winter Trail Tournament Saturday February 2nd on Lake Chicot with 15 boats fishing in the tournament on a beautiful spring like day. Unfortunately I feel, most of the bass didn’t realize what a beautiful day it was and continued to stay hid from us for the better part of the day! Fishing on Lake Chicot Saturday was again slow with only two limits being caught and five zero’s recorded, but hay we could’ve been working, right!
Last Saturday on Lake Chicot, first place went to a team from Arkansas, who also won the last tournament here, Steve Tullos and David Streeter, their 5 bass limit, which include two bass caught after 2:50, weighed in at a nice 17.08 lbs., second place went to the father and son team from Clarksdale, Glen Brooks and Matt Brooks, their 5 bass limit weighed in at 15.85 lbs., third place went to a team from Brandon, Bart Ballard and Justin Thomas, their 4 bass weighed in at 14.70 lbs., coming in 4th place was a team also from Brandon, Chris Coy and Rudy Vanderford, Chris’s brother Andy substituted for Rudy and their 3 bass weighed in at 11.77, which included the tournament lunker of 6.55 lb. Congratulations to all the money winners, y’all earned it for sure.
MRAA 2018/19 Winter Trail Results Lake Chicot II 2/2/2019:
| Place | Angler 1 | Angler 2 | # Fish | Pounds | Winnings | |
| 1 | Steve Tullos | David Streeter | 5 | 17.08 | $775.00 | |
| 2 | Glen Brooks | Matt Brooks | 5 | 15.85 | $385.00 | |
| 3 | Bart Ballard | Justin Thomas | 4 | 14.70 | $230.00 | |
| 4 | Chris Coy | Rudy Vanderford | 3 | 11.77 | $410.00* | |
| 5 | Jene Jones | Taff Hitt | 2 | 11.69 | ||
| 6 | Billy Hopkins | Taylor Flemming | 2 | 6.81 | ||
| 7 | Ryan Cummins | 1 | 3.99 | |||
| 8 | Reid Stewart | Brad Hayes | 1 | 3.04 | ||
| 9 | Tim McDaniel | Terry Bates | 1 | 3.02 | ||
| 10 | Mac Hutson | Taylor Hutson | 1 | 2.45 | ||
| 11 | Joey Beevers | Bobby Burton | 0 | |||
| 11 | Kenny Vanderford | Grant Allen | 0 | |||
| 11 | Todd Lott | Jim Goodman | 0 | |||
| 11 | Tad Keller | Michel Hayes | 0 | |||
| 11 | Daniel Clark | Thad Shelby | 0 | |||
| Charles Hughes | David Huggins | |||||
| Jason Lunceford | Andy Graves | |||||
| Mike Ainsworth | Josh Goodman | |||||
| Newton Ford | Jonathan Kent | |||||
| Patrick Chapman | Rusty Linaras | |||||
| Josh McGee | Kyle Wester | |||||
| Marty Crain | ||||||
| Matthew Bates | Brandon Williams | |||||
| Eddi Gibson | ||||||
| Scott Mitchell | Jay Mitchell | |||||
| Gordon Watkins | John Hadad III | |||||
| John Polasini | Reeves Polasini | |||||
| Jay Pickle | Pat Pickle | |||||
| Lawson Davis | Matt Battman | |||||
| Randy Bolden Jr. | ||||||
| Ryan Grey | Michel Coomes | |||||
| Johnathan Sulton | Colby Sulton | |||||
| Pete Christian | Jay Smith |
*=Lunker
Our sixth and final 2018/19 MRAA Winter Trail Tournament is supposed to be at Eagle Lake instead of Lake Washington on March 2nd. This a reschedule of our first tournament that was supposed to have been at Eagle back in October, but was moved due to a fish kill. Now with that being said, the Mississippi River is in the process of rising to several feet above flood stage in Greenville before the end of the month, even though the river forecast is not showing it yet. Today’s predictions is for the crest to be between 55-56 feet on the Greenville gauge, that is seven to eight feet above flood stage on the Greenville gauge, and it may go higher than that. Vicksburg will get the same water that Greenville’s getting, so this may make it impossible to get to Eagle Lake. Right now the plan is still to fish Eagle Lake, however if the river go over Hwy 465 leading to Eagle Lake, we’ll have no choice but to move the tournament back to Lake Washington. NOW WITH THAT BEING SAID, we’re all just going to have to wait a couple of weeks to see how all this plays out, but it’s not looking good for Eagle right now.
Fishermen please remember to support our sponsors below, without their help our trail would not be what it is, so again, please support them when you can.
MRAA 2018/19 Winter Trail Point Standing after five tournaments:
| Place | Angler 1 | Angler 2 | Points |
| 1 | Steve Tullos | David Streeter | 547.75 |
| 2 | Tim McDaniel | Terry Bates | 532.00 |
| 3 | Joey Beevers | Bobby Burton | 528.40 |
| 4 | Chris Coy | Rudy Vanderford | 505.80 |
| 5 | Todd Lott | Jim Goodman | 443.70 |
| 6 | Kenny Vanderford | Grant Allen | 429.39 |
| 7 | Bart Ballard | Justin Thomas | 399.34 |
| 8 | Newton Ford | Jonathan Kent | 397.74 |
| 9 | Jason Lunceford | Andy Graves | 389.59 |
| 10 | Mike Ainsworth | Josh Goodman | 380.54 |
| 11 | Jene Jones | Taff Hitt | 367.90 |
| 12 | Mac Hutson | Taylor Hutson | 347.10 |
| 13 | Glen Brooks | Matt Brooks | 320.40 |
| 14 | Josh McGee | Kyle Wester | 272.51 |
| 15 | Marty Crain | 236.30 | |
| 16 | Reid Stewart | Brad Hayes | 202.52 |
| 17 | Charles Hughes | David Huggins | 188.67 |
| 18 | Matthew Bates | Brandon Williams | 187.31 |
| 19 | Tad Keller | Michel Hayes | 182.74 |
| 20 | Daniel Clark | Thad Shelby | 163.45 |
| 21 | Gordon Watkins | John Hadad III | 115.40 |
| 22 | Patrick Chapman | Rusty Linaras | 114.88 |
| 23 | John Polasini | Reeves Polasini | 109.79 |
| 24 | Scott Mitchell | Jay Mitchell | 107.85 |
| 25 | Jay Pickle | Pat Pickle | 103.13 |
| 26 | Billy Hopkins | Taylor Flemming | 101.81 |
| 27 | Lawson Davis | Matt Battman | 100.90 |
| 28 | Randy Bolden Jr. | 99.77 | |
| 29 | Ryan Cummins | 97.99 | |
| 30 | Ryan Grey | Michel Coomes | 96.82 |
| 31 | Johnathan Sulton | Colby Sulton | 95.39 |
| 32 | Eddi Gibson | 80.00 | |
| 33 | Pete Christian | Jay Smith | 73.93 |
