Thank You to all that submitted stories to the Mustad Slow Death Success Story Contest! From the response, many of you have experienced a lot of great fish-catching success using the Slow Death Hooks and technique.
Over the past 6 months we chose 4 winners each month from the stories submitted, and out of those 24 we chose our Grand Prize Winner!
Congradulations to Mike Vorderstrasse of Parker, Colorado! As our Grand Prize Winner, Mike receives the following:
- To fish a 2010 AIM Tournament Practice Day with your choice of one of the following Mustad Pro Staffers; Gary Parsons, Keith Kavajecz, or Chase Parsons.
- Co-Angler entry fee paid for an AIM Pro Walleye Series Tournament.
- Room/Lodging for the days of the AIM tournament covered.
Below is Mike's Winning Mustad Slow Death Hook Success Story:
I currently own a trailer house at Lake McConaughy in Ogallala Nebraska. I have been an avid fisherman my entire life, walleyes for the past 14 years. I first used the slow death hooks on 05/29/2009, I pulled up to an Armada of boats who weren't catching much, followed the directions and was shocked. I didn't have my other rod in the holder and the 1st rod was doubled over, the second rod went when I was taking the hook out. I turned the boat around before everyone could move in and caught my next two. I was completely shocked, I was back on the trailer with my limit in 15 minutes. It was so sweet.
The next day I took out a good friend, John Moore, who has really struggled the last few years at catching any walleyes. He had the best morning of fishing in approximately 5+ years. We caught our limit extremely fast and fun fished for 3 hours after. There was the biggest tourney on the lake that day and no one could figure out what we were doing, I felt like the man! When we arrived at the park John's wife asked how many fish he caught, he looked at me with a HUGE smile and said, "Mike, am I out of line if I say I caught 40?" my answer "Dude, we used 6 dozen night crawlers in 4 hours and they were cut in half, so no you are not out of line." I talked to him two days ago and he thanked me again.
The best slow death day was the Fathers day fishing tournament 2009. You could fish two father son teams out of one boat. I fished with my 5 year old son Brooks and my neighbor Jeff White and his 9 year old son Kohl. Jeff has a lot of 
family at the lake and it seems like he doesn't get to take his son out fishing more than 4 or 5 times a year, so this with it being my sons first tournament put a lot of pressure on me to catch fish and needing a way that the boys could do it themselves. It was also a Colorado Walleye Associations tourney on the lake that day, so there were a lot of boats. Our tourney had 35 boats, it was an all species tourney and I decided we should focus on walleye initially and then the other species. We proceeded to pound the fish instantly. We had the local retired know it all fishermen following us around and continually asking, "What are you guys doing?" All I said was, “Catching fish, what are you doing?" The true beauty of this moment was all that Jeff and I were doing was baiting, netting, untangling, keeping and releasing fish, the boys did it all, Jeff and I never reeled in a fish. There were plenty of high fives going around. There were multiple times we didn't have a rod in the water, sometimes it was like the gong show, it was so fun. If you don't believe me when I say this you can check the tourney results, we were the only boat in the Father Son Tourney to weigh walleye. I would say the boys caught a total of 40 to 50 walleyes that morning. Kohly had never caught a limit of walleyes, well not only did he catch a limit; he won the biggest walleye and also won the heaviest stringer of walleye. Kohl had is picture in the local Keith County newspaper, won two trophies and was the proudest kid in the whole Vans Lakeview community that weekend. It was really cool. Jeff is so thankful that his son was able to do so well. Mustad, I am so thankful for this product and especially for them memories that none of us will ever forget.
God Bless,
Mike Vorderstrasse
Congrats Again Mike - and Thanks for entering!
