After Hot Start, Realtree Fishing Pros Eye 2024 Championships

Mar. 11, 2024 - (COLUMBUS, GA) Realtree Fishing pros will be competing for the top titles in bass fishing this month as REDCREST — Major League Fishing Bass Pro Tour’s culminating event — will be held March 14-17 on Lay Lake near Birmingham. A week later, BASS will steal the show, hosting the Bassmaster Classic on Grand Lake O’ the Cherokees outside of Tulsa.

Realtree sponsored angler Dustin Connell, winner of the Bass Pro Tour’s (BPT) 2024 inaugural event, will attempt to win his second REDCREST title of the year. In his way will be Jacob Wheeler, the top angler in professional bass fishing right now. Wheeler has overwhelmed the BPT throughout its existence, twice becoming the Tour’s Angler of the Year, and taking down seven tournaments throughout his tenure. Most recently, Wheeler won the BPT’s second event of the season at Santee Cooper in South Carolina.

Jacob Wheeler and other Realtree Fishing pros will be competing at the 2024 REDCREST on Lay Lake.

Not to be overlooked, Realtree pros Adrian Avena, Mark Daniels, Jr., and Mark Rose will also be swinging for the fences at REDCREST. These three veteran anglers are perennial REDCREST qualifiers with a combined $6 million in career earnings.

Lay Lake will be a challenging fishery, but BPT pros are sure to rack up the bass. The Tour’s unique format of catch-weigh-immediately release lends itself to fast-paced action, and hungry springtime bass should make for rapid catches. Both Wheeler and Connell are experts in the newly advancing techniques utilizing forward-facing sonar, and you can expect them to be looking to offshore structure to uncover the motherlode of winning fish.

REDCREST features a premier expo for fans of competitive bass fishing, and pros will be on hand following the fishing for meet and greets. All of the action can be viewed live throughout the event at MajorLeagueFishing.com.

A week later, Stetson Blaylock will compete against a field of 53 competitors from across the nation at the 54th annual Bassmaster Classic in Tulsa, March 22-24. There, pros will take to Grand Lake in an attempt to secure one of the biggest titles in fishing.

Fishing fans will flock to the world famous Classic expo, being held at the Cox Business Center in Downton Tulsa. The Realtree Fishing display will be there (booth #1709), giving fans the opportunity to purchase caps and gear featuring a variety of Realtree’s popular patterns, including Aspect and WAV3.

The fishing competition will be heated. Grand Lake is a diverse fishery, known for quality over quantity in its bass. Past events held on Grand have seen both shallow and deep water tactics prevail, and this year it’s anyone’s guess how the winning bass will be caught. With above-average temperatures throughout much of the winter, Oklahoma’s bass population is ahead of its normal spawning scheduling, meaning a shallow water shootout could be on the horizon.

Realtree Fishing pro Stetson Blaylock will be searching for his first Bassmaster Classic title.

This will be Blaylock’s fifth consecutive Classic appearance. Once seen as the new kid on the block, Blaylock now carries a decade of competition under his belt, racking up top-10 finishes all across the country. A deep-water specialist, Blaylock will be a threat to mine Cherokee’s remote brush piles in search of a winning area.

Blaylock has finished third in the Classic two times. Will this be his time to break through and solidify his career with a Classic crown? Fans can follow along at Bassmaster.com.

The action will be intense at each of bass fishing’s world championships, with many of Realtree’s top professional anglers contending for the titles. Already off to a hot start, will this be the year of a Realtree sweep? Join us in cheering on the sport’s best.

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