The Mental Game - First Step: Knowing What Your Trip Is

The first step in becoming mentally prepared for your fishing trip is knowing what your trip is.  Is your trip a fun trip you are taking to place you know well, an expedition to a new stretch of water, or a tournament where pride and money are on the line?  Each one requires you to prepare in different ways.  Here is a step by step process to start your mental preparedness for each:

Fun trip to preciously explored waters: 

1.       You already know what type of fish to expect, so start developing a mental list of what presentations will catch fish this time of year.

2.       Do a little research; try to figure out what patter the fish are currently in.  Are the post-spawn, are they in a fall patter, see if you can figure out where you might expect to catch the fish.  If you keep a fishing log (and you should), read over logs from this time and similar conditions in previous years.  Next, read over current reports on the internet to see what everyone else is doing (this should be secondary to what has worked for you in the past.  Internet reports are not always accurate!) 
3.       Start thinking about what you will need to bring with you.  Was there anything you forgot in the past that you wished you had or anything you brought that you never used?  Just start getting a mental idea of what you want to do. 

Exploring a new stretch of water:

1.       Learn what type of water it is.  Are you fishing a river, a lake, a bay, etc.?

2.       Do some research on the internet or in magazines and books about this water.  Start thinking about how this will affect your trip and what you will need for it. 

a.       If it is a River: is it a larger or small river, is there a strong current or is it slow and meandering, are the current water levels up or down, etc?

b.   If it is a Lake: is it a large or small lake, will you focus on one cove or can you cover the entire lake, what are the current conditions, and how will  all this affect the fishing?

3.       Learning about and doing a little research about the water you are headed too will help you know what to expect when you get there.  This is true in fresh or saltwater. 

Tournament: 

1.       Prepping for a tournament is really no different than anything else. Do your research from what you have on file and on the internet.  Start developing an idea of what you want to do.  

2.       For a tournament you also need to make sure your finances are in-line enough to pay for your entry fees, gas, food, etc.  You don’t want to be worried about that when more money is on the line.  Tournament fishing costs more than fishing for fun.
3.       You will need to be completely focused in a tournament, so really start thinking about everything you will need for that now!

Continue Reading: The Mental Game - Step 2: Making a List