The Fishing was Divine – 2 Men, 157 Fish, & Maybe Some Help from “Above”!?

CLIENTS: This morning, Tuesday, November 10, I fished with longtime guests Frank Sumner and the pastor of his church, Mike Tracy. Both are part of the New Beginnings Church in Harker Heights, Texas. (https://nbc4you.net/#nbc-home)

Wisely, Frank always books 6 months in advance and in peak seasons in both the spring (late March through mid May, and the fall (mid October through early December). His results through the years stand well above average because he is always on the water when fish are biting best.

TODAY’S DATE: 10 November 2026 (AM)


NEXT OPEN MORNING DATES: 17, 24, 30 Nov., 4 Dec. 2026

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Pastor Mike Tracy and U.S. Army veteran Frank Sumner worked for just over 4 hours and encountered a solid bite. Just as the bite was waning around 10:10A, some wind and cloud cover moved in which reignited the fish and extended the bite another 40 minutes or so. They finished up with 157 fish on MAL Heavy Lures and MAL Dense Lures.

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED:

This morning, we started off with glassy calm conditions, but with abundant cloud cover. The fish fed well as the clouds kept the sun from beaming through the calm surface. At just a few minutes after 8 AM, the men had already put together a 51-fish catch.

Given that many of the fish in this catch were on the smaller side, I asked them if they were open to moving (and violating the rule that says: Don’t leave fish to find fish!) in order to try to find fish of better quality.

Generally speaking, the deeper and clearer the water is, the greater the ratio of quality fish to smaller fish has been ever since the very first cold front kicked off our fall fishing on October 1.

We made this move and were treated to seeing a buck swimming at high speed after a doe as the two crossed a stretch of lake about an eighth of a mile wide. We were also treated to the better quality fish I was hoping for.

As I began to search deeper, clearer water with sonar, I passed on two areas, then came up upon a bottom-hugging school of white bass at a third area. These fish were not really all that enthusiastic, so we decided to leave them behind, but, as I prepped the boat for the move, our conditions improved in that the skies clouded back up and were now fully grayed over, and a gentle southeast wind began to blow.

I did not move the boat more than 100 yards before finding a large group of white bass, also bottom-hugging, which reacted like the polar opposite of those fish we had just been on top of. From that point until we wrapped up at 11 AM, the fish fed well. The last half of our trip produced more than double the fish versus the first half of our trip (106 vs. 51).

Frank and Mike ended the trip with 157 fish landed including 12 hybrid striped bass, 1smallmouth, and 144 white bass.

Prior to the change in weather, we had been using the MAL Heavy lures with a white blade. After the sun began to shine, I changed back over to the MAL Dense with silver blade, silver body, and chartreuse tail. Even when it clouded back up, I stuck with the MAL Dense for the sake of its faster sink rate.

RESULTS: 157 fish, all caught and released

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

FIND LURES HERE: https://whitebasstools.com/

SEE THE “SMOKING TACTIC” TUTORIAL HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC3FMEQHOMQ

OBSERVATIONS:

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Taken on Lake Belton on 04 Nov. 2026, approx. 6:10AM…

Taken on Lake Belton on 27 Oct. 2026, approx. 7:00AM…