Presented by Yamaha Motor Corp USA and Warrior Boats Inc.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Sept. 25, 2024
Contact: Denny Fox, 920-505-0122
Anglers Insight Marketing LLC (AIM™)
Freiburgers Make A Run To The Finish, Winning AWWS Open at Dubuque Rivers Division Qualifier
River Rats who fish walleye on the Mississippi River system love those wing dams that help control the river and also hold their favorite, and that showed at Sunday’s (Sept. 22) AIM Weekend Walleye Series Rivers Division qualifier at Dubuque, Iowa, as Clayton and his father Robert Freiburger took the win with 31.31 pounds, nearly $4,000 in cash, and got a boost in the race for Yamaha Motor Corp. USA Team Of The Year.
“The Freiburgers are a river fixture in the Dubuque area, and they showed their skills working those wing dams to win $3,000, plus $850 in first-place AIM Side Pot Challenge cash,” said Denny Fox, AIM national tournament director. “And they did it without willow cats. We’ll see how much this win boosts them in the TOY standings.”
Clayton Freiburger, from Dubuque, and his father Robert of LaMotte, have a combined 70 or so years of nailing walleye on Pool 12 where they live and where they spent all their time at for this tournament in their Yamaha 250 SHO-powered boat.
“We pre-fished Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday,” Clayton said, and nearly all on the Illinois side, where the preferred live bait of many, willow cats, aren’t allowed. “We knew a majority of the teams would have willow cats (they had to stay in Iowa waters), so that opened up quite a bit more water for us.”
“We fished primarily all along the wing dams, right on top or on the upstream side. We located probably a dozen that were holding fish. There were probably six that were holding the right fish,” he continued. “We usually go back and check them daily because the bigger fish show up at different locations on different days.”
On Sunday, that paid off in the first 10 minutes when they landed four walleyes, all under 19 inches, at their first dam, plus the first fish that counted towards the win.
“Our first card fish was a 24-3/4-incher at the first dam. We spent about an hour and moved to our second, and we picked up a 23-1/2 and some smaller fish we didn’t put on the card. Our third stop, we picked up our biggest, a 26-1/4, and a 24-1/2. Our last stop we picked up a 25-1/2, and we had trouble upgrading after that,” he said. He said they were a bit surprised at winning with 31 pounds-plus.
At each dam, they’d work leeches and crawlers on three-way river rigs, and also two Headhunter crankbaits, an H-12 diver and a Shad Dad. “You cast them over the top of the dam and reel them back in and you’ll usually get them on the face of the dam,” Freiburger said. “The shad suspends. We were casting the front sides and would go back and forth using our trolling motor. A lot of times fish will follow the bait off the dam and you’ll use a ‘stop and go’ technique” to trigger their bites.
“I knew we were doing well. I was a little surprised. A lot of times it takes 35 pounds to win but the weather changed, and that had an effect on the bite. I’ve been fishing here since I was 10, so I have 30 years on the river, and my dad’s probably got 40 years of experience. It’s where we’re comfortable. Every pool is different, but it’s also within our comfort zone. We were excited to hear we won,” he said.
Now that they’ve got one in the box, they’re looking at the coming two events, the next and last seasonal qualifier Friday, Oct. 4 at Pools 2 and 3 and the St. Croix River near Hastings, MN, right before the two-day division championship, Saturday and Sunday Oct. 5 and 6 in Pools 3 and 4 near Hager City, WI.
“We definitely want to try to make a run for it,” Freiburger The Younger added.
Finishing in second with 29.72 pounds and winning $1,700 plus second-place Side Pot Challenge cash of $510 and another $300 for being the highest place finisher having all Garmin electronics aboard were Joe Newcomb and Kyle Brantner of Pepin, WI, who used their northern river knowledge just fine in Dubuque despite a poor pre-fish aboard their Mercury 250 Pro XS-powered boat.
“We got down there Friday mid-morning and hit the water. We’d been down there last year and had six or eight spots we wanted to check, but we never even saw a walleye get caught. We were kinda bummed,” Newcomb said.
“Saturday, we hit a couple different wing dams and caught fish and thought maybe yesterday was a fluke, so we checked the others we fished the day before and caught 11 or 12. A couple were nice but nothing giant. I think I had one that got off that felt like a 28 or better. That got our confidence up,” he added.
The luck of the boat launch number—they were mid-pack—put a nearby wing dam out of the question. Instead, their blasted way south and got to another producer.
“Our first fish was a 21 or a 22, then the second I broke off, and then Kyle put a 28-1/4 in the boat, and we also put a couple of shorter fish in. We fished until about 10 a.m. and upgraded one 15-inch to a 21,” he said, then one more glitch hit. Their trolling motor battery died.
“We ended up trying to use our Power-Pole and got it to stick a little, and caught maybe a 23, one of the last fish we got. That got us to just about 30 pounds. That’s what we figured we’d need to be in there. But the rest of the day we struggled trying to fish without a trolling motor,” he said. Watching competitors Joe Okada and Galen Bremmer (they eventually finished seventh) ease up to that last wing dam and start bringing fish over the side was, well, “painful,” in Newcomb’s words.
“They had one that would have been an upgrade for us and probably would have won the tournament, but that’s the way it goes,” he said.
They’ll have plenty of time to make up for it, as they’ll be fishing both the Hastings and Hager City events, which, Newcomb said, are in their backyards. They’re also looking forward to the TOY points scores after finishing second.
“We were in fifth, so we should have moved up a few anyway. We’re looking forward to the next two events,” he added.
In third, with 27.75 pounds were Mason Jackson and Harry Miller of Bellevue, IA. They went home with $1,000 and $340 in third-place Side Pot Challenge cash. William Shaw And Brett King of Hager City won $750 for fourth place with 27.21 pounds and pocketing a extra $200 bucks from Garmin for using a Kraken Trolling Motor. Finishing fifth were Aaron Fortney of Gays Mills, WI, and Tom Stiner of Moline, IL. With a $500 payday.
Okay, Fan Nation, you read it. Time to double up and double down. The next two events are coming up rapid fire at Hastings, MN, and Hager City, WI. You can still enter the final qualifier. Just go to aimfishing.com to sign up, and follow the fun at both events at AIM’s Facebook page.
You know you want to. You know you can.
Anglers Insight Marketing LLC (AIM™) is a unique tournament organization created and owned by many of the most accomplished and recognizable professional walleye anglers, along with others who share the mission of advancing competitive walleye fishing and making it sustainable into the future.
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