Freaks of the Deep - Grant Goldbeck

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Grant Goldbeck Big Worms
PHoToS By MATT PANGRAC
« November/December 2010

Bigger is better… unless you have the biggest.
Then, at times, biggest is the best option.
By MATT PANGRAC*
oK, I’ll admit it. When I scheduled a three day trip to Falcon Lake
on the Texas/Mexico border with Elite Series pro Grant Goldbeck
in late September, I had ulterior motives. First of all, if you’re
looking for a place to shoot photos of obscenely large bass, Falcon’s
a pretty safe bet. Secondly, I wanted to pick Goldbeck’s brain
about a bizarre technique and bait that I watched him fish several
months earlier during the final Bassmaster Elite Series tournament
of the 2010 season on oklahoma’s Fort Gibson Lake. Finally, I just
wanted to get away from the laptop for a few days and catch some
hawgs….Mission accomplished.
November/December 2010 » 37

Shakin’ a Giant
Texas rigging isn’t the only way
Goldbeck likes to rig his giant
worms. When he is faced with
dense brush piles in deep water or
slack current conditions, he reaches
for an over-sized trick worm made
by Xcite Baits called the Maximus.
At 10.5-inches in length, the
Maximus doesn’t technically qualify
as a giant worm, but when it’s
paired with Xcite’s X-Lock 5/8-ounce
shakey head, it’s a behemoth by
anyone’s standards.
“The trick worm and X-Lock
head create a one-piece package,”
Goldbeck explained. “If I really
need to pick apart a piece of cover,
that’s the bait that I’m going to
reach for because it really comes
through heavy cover well.”
The giant shakey head is
also an ideal offering for neutral
bass in slack current on fisheries
like Kentucky Lake. When paired
with the jig head, the high floating
worm creates an in-your-face
presentation that suspended bass
can’t resist. “It’s a great bait to use
for stroking,” he said. “It jumps off
the bottom and then goes straight
down and lands on its head. When
there’s no current and the bass are
suspended, that floating worm gets
right in their faces.”
when Paul
remember Elias broke
the all-time heavyweight record on Falcon
Lake in 2008 with over 132-pounds using
a 12-inch Mann’s Jelly Worm? I can recall
thinking, “I wish I lived near a lake where
the bass ate foot-long worms with reckless
abandon.” Truth be told, I did – I just
didn’t know it. And chances are so do you,
regardless of whether you live closer to
the Washington Monument or the Seattle
Space Needle.
Let’s get the basics out of the way
first. The term “giant worm” is pretty much
the only vernacular suitable to describe
what I watched Goldbeck use on Ft. Gibson
Lake that June afternoon as he competed
in Elite Series competition. It wasn’t your
typical eight-, 10- or even 12-inch variety
of soft plastic. It was truly a giant. In fact,
the occupants of the three spectator boats
38
« November/December 2010
Grant Goldbeck Xcite Maximus Bass
watching Goldbeck sling the behemoth
worm were all chuckling, mostly out of disbelief.
Goldbeck was serious. He only had
three fish in the livewell and was looking
to fill out his limit. In his mind, the 14-inch
worm was his best option.
It wasn’t until after our jaunt to Falcon
Lake three months later that I understood
why he had so much confidence in a giant
worm. Goldbeck’s giant worm journey
was born on the West Coast, defined on
the East Coast in his home state of Maryland,
and has been utilized on a vast array
of waters between the two costal destinations.
» the giAnt AWAkenS
“My cousin is from California, and
about 15 years ago I started flying out
there from Maryland to fish with him,” explained
Goldbeck. “There are so many little
custom worm companies in California that
make hand poured plastics and my cousin
was really big into pouring worms in his
garage with his team partner who had a
small custom worm company.”
Over the course of his time in California
on lakes like Casitas, Castaic, Perris, and
Diamond Valley, Goldbeck started catching
bass on giant, custom poured worms
ranging from 14- to 20-inches in length.
The hefty plastics didn’t just fool big bass,
they also caught plenty of keepers.
“I was catching two-pounders on
these giant worms and I started to notice
how the fish were reacting to these things.”
Goldbeck continued, “There was no particular
forage in these California lakes that
resembled the giant worm and a bass is
a bass, so what’s the difference between
throwing it on the West Coast and throwing
it on the East Coast?”

Stashing away an array of hand
poured giant worms in his luggage, Goldbeck
returned to Maryland and visited Triadelphia
Reservoir, a small, electric motor
only, body of water near his home where
he grew up fishing. “When I went there
and threw these 14- to 16-inch worms, I
started catching numbers and sizes of
bass that I’d never caught before. It was
an eye opener. Immediately, I incorporated
the bait into my tournament arsenal.”
During our time on Falcon, Goldbeck
relied primarily on two giant worms, both
made by Upton’s Customs. The 13-inch
straight tail worm received the lion’s share
of the work. It’s tagged as a 13-inch worm,
but in all reality, this worm is every bit of
14-inches and is as thick as a pinky finger.
The second worm was an Upton’s Customs
17-inch paddletail worm which has
the diameter of an index finger and resembles
something that you have to check
for under the bed and in the closet before
putting your kids to sleep.
» hook, line
And Sinker
Big bait, big hook, right? Wrong. Even
with a giant worm, Goldbeck uses a modi-
fied 5/0 Extra Wide Gap Gamakatsu light
wire hook. When properly rigged, it looks
totally under matched. “The hook looks really
small once it’s Texas rigged,” admitted
Goldbeck. “The length of the hook isn’t important.
I’m more concerned with the gap.”
This is where the hook modification
comes into play. Starting with a fresh
hook straight from the package, Goldbeck
initially bends out the hook point so that
it is above the eye of the hook. He then
uses pliers to carefully molds the shank of
the hook so that it has a deeper belly and
more gap between the point and shank.
The finished product is a hook that is the
size of a 5/0 Extra Wide Gap, but has the
gap of a 7/0 Extra Wide Gap.
With the extra wide gap, the bulky
plastic doesn’t interfere on the hook set.
“Once in a blue moon, you’ll miss a fish
that pulls off the tail, but I’ve caught 10”
fish on a 14-inch worm. I feel extremely
confident when I hook a fish it’s going to
end up in the boat. With a giant worm,
there’s nothing like a heavy jig head for
the bass to use as leverage to throw the
hook,” he said.
The diminutive hook size is applicable
for giant wormin’ because the bass consis-
convicTion cRaw
tently target the head of the bait where the
hook is located. A former boxer, Goldbeck
said that it’s similar to a championship
bout. “If you want to take something out
quickly, you go for the head. It’s like boxing.
you can go to the body and wear your
opponent down, but if you want to take
someone out in a single shot, you target
above the shoulders.”
Goldbeck also likes to go small when
it comes to weights. Most of the time he
favors a 5/16-ounce tungsten slip sinker
which he fishes unpegged. “With a light
weight, the fish doesn’t feel it when it sucks
in the bait,” he explains. “More importantly,
it allows the bait to move naturally on the
bottom and it generates a lot of action.” If
he’s fishing in windy conditions, he’ll upsize
to a 3/8-ounce or even a ½-ounce bullet
weight.
In keeping with the light theme, Goldbeck
doesn’t overpower the giant offering
with heavy line. He favors 16-pound-test
Sunline FC Sniper fluorocarbon, saying
that it’s limper than some other fluorocarbon
line on the market but still provides
strength and abrasion resistance. If he’s
targeting heavy cover, Goldbeck will bump
up to 20-pound-test.
Ribbon hinge woRm
Texas Rig Jig
Check out our full line of neutrally buoyant soft plastic baits at
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(434) 223-8427
November/December 2010 » 39

Grant Goldbeck Big Selection
40
« November/December 2010
Grant Goldbeck Big Shake

With the combination of a giant worm
rigged on a light wire extra wide gap hook,
light weight, and 16-pound-test line, Goldbeck
stresses that the right rod is paramount
for success. He leaves the pool cue in the rod
box and uses a seven-foot, six-inch mediumheavy
Pinnacle Perfecta Tournament Class
rod designed for football jigs. “With a heavy
rod, there’s potential to bend the hook,” he
explains. “I want a rod that is forgiving and
has a light tip with plenty of backbone.”
The soft tip and strong backbone not
only allows Goldbeck to burry the hook and
land a surging bass, but it also allows him to
work the worm properly along the bottom.
» ShAke, rAttle
And roll
Goldbeck prefers to target offshore
structure deeper than 10-feet when throwing
a giant worm. It’s not that he hasn’t
caught fish shallow, but he believes that
the size and bulk of the offering makes it
ideal for probing the depths.
“When you’re fishing offshore structure
like rock piles, brush piles, or creek channels
with a 14- to 16-inch bait, it doesn’t seem
quite as big as it does when you’re throwing
it in shallow water,” he explained. “There’s
so much more water out there that it fits in
with the surroundings. It’s just a little larger
and it’s easy for the bass to find and identify.”
When targeting deep water where
there is reduced light penetration, fishing
a giant worm is more like stepping into the
Octagon in a UFC fight instead of playing
hide and seek. “You know that the fish is
seeing the bait,” stated Goldbeck. “A giant
worm not only helps you locate the bass, it
helps the bass locate the bait.
“I want the bass to find the bait as
quickly as possible. I throw a giant worm
because they’re going to be able to locate
and identify the bait more quickly than a
smaller worm. I’m not wasting time while
the fish are looking. They know it’s there,
they find it, and they eat it.”
Rather than work the worm in a series
of hops or dragging it across the bottom,
Goldbeck lightly shakes the offering once
it has reached the bottom. Without heavy
salt content weighting the entire worm, the
offering stands us vertically in the water
column and quivers at the slightest movement
– a key factor to success.
“I like to shake the bait on a slack line,”
he explains. “I don’t want the fish to feel
me when they hit. The slack also gives the
bait a lot of action. Out West, they make
rods called shaking sticks where you can
keep the bait in place and make it quiver.
I basically took that technique and applied
it across the country with a regular rod.”
After the fish has picked up the worm,
Goldbeck drops the hammer. “I used to be
one of those guys who thought that you
had to give the fish a little bit of time to
eat the bait. After the first time I had a
two-pound bass swallow a 14-inch worm, I
started setting the hook like I was fishing
a seven-inch worm or a jig,” he explained.
» tiMing iS
eVerything
“I used to throw giant worms strictly
in the post-spawn and summertime when
the water reached the mid 70s,” admitted
Goldbeck. “Now, I’m starting to get to the
point where I’ll throw in the winter and
also the pre-spawn. I pretty much have
one tied on year-round.”
While he says that the summertime
and post-spawn are still the most productive
times to throw the big worm when
you’re looking to catch numbers of bass,
Goldbeck has caught some big female bass
during the pre-spawn, though he says that
he doesn’t get nearly as many bites during
that time of the year. “If you stick with it,
you can catch some absolute giants early
in the year because the fish are trying to
fatten up before heading to the beds.”
He also has had success in giant
worms during the winter. In November
of 2009, he finished in the Top 10 in the
first annual Fish & Chips tournament on
Lake Of The Arbuckles in Oklahoma, dropshotting
a 14-inch worm in 25- to 30-feet
of water. “I went to a giant worm because
there are a lot of lakes where these big fish
haven’t seen giant worms. When they’re
grouped up offshore, a big bait gets their
attention and offers an easy meal. Using a
½-ounce tungsten drop-shot weight, Goldbeck
targeted rock bottom and fished the
worm on 16-pound-test fluorocarbon.
Schooling fish present another scenario
where he likes to go big. After firing
up an offshore school, Goldbeck will
reach for the giant worm and attempt to
trigger a brawl. He said that there are
times when he can feel the bass fighting
over the worm as he shakes it on the bottom.
“It depends on how active the bass
are, but there are times that the giant
worm will trigger the biggest bite in the
school.”
So, when doesn’t he throw the giant
worm? When the fish are extremely finicky
or it’s the backside of a massive cold front,
the giant worm is relegated to the rod
locker. “If I’m fishing a lake where bites
are really hard to come by or if a cold front
comes through the area and it’s a high
pressure day, that’s when I’ll leave it in the
box.” BW
November/December 2010 » 41