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What's in My Kit? Stephen Maas - Tournament Angler

By Stephen Maas

Taking the time to sort and pack away fishing tackle from time to time is one way I find to better prepare for future trips and finding out what has been hiding away in the back of the shed.

So, following in the footsteps of a few other Tackle Tactic Pro Team members, I thought I'd do a quick run through of 'What's in My Kit'.

First things first, when I find the time for a tidy up it'll generally start with culling any gear that hasn't been used for a while. This doesn't mean it no longer works or is broken, it's just not the first thing I'd grab for a specific trip. This normally means that a stack of used lures or packets of opened plastics get handed down into my kids tackle boxes. It keeps them happy and clears the way for my own personal stash.

Luckily enough I have a fair portion of the shed set aside for the kayak and fishing gear, allowing me to have rod storage, along with shelves and cupboards for all of the other gear so that it can tidily be put away in places where it is easy to see and can be taken out for specific trips.

My fishing pretty much revolves around kayak fishing. This straight away means limited room to take bulk amounts of gear on fishing trips. Probably the biggest thing this has taught me is to be more precise in what species I'm targeting and more importantly more precise about what gear that I'm taking per trip. By having my equipment sorted and stacked it's easy for me to pick and go as I need to get ready for each day on the water.

Rods and Reels

Recently getting my hands on a few of the Okuma Helios SX Spin Rods, I find these great for casting lightly weighted plastics. Using the light and medium models I find them adequate for most estuary species. The Helios SX series are ultra-light, fast action, using high end components, Toray carbon construction and Japanese EVA split grips. I find these rods very comfortable, especially when sitting in the kayak all day.

The Helios Rods I find perfectly match up with the Okuma Helios SX reels. Using the HSX-30 size reel is also a suitable reel for most of the estuary species that I chase. Nine bearings and a high load carbon drag, you can't go wrong with a budget friendly combo set up for around $300 that looks pretty smick as well.

Lures

I've been fishing for well over 30 years, chasing many species and certainly thrown a few lures in that time, so what to stock on the shelves or have in the tackle boxes is a very daunting step. The walls of a tackle shop are covered with many lures, ranging across target species, lures sizes, shapes, colours, hard bodies, surface, soft plastics, vibes, creature baits, swim baits...etc., the list is almost endless.

Like I said, most of my fishing is kayak based and more specifically kayak bream and bass lure only tournaments. So, how do you cull a tackle shop worth of gear into a small shoeboxed sized tackle tray in the kayak storage, for a day on the water? One thing I did several years ago was to take note of what's working for others. By checking fishing reports and tournament results from the past few years, I was able to record what lures were commonly use for the winning results.

To refine it even more I wrote down and tallied up the top five most productive tournament winning lures, including the ZMan 2.5" GrubZ. Some may say, 'but you're not using your sponsors products all of the time', as a reply to that, 'No, sometimes you can't'. You have to use what the fish want to eat and that is why I recorded the top five productve lures, so that I could then find a technique that suits my favoured fishing styles.

Throwing soft plastics and creature baits for bream would be up there as my 'go-to' method. It would be a whole other article on the rigging and soft plastic choices, however I'd certainly have ZMan GrubZ in the tackle tray while chasing bream. GrubZ and paddle tails in various sizes and colours are always in stock in the tackle cupboard and more importantly tied on during a tournament. Made from ElaZtech material, their 10X Tough construction means that I can catch more fish per lure, therefore again needing to take less gear per trip.

I still use the same process of recording what lures other people are using for a social day chasing a feed of flathead or whiting for the table and only use what I know works. This not only limits the amount of gear that I need to take but also helps with the amount of gear that I need to stock.

Miscellaneous Items

In my kit you will also find hats, sunscreen, mozzie spray, pliers, scissors, Boomerang Tool Companu Snips, Pro-Cure scents and Moncross tackle trays. These are all items that get a regular place in the kayak, as does a tray or hardbody crank type lures and crabs. One product that I find very useful is the range of Moncross tackle management boxes. By having several boxes set up, I can swap out boxes to suit target species, lure types or jighead sizes. I use the 'Walker' range of boxes as I find the size perfect for the kayak centre hatch and they are also great for quick little landbased missions. Throw a few lures in and away you go.

Using the Moncross range of trays also gives me the opportunity to have several trays of TT Lures jigheads for selection. Having several boxes set up gives me the choice of what box to take for species specific trips... chasing fish deep, take the box of heavy jigheads, targeting bass or flathead or whatever the species may be, need the larger size jigheads. It makes for an easy changover when getting gear ready.

Now, please don't get me wrong, my method of taking limited gear with on trips does have its disadvantages. The day you don't take a particular tray of lures or one particular species isn't playing the game, doesn't give you as much room for switching over to targeting a different species or trying a different technique.

Those days will and do happen, however for me the satisfaction of taking a handful of lures... having a target species, having confidence in your gear and techniques... and then catching that fish, is a successful trip in my opinion.

Thanks for taking the time to read this article.
Cheers, Stephen Maas

Gear List:
Okuma Helios SX Spin Rods - HSX-S-702L 7' 1-3kg & HSX-S-702ML 7' 2-4kg
Okuma Helios SX Spin Reels - HSX-30

ZMan 2.5" GrubZ
TT Lures HeadlockZ Finesse jigheads
TT Lures Hidden Weight System (HWS) jigheads

Boomerang Tool Company - The Snip

Pro-Cure Shrimp Super Gel Scent