Canada’s national bass-fishing team aims to take on the world

For what seems like the 1,500th time, Norm Hayman casts a white-skirted buzzbait with impressive accuracy towards a patch of weeds along the shoreline of Ontario’s Lower Buckhorn Lake. As he quickly retrieves the gurgling topwater, the water suddenly explodes behind it. “Damn! He just missed it,” Hayman says, pointing to where the bass appeared. “Quick! Throw your worm out right there and see if you can get him.” With considerably less accuracy, I cast my unweighted wacky rig and wait 10 tense seconds for a hit, but nothing happens. Thankfully, our boat’s livewell is already full with a limit of respectable largemouth and smallmouth bass.

As co-anglers in the 2nd Annual Canada Bass Pro/Am out of the Kawartha region’s Beachwood Resort, Hayman and I are fishing alongside our host, bass pro and fishing guide Joe Ford. The vice-president of the Canadian International Sportfishing Association (CISA), Ford is also one of the event’s key organizers. To be honest, he and Hayman have contributed most of the fish in the boat, so it’s painfully clear—to me, at least—who’s representing the “amateur” in this late-June Pro/Am. Granted, I’ve caught my fair share of bass over the years, but these guys are in a different league altogether.

“Okay, Buzz King,” Ford says to Hayman, who’s fishing in the back of the boat. “It’s time to catch us a five-pounder.” Hayman is the founder of Bass Freaks Canada, a series of regional social media sites for bass-fishing enthusiasts across the country. So far, his relentless casting has been paying off, resulting in three decent fish in the last hour alone. “You have to put a lot of miles on a lure to get bit,” he says. “I love buzzbaits because you can cover so much water with them.”

Meanwhile, I’ve only caught one keeper with my wacky rig, but I’m not too stressed about it. The point of this friendly tournament isn’t to take home a cheque, after all, but to raise funds for CISA’s national bass-fishing team—Team Canada—as it prepares for upcoming international competitions. Those include late-September’s 5th Annual Pan American Black Bass Championship in Nackawic, New Brunswick, and the Black Bass World Championship on Italy’s Bolsena Lake in October.

While Hayman and I are attending as media guests, each of the 19 other teams in today’s tournament paid $1,000 for the chance to fish with one member of Team Canada in the morning, and another in the afternoon. Prior to Ford in the afternoon, Hayman and I also fished with veteran bass pro and Team Canada member Dave Chong during the morning session.

WELCOMING THE WORLD 

The September 25 to 29 Pan American in Nackawic, New Brunswick, will see two-person teams from several countries fish for medals and national pride on the Saint John River, which is also known by its indigenous name, Wolastoq. At press time, participants from the U.S., Mexico, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic had been confirmed. Along with Team Canada, there will also be teams from Ontario’s Curve Lake First Nation and New Brunswick’s Wolastoqiyik Nation.

As well, teams from southern Africa will be competing against Team Canada and the USA Bass Team in the concurrent Challenge Cup, a sort of “tournament within a tournament,” Ford says. “This Pan Am is going to be pretty special. It’s going to be one for the ages.”

Most of Team Canada’s eight pairs of pro anglers made the squad by placing highly at one of two events: last September’s Canada Bass/CISA Pan Am Qualifier on the St. Lawrence River in Ontario, and last May’s Destination Nackawic Smallmouth Open in New Brunswick. The successful members include Dave Chong, Steve Neveu, Adam Howell, Corey Gaffney, Jason Hare, Graeme Mace, Rick Kewell, Jason Hynes, Phil Curtis, Brent Valere, Bob MacMillan, Adam Foster, Jim Tzogus, and Ben and Jon Stokdijk. Also included are three special members, Bassmaster Elite Series anglers Cooper Gallant and Jeff Gustafson, who won the 2023 Bassmaster Classic, and fishing TV icon Bob Izumi as captain.

In case one of the pairs has to drop out, there is also one alternate duo, of which Ford himself is a member. No stranger to international competition, he’s earned three gold medals with Team Canada since it was first established in 2018 prior to the Pan America event on Florida’s Lake Okeechobee.

This Pan Am is going to be pretty special. It’s going to be one for the ages

Unlike the last time the Pan American was held in Canada—in Cornwall, Ontario, in 2019—the organizers have had plenty of time to prepare for September’s event out of the newly built Big Axe Marina on the Saint John River. “The 2019 Pan Am was a good event, but this one is going to blow the doors off any predecessors,” Ford says. “It has an unprecedented amount of provincial and municipal support.”

Team Canada member and CISA media director Adam Foster agrees. “There’s direct involvement between the municipalities, including Destination Nackawic and Capital Tourism Fredericton, where they’re facilitating the logistics of putting on such a big show,” he says.

Originally from Nova Scotia, Foster now lives in Nasonworth, New Brunswick, and has been fishing the Saint John for close to a decade. He knows the fishery well, and is confident in the event’s success, noting that 50- to 100-fish days are common. And while he concedes Great Lakes bass might be bigger, Foster maintains their finned cousins down East are “a little more hearty.”

According to Ford, the tournament will also give CISA a valuable opportunity to showcase its mission. “CISA’s values are to support the competitive sportfishing community and build strong partnerships with host communities,” he says, while also noting the economic benefits the tournament will bring to the region. “We’re going to show the province of New Brunswick a $2 million economic impact for a five-day event.”

We want to continue to show the rest of the world that Canada has some great bass anglers

Ultimately, Ford says, CISA aims to build on the Pan American tournament and eventually host the Black Bass World Championship. Another goal of putting on an international fishing tournament of this type, Bob Izumi points out, is to strengthen the global campaign to get fishing recognized as an Olympic sport. He acknowledges it’s a complicated process (see “Olympic Games goal” below), but says the more countries that get involved, the better the chances of success.

TACKLING THE WORLD

Back at Lower Buckhorn’s Beachwood Resort, the time has come for the organizers of the Pro/Am tournament to hand out trophies, hold an auction and thank the participants. “We’re a not-for-profit corporation, so we don’t make money,” CISA president Brent Valere tells the assembled anglers. “We have to fund ourselves and you guys are helping in a very large way.”

When he finally announces the winners, I’m surprised and a bit sheepish—Norm Hayman and I have placed third, with a total weight of 17.15 pounds for six fish. I know it’s all due to Hayman’s buzzbait and the multiple fish Joe Ford and Dave Chong contributed, but I can’t lie: it feels good to be part of a winning team.

Team Canada star member Jeff Gustafson certainly knows what winning feels like, and he’s excited about Canada’s chances at September’s Pan American. “We want to continue to show the rest of the world that Canada has some great bass anglers,” he says. “And when they come to our country, we want to show them who’s the boss!”

Learn more about the Pan Am Championship at www.fishcisa.ca

OLYMPIC GAMES GOAL

How far along is the bid to get fishing into the Summer Olympics? Despite ongoing efforts, it has yet to be recognized as an official Olympic sport, which is the mission of the International Sport Fishing Confederation (known by its French acronym, CIPS). Founded in 1952 and based in Rome, CIPS comprises 152 fishing federations from 79 countries and represents several fishing disciplines, including fresh- and saltwater angling, fly fishing, ice fishing, kayak fishing and casting. The Canadian International Sportfishing Association is a member of the International Fresh Water Sport Fishing Federation, which is the freshwater angling arm of CIPS.

CIPS has been handling the proposal to get fishing back into the Olympics—it appeared as an unofficial sport in the 1900 Paris games—but doing so has been a long and arduous process. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) denied an application for recognition in 2016, for example, but efforts to reapply continue.

“Progress is moving at an exasperatingly slow pace,” says CIPS vice-president and USA Bass Team manager John Knight. The latest obstacle, he says, is that the IOC is reluctant to consider fishing because it involves an animal. He says that argument doesn’t hold much water, however, considering equestrian sports are part of the Olympics.

Overall, Knight says he remains optimistic, pointing to some recent streamlining of the byzantine recognition process. In 2022, all the international federations that were part of the Global Association of International Sports Federations merged into a new organization called SportAccord. Now representing both Olympic and non-Olympic international federations, including CIPS, it is establishing a new procedure for the official recognition of new Olympic sports.

Adding to Knight’s optimism is the fact CIPS president Claudio Matteoli is a close friend of Ivo Ferriani, the president of SportAccord. “He has discussed our efforts to be recognized several times with the president of SportAccord,” Knight says. “We hope that the time is not very far from having recognition.” Meanwhile, CIPS membership continues to grow, with the organization recently welcoming Iran, India, Bulgaria, Lebanon, Philippines and Jordan to its ranks.

Learn more the Olympic fishing bid at www.outdoorcanada.ca/olympics.