Buddy Gross earns his second Bassmaster Elite Series in Fla.
On a day where nearly all of the top 10 anglers had trouble finding big fish, Buddy Gross bucked the trend.
The LFO High School alum pulled in five bass totaling 22-pounds, 6-ounces and rallied from fifth place to first as he won the 2020 Site One Bassmaster Elite Series event at Harris Chain in Leesburg, Fla.
Gross finished the fourth and final day of the tournament on Sunday with a grand total of 77-11. Drew Benton of Blakely, Ga. was second at 71-5, while Day 3 leader Ray Hanselman, Jr. of Del Rio, Tex. placed third at 71-8.
“I think somebody needs to pinch me and wake me up,” Gross told the audience at the final weigh-in just seconds after he was declared the winner. “I didn’t see this coming.”
Gross began the week with a fivebass haul of 22-12, which was enough to earn him third place after Day 1. He took the lead after a five-fish limit of 71-11 on Day 2.
But a tough day on the water Saturday netted him only 14-14 as he dropped to fifth place, but still safely inside the cutline, as only the top 10 anglers went out on Championship Sunday.
Sunday was a tough day for the top 10 as the total weight for five fish fell between 9-5 and 15-6 for eight of the 10 finalists, but not for Gross or Benton, who discovered the magic formula.
Benton weighed in five fish for a total of 21 pounds even, but Gross did even better, beating Benton’s total by 1-6 to pick up his second all-time Bassmaster Elite Series victory and pocket $100,000.
“This week was a very, very tough week,” Gross continued in the post-tournament interview. “I’ve actually dreaded coming to Florida the whole year because it can bite you so fast and it bit me. In practice, I didn’t catch them. I didn’t have the bites. But I just went and I got on something and ran with it the rest of the day and it turned into this. It’s a blessing from God and I appreciate it.”
Gross picked up his first series win at the 2020 DeWALT Bassmaster Elite tournament at Lake Eufaula in Alabama. He caught his limit of 20 bass that week for a total of 84-8 to win another $100,000.
Now in his third year on the Bassmaster Elite Series, Gross has fished in 30 tournaments and finished in the money 27 times. He has one third-place finish with five top 10’s, 10 top 20’s and 16 finishes in the top 30.
His first $100,000 paycheck came in May of 2016 when he won at Pickwick Lake in Florence, Ala. on the FLW Tour, now known as Major League Fishing.