The 2026 Bassmaster Elite Series stop at the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway looked like a write-off for Jason Christie when the Day 4 cut shook out. The Park Hill, Oklahoma veteran was tied for 37th, and his last result on tour was a dead-last finish at Lake Martin.
Four days and one Garmin-charted backwater later, Christie was lifting the trophy with a four-day total of 58 pounds, 2 ounces. It was his ninth career Elite Series win, and he admitted on the stage that he had been the last person in the building who thought it was possible.
"I thought there was zero chance I'd win," Christie said.
The decisive bag was 12 pounds, 9 ounces on Day 4, with two late bites doing the heavy lifting - a 2-pounder and a 3-pound, 12-ounce largemouth that came roughly 30 minutes later. His daily progression of 12-5, 16-10, 16-10 and 12-9 told the story of an angler who started slow, found something on Day 2, and refused to leave it.
That something was a backwater on Columbus Lake, directly across from the tournament site. Christie chose it over more obvious community holes because new sonar technology had told him exactly where the better fish were holding.
"Garmin just released a new 360-degree sonar unit and I went into [my local spot] and marked those stumps, because I figured that's where those big ones would hang out," he said.
- A half-ounce white, blue and chartreuse Booyah Covert spinnerbait with a gold Colorado blade and a white YUM trailer - A half-ounce Booyah Mobster swim jig with a YUM Craw Chunk trailer - A Texas-rigged YUM Wooly Bug for flipping into the heaviest cover
The bigger bites came off targets the rest of the field could not see - the submerged stumps Christie had marked in pre-fishing. He locked into the same area on the final morning, knowing it was a finite resource.
"The difference was I caught two big ones yesterday and one today off stuff you couldn't see," Christie said.
He never relocated. There was no late-tournament hunt for a fresh school. He committed.
"If I'm going to lose this, I'm going to lose it in my home," Christie said.
When he idled back into the marina at the end of Day 4, Christie was certain he had been beaten by a heavier limit somewhere up the standings.
"When I was idling in, I figured somebody had caught 'em," he said.
Nobody had matched the bag. Dakota Ebare took second at 55-13 with a Strike King KVD Squarebill crankbait, a Strike King Rage Bug for flipping and a Strike King Tour Grade Spinnerbait. John Garrett finished third at 54-15 throwing a Strike King Tour Grade swim jig and a Rage Bug. The pattern was loud across the top of the leaderboard - shallow grass and wood, shad-spawn-style retrieves, swim jigs, spinnerbaits and a flipping bait, all bouncing off cover the LiveScope generation now treats as keep targets.
The contrast with Lake Martin was not lost on Christie. He referenced it himself.
"It's funny. In the previous Elite tournament (Lake Martin), I finished dead last, and I win this one," he said.
The final word was the line that probably best captures why Christie still runs an Elite schedule.
"It feels good to win because I fish to win every single time I go out," he said.
The win was worth $100,000.
