Lampman surges to Mississippi River walleye title

DUBUQUE -- Robert Lampman of Victory, Wis., capped off a furious comeback Friday to run away with the AIM walleye tournament here on the Mississippi River.

On Wednesday, after the first day of competition, Tommy Skarlis of Dorchester in far northeast Iowa caught seven walleyes weighing 51.05 pounds, establishing what many thought was an insurmountable lead. After the first day, Lampman was in third place with 24.1 pounds.

But while Skarlis slumped to 12 pounds on Thursday and only 3 pounds on Friday, Lampman roared back with 33 pounds on Thursday and 30 pounds on Friday to claim a top prize valued at $25,000.

“I was just trying to be consistent, to catch my seven fish every day and hope for the best,” said Lampman, who last won a major tournament in 2005.

Lampman ran his three-day total to 87.58 pounds, well ahead of second-place finisher Harry Miller's 67.52 pounds and the 66.62 pounds caught by Skarlis, who fell to third.

Lampman, who trailed Skarlis by 6 pounds on the final day, said Skarlis' faltering performance Thursday “gave him hope" that he could catch him.

“It was my tournament to lose. That's the way it goes,” said Skarlis, whose characteristic smile seemed a bit strained during the weigh-in ceremony at the Mystique Casino.

In the AIM tournaments' catch-record-release format, no fish are actually weighed in. The anglers document their catch by photographing their fish as they are measured on a special 35-inch ruler, and a formula is used to compute their weight.

Obviously, no fish is injured or killed, and adherents of the system cite other advantages. For example, the 20- to 27-inch protected slot limit for walleyes from Pool 12 at Dubuque downstream to Pool 20 does not apply to AIM anglers, since they release all the fish they catch.

For that same reason, the five-fish daily bag limit does not keep them from “weighing in" seven fish per day, as AIM rules allow.

“With seven fish per day, you can see some huge comebacks,” as was the case this week, said Keith Kavajecz, who finished eighth in the tournament.

Lampman and most of the other competitors said the 20- to 27-inch slot limit has been instrumental in improving the walleye fishing in the pools where it has been in effect for the past seven years.

“It has worked great here, and I wish we could move it on up the river,” Lampman said.