ESPN Freshwater

Since the Elite Series season ended, I've been doing a little fishing around the house from what a friend likes to call my "tin boat."

Yep, that's right, I don't always go to the water in a pinked out Team Realtree/BassCat/Mercury rig that can be spotted from 2.3 miles down-lake. I don't always have to blow down the river at 80 mph with my hair on fire.

Sometimes I like to roll low-profile. Knap of the pond. One of my more imaginative friends even gave my little "tin boat" a code name; Sneaky Pete. Other "friends" make fun of Pete and think I'm crazy for even having it. Hey, it's a fun boat.

Pete's nothing real fancy, just a nice little 17-foot, 10- gauge, all-welded boat with a 90 Optimax on the back. It floats in less than 15 inches of water and when I get it stuck, I can bail out and push it around fairly easily.

It scoots along at 45 mph with two in the boat and burns very little outrageously priced gas in a day's fishing. If I burn five gallons of gas a day through this Merc, I'm spending way too much time on plane and not enough time fishing.

Even though Pete's a pretty basic rig, I still had to trick it a little with some nice color electronics and a MotorGuide Tour 782 troller. That's right, 24 volts and 82 pounds of thrust on a hull that weighs about 600 pounds. I can almost plane it with the troller.

Why such a big trolling motor? I wanted the ability to fish the Arkansas River current all day without losing power on the troller, which is a problem in a big boat even with a Tour 109 and the best batteries.

Problem solved in the Sneaky Pete. I can roll this baby up on high bypass for hours on end without draining the Series 31 batteries. I also wanted the ability to bump the troller up on high and pull the boat off of stumps without firing up the big motor.

The main reason behind my purchase of the Sneaky Pete was to insure that I always had a boat. At the time I started shopping, I was with a boat company that left me hanging without a boat for 14 weeks.

Fourteen weeks for a seriously eaten-up-with-it bass angler is a torturous lifetime. I thought the wife was going to divorce me before that 14 weeks ended. I vowed then as soon as I won enough money, I would buy a small boat. Pete came along soon afterward.

Due to its size, a day in Pete really puts many things in perspective. Tackle storage space is fairly limited, compared to my BassCat Cougar's cavernous boxes, so I tend to stay with the basics.

I usually take 4 or 5 rods and a couple of boxes of baits. I even have a few little boxes of crankbaits, spinnerbaits, jigs, and a few bags of assorted Zoom plastics that I leave in the Pete — baits that I know I can take anywhere and catch some fish.

Pretty simple. Simple is good. Just man-o y bass-o. Fishing from the Pete is ... just fishing. Nothing fancy, just a boat to get you to the fish.

Pete let's me go places and see territory that I wouldn't be able to see from the 20 foot 'Cat. I can beat and bang around in the tin boat without worrying about tearing up any fiberglass.

Sometimes I'll take the Pete to places that I wouldn't even try to get into with a big boat. Lakes like Conway that's full of cypress trees (and cypress stumps) and not-very-well-marked trails. I spend quite a bit of time out on the Arkansas River.

Other times I'll take the Pete up to Dardanelle and slip around some of the less obvious places, maybe jump a few sandbars (don't try this at home — I am a professional), or get up super shallow in the lily pad fields.

It's pretty funny that none of the guys in their high-dollar, go-fast rigs with their fancy shirts on even look my way as I ease on by with the 90 Opti. I just smirk to myself (yeah, my other boat is a BassCat — biggest that they make) and go on about my business.

For a guy that spends quite a few days during the season working out of a pink boat, it's a pretty big deal for no one to look your way. It's almost like Pete has some kind of cloaking device. Yeah, I know that it is covered in Realtree's Max 4 camo pattern, but I'm talking about being almost invisible. Yeah that's it, Sneaky Pete the Super Boat.

Even the few derbies that I've fished out of Pete have been simpler and more fun. Fun fishing is good fishing. I never expected fishing from a tin boat to be this much fun when I bought Pete. I just wanted a small boat to kick around in when I was in between big boats. Who would have thought?

For more info on Kevin Short or to contact Kevin, check out his Web site at www.kfshort.com.