Well, I've finally recovered from ICAST.   

No mean feat after sitting for 10 hours in the Las Vegas airport while a massive electrical storm swept through Minneapolis where I was destined to catch my connecting flight on to Winnipeg.  Of course, when we finally took off from Vegas and landed in Minneapolis, I missed the last possible connecting flight by 10-minutes.  

So, it was spend the night in the Twin Cities and fly home on Saturday.  I won't even comment on the total "non-help" offered to us by Delta Airlines.  (Trust me, I'll take Air Canada any day!) They simply left us stranded in the Minneapolis airport, at mid-night, with no assistance whatsoever, save for a shrug of the shoulders.   

Remember the movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles when Steve Martin rented a car at the airport, walked out five miles to the parking lot, discovered the car wasn't there and then slugged his way through slush and snow all the way back to the terminal rental counter to be greeted by a perky agent?  Well, this agent wasn't even perky!  

So, Louie Stout from Bassmaster Magazine, his wife Deb and I started phoning hotels in and around the airport.  They had all been booked by similarly stranded passengers who had arrived on earlier flights and who also missed their connections.  So, Louie, Deb and I headed all the way downtown for a couple of hours sleep before heading back to the airport.  

 Fortunately, when I finally arrived back home in Kenora, I had the prescription to cure everything that was ailing me.  That is because I had scored half a dozen sample packages of the new VMC Spinshot hooks, courtesy of Cyrille Mathieu, that had just won ICAST Best of Show in the terminal tackle division.  

The really neat thing about this drop shot system is that I played a very small role in its development.   

Toronto terminal tackle lure whiz-kid, Bernard Yong-Set, who owns Stringease Tackle and makes the phenomenal Fastach clip, contacted me last summer and asked if I'd fish with a new prototype drop shot system he was working on with the VMC folks.   

I said, "yes", Bernard sent me some samples, I fished with them, offered some suggestions for improvements that were incorporated into even newer prototypes that I subsequently tested and provided more feedback.  

The final product was unveiled at ICAST and not surprisingly, at least to me, it won Best of Show in the terminal tackle division.  

  
(I caught these gorgeous smallmouth last fall while testing the VMC Spinshots in their prototype stage)

So, what makes it so special?  I mean, what could be simpler than tying on a hook and adding a weight to the end of your line?  How do you possibly make a better mousetrap out of that?  

 Well, let me tell you the ways!  

First, many anglers have difficulty tying the proper knots to get their drop shot hooks to kick out straight and stand parallel to the bottom.  (The trick, by the way, is always bringing the tag end of your line in from the hook point before passing it through the hook eye and then passing the tag end back through the eye after you've fashioned your knot.)  

Then, there is the complication of knots.  Some anglers will tell you to use a Palomar knot.  Others suggest that if you're using fluorocarbon line, you must use a San Diego Jam knot or the fluoro line will cut itself.  And on and on the knot debate rages.  

Most importantly, though, for any angler who has ever drop shotted, is line twist.  If your worm or whatever dressing you use on your drop shot hook is not positioned perfectly straight, it will spin every time you reel in your line and eventually your line will be twisted.  

Well, all that is history now, thanks to the ingenious VMC Spinshot system.  That is because the drop shot hook (which by the way, you can buy in a variety of sizes) is positioned between two ultra small swivels.)  So when you tie it onto your main line, you can use whatever knot you're accustomed to using.  Ditto, for attaching the dropper line down to your weight.  You can use a Trilene knot, clinch knot, Palomar knot - whatever you like!  

And here is the best part:  Your hook is always standing out perfectly horizontal to the bottom and you can never twist your line.   It so ingenious, so simple and so inexpensive, it is one of those things when you see it, you slap yourself on the forehead and wonder, why in the world didn't someone think of this years ago.  

Indeed, at least from the rigging perspective, the new VMC Spinshot hooks will make you an expert drop shotter the first time you tie one on.  As for finding and then catching the fish, well, that part's still up to you!  

  
(Dave Chong, Mark Kulick and I cleaned up on Erie smallmouth on the last day of the season last year drop shotting Mark's killer Slammer soft plastics.  Put a Slammer on one of ICAST's Best of Show VMC Spinshots and you've got an unbeatable combination)

If "seeing is believing", click on the following link and you can watch a short little video of the VMC Spinshot hooks that the WFN folks shot with me at Vegas.  
 
http://www.worldfishingnetwork.com/videos/channels/icast/vmc-spinshot-119182.aspx