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ou probably never really considered the possibility of turning your hobby into a money-making proposition. Few golfers have had the thrill of being handed a $50,000 check. Most water skiers only dream about winning a new boat. Stephenville’s Spike Stoker claimed both the check and the boat at a fshing tournament almost a year ago. Stoker, who moved to the city fve years ago to manage the Tractor Supply location here, teamed up with his partner, Justin Stone, to reel in more than 50 pounds of fsh at the Bass Champs Tournament at Lake Ivie in October 2009.

The Breckenridge native has been fshing competitively since he was 15 years old. He considers last year’s win his professional highlight. “I guess I started fshing when I was a little bitty boy,” Stoker said, adding he used to accompany his grandfather to wet a line in the Clear Fork of the Brazos River on family property near Breckenridge.

He and his parents lived on nearby Hubbard Creek Lake, where he began fshing tournaments before he was old enough to drive. “My dad would take me to the lake and he’d drop me and the boat off and come back at 3 o’clock in the afternoon and pick me up at weigh-in,” he said.

He fgures his frst tournament win came there at the Breckenridge Bass Club Tournament. He has a streak of top six fnishers there every year since he started. “From junior high or high school, on through college, I fshed the Breckenridge Bass Club Tournament every year,” Stoker said. “And I never fnished lower than sixth.” His love of the outdoors and fshing, specifcally, has taken him to lakes and tournaments all over the state. “I fsh all over Texas,” he said. “We won the Choke Canyon Tournament, south of San Antonio a little over a month ago. We won $20,000, but most of the lakes we fsh are south and west of Stephenville.”

“We could fsh any lake in Texas at any time,” he said, “but most of the trails we follow are Amistad, Falcon, Choke Canyon, Ivie, Hubbard Creek, Brownwood, mostly west and south.”

While he has pulled trophy specimens from most of the lakes in Texas, his favorite spot is Lake Falcon, just barely within the confnes of the Lone Star State. The lake is located near Zapata, between Del Rio and Brownsville, right on the Mexican border. “Falcon is one of the most unbelievable lakes there is,” he said, his voice rising with excitement. “Anybody can catch a big fsh down there. And you can catch a hundred of them a day."