First of all let me introduce myself to you guys, my name is Russell Gardner I was born and raised in Seneca South Carolina which to many is “Gods Country“ for the fact that we have the Blue Ridge mountains, Lake Hartwell and Lake Keowee bordering our small town. My fishing career started at an early age when my grandpa started taking me crappie and brim fishing on the shores of Lake Hartwell. Next… we got a boat, and he started taking me bass fishing on the lake. The first bass I hooked and reeled in on my own I was in love with the sport and I knew this is what I wanted to do one day for a living. Time went on and I got older and my dad and I started fishing local club tournaments together. We had some success early on then we graduated into a bigger club, the Fishers of Men Legacy trail. Our fist season in the Fishers of Men we made the national championship on Lake Guntersville in Alabama, and boy were we shocked when we got there for practice on the first day. Growing up on Hartwell and Keowee, I had never seen any grass or anything like Lake Guntersville. We did not have good electronics or GPS units on our boat so needless to say we were lost out there. However we finished with a limit and making the first cut but we failed to make the final day. That failure just drove my passion for the sport even more.

Life went on and there I was in high school and playing two sports for Seneca High school, as well as travel baseball. I did not fish as much as I wanted to due to games and baseball tournaments almost every weekend for four years. After graduation, I went on to Tri-County Technical college where I got a a degree in Industrial Electronics Technology (IET) and I became an electrician. I began fishing local club tournaments on my own at this point out of a 17’ aluminum center console boat with a 50hp Mercury that my grandpa gave to me. As my knowledge of the sport grew I quickly began being able to compete on the local level and I eventually out grew that boat and wanted to move on to the next level which was the regional BFL events. That is when I upgraded my boat to meet requirements for boater entry. After a few seasons on the regional level with some success and failures, I am proud to say that starting in 2023 I will be entering the MLF Toyota series as a boater where I am working on the dream of fishing for a living.