Chris Johnston of Peterborough, Ontario has joined the Bassmaster Century Club and claimed his second Elite Series title, weighing in 113 lb 12 oz across four days at the Yokohama Tires Bassmaster Elite at Santee Cooper Lakes in South Carolina. The back-to-back Progressive Bassmaster Angler of the Year sealed the win on Championship Sunday with a 30 lb 15 oz bag, finishing 19 lb 12 oz ahead of runner-up Brandon Palaniuk and a remarkable 42 lb 10 oz clear of tenth.
It is Johnston's 24th Bassmaster top ten and only his second Elite win, the moment landing on Canada's May 24 long weekend with a symmetry the host noted on stage. He is the first Canadian to win an FLW Tour event and the first to win an Elite Series event, and he now owns two Century belts to go with his two Angler of the Year crowns.
"I don't even have words to describe how this week went," Johnston said as he stepped off the stage with the trophy. "Unbelievable week. Thank you, Santee Cooper. Thank you for everyone for showing up. One of the best weeks of fishing of my life."
The pattern came together on the first day of practice, when Johnston was working grass in the lower lake and getting nothing serious for his trouble. "Caught a four-pounder or something and I saw a dock and I thought, I'm going to go in and check a dock," he said. "I just happened to have my full cast on the deck beside me and that's what I threw into that dock and caught a four-pounder. And that's what keyed me into this pattern this week. Two docks down, I shook off a five-pounder."
That dock-skipping soft-plastic bite became the engine of the week. Johnston compared the way Santee's big bass reacted to it with two of the most disruptive baits in tournament bass history. "I obviously got onto that deal in practice and it was like a bait they've never seen before," he said. "It was like the Senko 30 years ago. It was the A-Rig. And now obviously it's the full cast hideup corki. And when they see it, those big ones, they won't eat anything else right now. You twitch that in front of their face and it's game on. But getting them hooked up is one thing. Getting them in the boat's a whole another thing."
Hooking and landing the giants among Santee's dock cables and pylons was the day-by-day puzzle. Johnston told the stage his week ran on adrenaline and bad luck in equal measure. "My nerves are a wreck," he said. "I had everything happen this week. I blew a sandal. I fell in the lake. I lost fish. I had them wrapped up in docks. I had to crash my boat into docks to get fish out of the dock. Just an unbelievable week, but when it's meant to be, it's meant to be."
The sandal story produced one of the day's running jokes after Johnston spent Day 3 fishing barefoot on a sun-baked deck. "I blew a sandal yesterday and I had to fish all day in bare feet," he said. "My feet were on fire on that carpet on the deck of the boat. I was putting water on the carpet just trying to keep it cool."
Sunday's blowout bag was sealed by a fish caught in the dying minutes of the day. Johnston had already fished a dock earlier and put a four-and-three-quarter pound bass in the box when he asked his camera operator for one more cast on the way back to the ramp. "I cast out, I turned the trolling motor out to head back to weigh in, and all of a sudden my rod loaded up," he said. "I didn't even have a chance to weigh it. I put it in the box, but it was probably a six and twelve pounder. So I called it a five-pounder at the end of the day. So, it was just it was just my week and I'm super thankful for it."
He also took home Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Day for a 7 lb 7 oz kicker on the final round, a margin that left no doubt about who owned the fishery this week. Johnston dedicated the trophy to his sons, Beckett and Bo, who were playing baseball and lacrosse back in Ontario. "I'll be home tomorrow with a blue trophy, boys," he told them from the stage.
Johnston had admitted on the boat that he had been hungry for the result. "I haven't had a top 10 in about a year and a half, which I was kind of jonesing for one," he said. "It's been a while. To win in this fashion, I've never done it like this before. It's always been a nail-biter when I'm up here. So much nicer, way less stress, and yeah, awesome week."
*Source: Bassmaster TV stage interview, 17 May 2026.*