Hello to all,
My name is John Carter, I am the Fishers of Men, MI division Team Trail Director. I fished with the Fishers of Men in 2005 in both the West MI division and the North Kentucky division, and I was so impressed by Fishers of Men, that I applied to be a director. In 2006 I started the MI East Division.
For those of you who don't know anything about FOM, we are a non-denominational Christian ministry. We attempt to run the most professionally run team tournaments in the country. Our format is 5 divisional tournaments, leading to one of 5 regional tournaments, which lead to the FOM National Championship (which is a huge production) just ask any team who has been to one of them.
Our tournaments are run as follows:
We have an off-limits period which begins the Monday before the tournament (see tournament rules
http://www.fomntt.com/rules.php ), then Friday is an official practice day, until 5pm followed by a pre-tournament meeting. Our Friday night meetings are the Heart of our ministry. We try to hold the meetings at an area church, we provide our anglers with dinner and a short message before drawing blast off and giving away great door prizes. Tournaments are all on Saturdays from safe light til 3pm.
If you have never fished an FOM event, you need to check us out this year, and you will come back for more.
God bless,
John K. Carter
MI Director FOM
I personally like the sound of FOM as a circuit and it was one of the team trails me and my partner discussed possibly fishing last year. The pre meetings that were worth 50 points and the fact that we were not religious individuals was the only deterant for us. If the points for attending meetings ever change I would consider fishing it in the future.
T,
Dont let not being a religious individual deter you from coming to the friday night meeting. It is not like you think. It is a nice meal followed by a short message that is always interesting to here wether you are religious or not. The message rarely runs longer than 20 minuets and they still give away good doort prizes.
T,
Let me challenge you to come fish one event, and I would be willing to bet, you won't mind attending the Pre-tournament meeting. Just like a BFL tourney has a pre-tournament meeting, only we feed you and you hear a short 10-15 minute message. The fellowship is awsome unlike any other trail you have ever fished.
I would venture to say that most of the anglers in our division do NOT regularly attend church, so don't let that stop you from fishing with FOM.
John Carter
MI FOM Director
T,
Everyone else is right on the money, it's not quite what you may think. There is an inspirational message at each meeting, but fairly short and usually interesting. Religion at FOM is like a plate of cookies at a party; they're there if you want some.
What you will notice after a while is the attitude at FOM. Everyone is friendly; nobody cops an attitude 'cause you're not one of "them". The competition is fierce, there are some good sticks here.
Plus you get dinner. Sometimes just pizza, sometimes a darn good spread. Now stop and think about it...when's the last time you got to sit down and talk with your competition? Most everyone loves to talk fishin', good chance to learn a lot.
Give one tx a shot. Come to Saginaw bay. If nothing else it's a chance to fish for cash and catch the biggest smallies of your life.
I could not agree more, come fish one of the tournaments and you will enjoy it, the special emphasis on husband wife and father son/daughter teams is an added bonus as you have a great chance at qualifying for the championship this way. There is a good chance I will be breaking out my secret weapon (Wife) and fishing several east side tournaments with my partners this year. Youth events through the legacy division are another bonus. Seriously my wife was so mad at me for not taking her to the FOM tournaments that was begging me to sign us up this year, when was the last time your wife wanted you to fish more tournaments??????