2010 Schedule???

[skeeterman190]

 Who knows what to do?? Me personally i will prolly fish 1 next year and thats it. Burt Mullet. Its enjoyable and your gonna catch a huge bag.This next bit is my feelings.Times are tough and Flw is catering to the large expanse of numbers of Michigan.. I understand that.. The best fisheries around. Last year was my first year fishing BFl. I finished 30th in the points..anyone couldve done that if they forked over 200 bucks and has half a brain. Ill preach this till the day i die.. we need to diversify....we could have huge numbers if we did.. I know Eric all the great numbers are on the east but theres a ton of talent left untapped cause they dont wanna fish against homers.(no dig on u Bond) i like ya u got the same fire i got. We dont get the numbers now..Run one on some other lakes for more than 1 time a year..The BBT circuit on the westside drew a 69 boat average over the course of 5 tournies and they pay back 65%. There payout is terrible yet they are the only circuit over there that can draw boats. yes there a team deal but seriously.. i can look at a list of the top finishers there that dont need a partner to catch a bag there. would think if you showed some dedication to coming more than once a year to our area u would get more participation.

[djkimmel]

Thanks Team houston - All American. You and Jeff Bishop also - that was cool when he made it the same time Bill Cisler did. I had a great time at that event too. I don't nit pick when recognizing anglers who have made it to one of the big events. If you've been there, you earned it and congratulations. I think there were one or two others from Michigan who made it, but the tournaments all kind of blur together right now until I have a chance to look at the 'archives.' A number of friends and fishing acquaintances have made it from this region.

The All American is one of the great events to qualify for. I highly recommend the experience and hope many more Great Lakes anglers get a shot at it. It is one of the reasons I have enjoyed fishing the BFL circuit. Back to the 2010 schedule. If the schedule and lakes work for you, it is a well run circuit. I really like the boater / co-angler format. If you have any further tournaments aspirations, it is a great way to test the waters with burning through $50 to $70,000 in a year jumping right into the big fire.

[motocross269]

Two LSC tournaments...I like that....

[rufus]

Dan,
I once thought the same thing about the regional not being able to be held on a water body that a division has fished, but apparently that is not true. We fished against the Illinois divison at the regional this year. One of their stops this year was on July 11 at Fort Madison. As I have stated in the past, I have no problem whatsoever in competing against locals, but 5 of the top 6 qualifiers were from Illinois. Yes, they did get us at this one. That was one challenging event, but I did get to keep par and got my coangler the first day a check  .

[Jighead]

Yeah, like Eric I'm another "homer" that unfortunately doesn't cash a check at every tournament.  At the risk of making this statement without doing a little research, my hunch is that most of the checks at the St. Clair and Detroit River BFL tourneys don't go to the eastside Michiganders that would be considered locals.  There's a host of excellent fishermen from Indiana (Hi Rufus...) and Ohio that do very well over here.

From a fishing standpoint, I'm kind of disappointed that there's not more of a variety of waters on the schedule.  I like to challenge myself on different waters once in awhile.   However, from a purely monetary standpoint, I'm happy to see a St. Clair/ Detroit River heavy schedule.  Living only three miles from St. Clair means almost zero travel expenses for me.

[Team houston]

One of those days we were limited to the bay because of bad weather. If we would have had the lost day on the big water it would have been different.

[dominater]

My concerns with this schedule have been echoed by many on this forum already.  To more accurately represent this division, I propose changing the name to the BFL - Smallmouth Division.  Michigan is a bit of a misnomer, I believe.

[dartag]

wonder why no regionals are listed.

i see there is a Stren  Invitational listed but no championship.

[skeeterman190]

Ah my post got thrown outta proportion my bad.. i know Eric isnt a homer..heck my a good friend of mine won the points and Heath was third i was just sayin its not everyones back yard and some like i wont take help from anyone ill figure it out myself..

[djkimmel]

Dan,
I once thought the same thing about the regional not being able to be held on a water body that a division has fished, but apparently that is not true. We fished against the Illinois divison at the regional this year. One of their stops this year was on July 11 at Fort Madison. As I have stated in the past, I have no problem whatsoever in competing against locals, but 5 of the top 6 qualifiers were from Illinois. Yes, they did get us at this one. That was one challenging event, but I did get to keep par and got my coangler the first day a check  .

There does seem to be exceptions at times. But you are a very good tournament angler no matter where you fish. Of course, it would be nice to fish home waters. Our season, weather, facilities, community support all seem to make it difficult getting a regional here though it has been discussed quite a bit the past few years.

I find it interesting that the Michigan team did recently win against all the other states on the Mississippi. I was on several teams that won or took 2nd in divisionals in other states though some of those were on other parts of the Great Lakes. Maybe there is a way Michigan division BFL anglers can help get a divisional here with some effort done correctly?

[Jighead]

wonder why no regionals are listed.

i see there is a Stren  Invitational listed but no championship.

There was a live chat on FLW Outdoors.com yesterday with Charlie Evans.  He said that BFL Regional dates will be announced soon.  This is according to a report on BassFan.

[Bassinkid10]

I thought I saw the regionals listed if you look for them on the main FLW page where it lists The Stren schedule. 

Pete

[motocross269]

Dan,
I once thought the same thing about the regional not being able to be held on a water body that a division has fished, but apparently that is not true. We fished against the Illinois divison at the regional this year. One of their stops this year was on July 11 at Fort Madison. As I have stated in the past, I have no problem whatsoever in competing against locals, but 5 of the top 6 qualifiers were from Illinois. Yes, they did get us at this one. That was one challenging event, but I did get to keep par and got my coangler the first day a check  .

There does seem to be exceptions at times. But you are a very good tournament angler no matter where you fish. Of course, it would be nice to fish home waters. Our season, weather, facilities, community support all seem to make it difficult getting a regional here though it has been discussed quite a bit the past few years.

I find it interesting that the Michigan team did recently win against all the other states on the Mississippi. I was on several teams that won or took 2nd in divisionals in other states though some of those were on other parts of the Great Lakes. Maybe there is a way Michigan division BFL anglers can help get a divisional here with some effort done correctly?

Maybe the Success of the state teams has something to do with working as a "Team"...I know that was the case with the BASS divisional team this year, I would bet it was the same with TBF..
Maybe that would be the key to the success of anglers from this state at Regionals....
I have seen it on the BFL circuit..There are 5-6 boaters that come up to LSC and fish the BFLs from out of state..They work together and share spots equally and most of them cash checks every time...(I won't mention any names but check the results)...Obviously you have to trust the anglers that you work with...

[djkimmel]

Some teams do a great job working as a team. Trust is pretty important. I've been on good teams and teams that were just a group of individuals. The good teams have done better much more often.

[gr@ssmonkey]

  i am saddened by this schedule,can anyone bring michigan together or is it always east vs west......I live on the west side but love fishing ST. Clair,just find it hard to justify the cost of travel for all the tourneys vs reward,but if i thought I could get a break on 1 or 2 tourneys (west side) I would definetley fish them all as I am wanting to fish one of them regionals.......but Ebond makes alot of sense to me and I will have to sit this year out again ,maybe come for one of the St. Clair tourneys.....would love to see 2 east side tourney's 2 west side events and the 2 day tourney at wixom/sanford chain,but that will have to go on the wish list
        good luck to all that compete in 2010!!!!!!

[TCook]

Looks like there are 3 detroit river tournaments now and the regional will be at kentucky lake.

http://bfl.flwoutdoors.com/schedule.cfm?bTournamentRef=0&cid=2&did=0&state=MI&tmonth=0&tyear=2010&ln=0

[motocross269]

That stinks..   ....
Did they change it because of the BASS Open??? I know some guys were complaining about that...

[SethV]

I would guess they moved the date because of the bass open.  I am ok with that, but not really thrilled to see another elizabeth park tx.  I am already not looking forward to the long boat rides.   

[Jighead]

I don't think it's so bad.  I'm glad they took the 7/21 tourney off the BASS Open, but I wish they could have left it on St. Clair instead of moving down to the river.  At least they didn't move it all the way to Sandusky 

I know I'm looking too far ahead (gotta get there first right?...), but I wish they would do the Kentucky regional out of Kenlake Park or Paris instead all the way up at the dam.  That makes a 70+ mile run south to where it's been fishing the strongest lately.

[djkimmel]

Yes - the schedules changed due to the BASS Open. Only so many weekends available during our summer 'season' unfortunately. They didn't want a tournament on the same weekend as the BASS Open was already going on.