FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
$3.88 MILLION EVERSTART SERIES TO VISIT LAKE VERMILLION
TOWER, Minn. (May 1519, 2003) – The EverStart Series Northern Division will kick off the 2003 season June 4-7 when Lake Vermillion plays host to the $3.88 million bass-tournament trail. The event, which will feature as many as 200 pros and 299 200 co-anglers, will pay out as much as $256,825 in cash and prizes, including a top pro award of worth as much as $61,900. $10,000 cash plus an Evinrude- or Yamaha-powered Ranger 519VS Comanche bass boat equipped with EverStart batteries, a Minn Kota trolling motor and Garmin electronics.
The tournament marks the first time the EverStart Series has visited Lake Vermillion, and anglers who prefer fishing structure will likely excel. The lake is made up of a variety of almost endless structure, including shoreline rubble, docks, points, grass, reeds and rock piles. Plastics in crawfish color patterns are likely to be the bait of choice, with spinner baits and crankbaits also effective along shorelines and over rocky structures.
Fortune Bay Resort and Casino in Tower will host daily takeoffs at safe light. Wednesday and Thursday’s weigh-ins will also be held there beginning at 3 p.m., and Friday and Saturday’s weigh-ins will be held at the Wal-Mart store located at 12080 Highway 169 in Hibbing beginning at 4 p.m.
Opening-round anglers compete for two days to determine the 20 anglers in each division who advance to Friday’s semifinal round based on their two-day accumulated weight. Anglers Pros and co-anglers start at zero Friday and compete for one of 10 slots in Saturday’s final round. Weights are again cleared for Saturday’s competition, and anglers compete for position and prize money.
The winning pro is guaranteed the $10,000 cash award and an Evinrude- or Yamaha-powered Ranger 519VS Comanche bass boat equipped with EverStart batteries, a Minn Kota trolling motor and Garmin electronics.the Ranger boat. for a total prize package worth $61,900, and Iif the winner is the original owner of a Ranger boat, Ranger will award an additional $10,000 cash bonus for a total prize package of $61,900. The winning co-angler is guaranteed a $5,000 cash award. If the co-angler winner is a registered Ranger boat owner, Ranger will also award a new Ranger 519VS Comanche bass boat.
The EverStart Series features a pro/co-angler format with pros supplying the boats, fishing from the front deck against other pros and controlling boat movement. Co-anglers fish from the back deck and compete against other co-anglers. Every angler who receives weight credit in a tournament earns points that determine angler standings. Two hundred points are awarded to the winner, 199 points for second, 198 points for third, and so on.
Designed as a pathway to the $5.76 million Wal-Mart FLW Tour, the world’s most lucrative bass-tournament series, the EverStart Series features four divisions – Central, Eastern, Northern and Western – with four regular-season events each. The season culminates with the $335,975 EverStart Series Championship, which will be held Oct. 29-Nov. 1 on Old Hickory Lake near Gallatin, Tenn. The event will be broadcast to 55 million subscribers of the Outdoor Life Network on the “FLW Outdoors” television series. Central Division anglers who finish in the top 40 in the final points standings are eligible to compete in the championship.
The EverStart Series is administered by FLW Outdoors, the world’s leading marketer of competitive fishing. Other FLW Outdoors-sanctioned tournament trails are the Wal-Mart FLW Tour, Wal-Mart Bass Fishing League, Wal-Mart Texas Tournament Trail, Wal-Mart RCL Walleye Tour and Wal-Mart RCL Walleye League. EverStart Batteries, the best-selling batteries in the world, are marketed exclusively by Wal-Mart stores.
Wal-Mart and many of America’s most respected companies support FLW Outdoors and its six tournament trails. Wal-Mart has been the title sponsor of FLW Outdoors since 1997.
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