The FLW website has been updated with registration info for the league events.
Normal registration opens 3/1/07 at 8:00 am CST for the league events. Contingency boat owners get to register 1 or 2 days early, depending on boat brand.
What’s with the new rule that we can’t pre-fish after noon on the Friday before the tournament?
Brady
Most professional tournaments have a ruling like that and even alot of the bigger nonprofessional tournaments. The anglers need to be off the water by a certain time and also have to attend a rules meeting that late afternoon or early evening. This applies to everyone, both angler and co-angler. Its a normal rule.
Thanks, Bill
Actually Bill, the noon deadline is new this year. In years past, we have pre-fished for FLW league events right up until the registration/rules meeting, perhaps pulling off the water at 4 or 5 in the afternoon to meet the 6 pm registration deadline.
What this will effectively do is kill a day of pre-fishing for guys who take a Friday off of work to prepare for a Saturday event.
Not trying to start anything here, but that new rule does wreck a day of prefishing. My understanding was the league was geared more towards the weekend angler. This will make prefishing more of a challenge for people with limited time-off. Not a positive change for the league, but that’s just my opinion.
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Not trying to start anything here, but that new rule does wreck a day of prefishing. My understanding was the league was geared more towards the weekend angler. This will make prefishing more of a challenge for people with limited time-off. Not a positive change for the league, but that’s just my opinion.
I agree. I don’t think there was a need for this rule to be implemented.
Most tournaments have a rule like this but it is usually 3 or 4 o’clock which is a lot later than noon.
Just when I’m getting excited for the upcoming season, they throw a curve ball like this on us. I for one think this rule stinks. What are we supposed to do from noon to 6:00 on Friday? Sit around playing tiddly winks?
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Just when I’m getting excited for the upcoming season, they throw a curve ball like this on us. I for one think this rule stinks. What are we supposed to do from noon to 6:00 on Friday? Sit around playing tiddly winks?
Well, the glass boat guys will be wiping down their boats, and the tin boat drivers will be pointing out the spots they missed. 
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Well, the glass boat guys will be wiping down their boats, and the tin boat drivers will be pointing out the spots they missed.
LOL
I agree Coot. That was the first thing I thought about, being for the weekend angler. I was in that spot last year, where I only had Friday to pre-fish.
That does suck. 
I was teetering on the idea of fishing a few of these, but was limited to 1 day of prefising and perhaps a 1/2 day afternoon. This might just make my decision for me.
I do certainly understand the issue that the league is geared towards the weekend angler. I believe that another factor needs to be taken into account. With the increased entry fees and the unmatched (I believe) payouts, the FLW is hoping that boaters will invest more than 1/2 a day preparing for this event.
That’s my take.
FYI – They also changed the rule on the tour event with off the water at noon, registration from 1-4 and rules meeting @ 4:30. I am excited because this allows additional time for prep after the meeting and hopefully more sleep. At the tour if you don’t have it together by 12 on the day before…
ted merdan
What did I miss? This is what I found:
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4. Pretournament practice
There will be no official practice period or off-limits period prior to the pretournament meeting. The purchasing of information or the hiring of services will not be permitted after the balance date for each tournament (August 25, 2007, for the Walleye League Finals).
Sully
Sully, this is a change (for the better ) from earlier in the week. Previously, rule 4 looked just like this (as it currently does in the tour rules)
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4. Pretournament practice
There will be no official practice period or off-limits period prior to the pretournament meeting. However, no contestant may be on tournament waters for the purpose of locating fish or potential fishing waters after 12 p.m. (noon) on the Tuesday (Wednesday of Championship) of registration and pretournament meeting except during tournament hours. The purchasing of information or the hiring of services will not be permitted after the balance deadline date for each tournament.
Just speaking for myself and a few of the buddies that I fish with (I don’t want this to sound like I’m speaking for everyone), we do invest more than 1/2 day prefishing. We budget our time very carefully to take advantage of weekends prior to the event and limited time off from work to make sure we have some sort of a program figured out come tournament day. This is not just for ourselves, but also for the co-anglers who have invested resources and are looking for a good tournament experience. I know for me personally, this will not force me to pre-fish more, but the limited time will force me to pre-fish less. It may not make sense for me individually to burn a personal day on Friday when I only get 1/2 the day to fish. I have fished all WI league events since it’s inception and feel they run a top-notch circuit. In fact, I always look forward what lies in store for the next season. This new rule may play a role in what tournaments I am able to fish. Hope I didn’t make this long rambling post sound like sour grapes, that was not my intention, but not sure why you fix something that appears to me to not be broke.
Ooops, never mind. Must have been typing the same time as Jason. The rule still read with the 12 noon stipulation last night when I checked the FLW site. Glad to see they have changed it!
Hunter,
you can bring the tiddly winks and we can have some real good compitition before the rules meeting. Better yet why not have a boat cleaning contest and see which boat shines the most. At least that way my boat will look good for whoever gets to fish with me. I will have to change my motto to “The boat Looks Good Dont it”, instead of my job is to put you on fish and your job is too catch em. Maybe we can have a traveling trophy. LOL 
I sent an email to Sonny last night and he indicated that rule was only intended for the Tour events since their rules meeting begins earlier. He said it was too late to change the brochures since they’ve already been printed, but they were going to update the website. It looks like they already have. I’m glad they did. My wife will kill me if I take any more time off to fish 
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Hunter,
you can bring the tiddly winks and we can have some real good compitition before the rules meeting. Better yet why not have a boat cleaning contest and see which boat shines the most. At least that way my boat will look good for whoever gets to fish with me. I will have to change my motto to “The boat Looks Good Dont it”, instead of my job is to put you on fish and your job is too catch em. Maybe we can have a traveling trophy. LOL
Well I’m almost sad they changed it now. I was already moving forward with my new enterprise, topless boat washers at the tournament landings. I think that would have guaranteed almost no one would fish at all on Friday
the ladies going to need a water boy?
I always prefished Friday alone, co-angler, to help get that lake feel. This rule sure stops me helping My boater
with any info i could provide. It is a team event !! for weekenders, Sonny’s quote.
This rule steps it a little closer to full timers. I think the 4:00 pm off is sufficient. 
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