The Illinois Walleye Trail is pleased to announce the 2009 fishing tournament schedule. With the current economic conditions, we felt we needed to make a change, to help the fishermen reduce their expenses and time requirement. Therefore, the upcoming season tournaments will be 4 one day tournaments, with a one day State Championship combined with the fourth one day. We also feel that restructuring to a four month schedule we can reduce expenses and increase our participation commitments. We also feel that we can create a larger payout with minimal overall cost by increasing the entry fee to $200.00 per team per event. Here is the old payout based on 50 teams compared to the new $200.00 entry fee.
Old $140.00/team
$5.00 Angler of Year
$5000.00 Payout Cash
1 place $1750.00
2 place 850.00
3 place 500.00
Etc.
New
$200.00/Team
$5.00 Angler of Year
$7250.00 Payout Cash
1 place $2700.00
2 place $1400.00
3 place $ 975.00
Etc.
With 20% of field 10 places would receive cash.
Under the old rate, if you fished all 6 tournaments total cost would be $840.00
Under new rates if you fished all 5 tournaments total cost would be $1000.00. Over the entire season the increase to fishermen will be only $160.00 ($33.00 per tournament per team or $16.50 each participant) but the payout will increase approximately 45%.
Big fish pot is still optional and $10.00 per team with 100% payout.
The schedule, barring any complications is as follows:
November 2, 2008 Hennepin, IL
November 23, 2008 Henry, IL
March 22, 2009 Spring Valley
April 25, 2009 (Saturday) Spring Valley, IL
April 26,2009 State Championship Spring Valley, IL
AYA Tournament June 7, 2009 Hennepin, IL
Rules, points, Angler of the Year Fund, and invites to Cabelas National Championship will all remain the same.
The Trail will continue with sponsorships from Hennepin Marine, Lund Boats, Mercury Marine, and Cabelas National Championship.
Updated applications will be available on http://www.prairielandeyes.com in the next 7 to 10 days.
We hope everyone will be pleased about this new schedule and fees. If you have any questions feel free to contact me at [email protected] or 309-527-6328, home or 309-242-6328, Cell.
_________________
Bob