SHREVEPORT, La. – Some of Texas’ own will fish for a share of $800,000 at the Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship presented by Castrol Sept. 11-14 on Cross Lake near Shreveport, La.
With seven Texas anglers competing, the Lone Star State is tied with North Carolina for the most representatives. Yamaha’s Jay Yelas of Tyler, Kellogg’s Clark Wendlandt of Cedar Park, Yamaha’s Alton Jones of Waco, Gary Klein of Weatherford, Kellogg’s Jim Tutt of Longview, Mark Pack of Mineola and Yamaha’s Takahiro Omori of Emory will represent Texas in a field of 48 Pro Division anglers.
Yelas, the 2002 Land O’Lakes Angler of the Year, qualified as the No. 1 seed and will fish head-to-head against No. 48 seed Harmon Davis of Marlow, Okla., for the first two days of competition. The angler with the heaviest weight will advance to the semifinal round of 24 anglers.
After fishing a limited number of FLW Tour events in 1997, Yelas returned to fish full time in 2002 and walked away with $67,500 in earnings as well as his Angler-of-the-Year title. A consistent angler, Yelas finished in the top 10 twice in 2002 and never finished below 38th. His career FLW Tour earnings exceed $90,000. This is his first championship appearance. Davis fished his way to a championship berth in only his first year on the Wal-Mart FLW Tour. The former EverStart Series Central Division champion has amassed more than $38,000 in earnings via the Wal-Mart FLW Tour, the EverStart Series, the Wal-Mart Bass Fishing League and the Texas Tournament Trail.
Wendlandt will enter the tournament as the No. 4 seed and will face fellow Kellogg’s pro Alvin Shaw of State Road, N.C., in the No. 45 spot. Former Land O’Lakes Angler of the Year Wendlandt racked up two top-10 finishes in 2002, including a fourth-place effort at the Wal-Mart Open on Arkansas’ Beaver Lake and a seventh-place showing on Alabama’s Wheeler Lake in February. The accomplished pro has 15 top-10 tournament finishes and two Angler-of-the-Year titles to his credit and is making his sixth consecutive championship appearance. He has earned $709,000 through the Wal-Mart FLW Tour. Shaw has seven top-10 tournament finishes in his Wal-Mart FLW Tour career, and his best outing in 2002 was a 14th-place effort at the Wal-Mart Open. A seven-year FLW Tour veteran, Shaw has earned more than $132,000 via the Wal-Mart FLW Tour, the EverStart Series, the Wal-Mart BFL and the Ranger M1.
No. 13 seed Jones will face No. 36 seed Craig Powers of Rockwood, Tenn., during days one and two. Jones had a solid season in 2002, fishing himself to a third-place finish on Wheeler Lake in February and an 11th-place spot at the Forrest Wood Open on New York’s Lake Champlain in June. Jones has earned more than $76,000 in three seasons on the FLW Tour and is making his second championship appearance. Powers earned his championship berth with finishes like his third-place effort on Arkansas’ Lake Ouachita in March. He has six top-10 tournament finishes in his four-year Wal-Mart FLW Tour career. The 1996 Wal-Mart Bass Fishing League Choo Choo Division Champion has career earnings of more than $302,000 through the FLW Tour, the EverStart Series and the BFL. This is his fourth championship appearance.
Klein will enter the tournament as the No. 17 seed and will compete against No. 32 seed Dale Teaney of Williamsburg, Ohio, for the first two days of competition. Klein had two top-10 performances in 2002, including a fourth-place finish on Lake Okeechobee near Clewiston, Fla., in January and a 10th-place effort on Lake Ouachita in March. This year was Klein’s sixth year on the FLW Tour, and 2002 also marks his sixth consecutive championship appearance. His two tournament wins and 10 top-10 finishes have earned him winnings in excess of $430,000. Teaney’s best finish in 2002 was a 22nd-place effort on Wheeler Lake in February. This is Teaney’s second year to fish the Wal-Mart FLW Tour and his second championship as well. He is an accomplished angler in the EverStart Series, the Wal-Mart BFL and the Ranger M1 as well as the Wal-Mart FLW Tour. His career earnings total more than $109,000.
Tutt qualified in the No. 26 spot and will fish against No. 23 seed Kevin Vida of Clare, Mich. After posting an eighth-place finish at the season opener on Lake Okeechobee, Tutt finished in the top 20 on Lake Ouachita in March and in the top 30 on Tennessee’s Old Hickory Lake in May. Tutt won back-to-back Wal-Mart BFL Cowboy Division titles in 1996 and 1997. He has earned more than $200,000 via the Wal-Mart FLW Tour, the EverStart Series, the BFL and the Texas Tournament Trail. This is his second championship appearance. Vida put together two top-20 finishes in 2002. Only his 12th-place finish at the Forrest Wood Open on Lake Champlain in June bested a 20th-place effort on Lake Ouachita. An accomplished angler on the EverStart Series and Wal-Mart BFL circuits, Vida is making his first Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship appearance.
Pack qualified as the No. 41 seed and will fish head-to-head against No. 8 seed Bernie Schultz of Gainesville, Fla., for the first two days of competition. Pack put together two top-10 finishes on the FLW Tour in 2002, including an eighth-place finish on Old Hickory Lake and a sixth-place finish at the Wal-Mart Open. Pack, who has also competed in the EverStart Series, the Ranger M1 and the Texas Tournament Trail, has amassed more than $140,000 in career earnings since 2000. Schultz has six career top-10 FLW Tour finishes, including an eighth-place finish at this year’s Wal-Mart Open. His career earnings are in excess of $228,000. This is his fifth championship appearance.
No. 46 seed Omori will face No. 3 seed and fellow Yamaha teammate Dean Rojas of Lake Havasu City, Ariz., during days one and two. Omori, an FLW Tour veteran, has three top-10 finishes to his credit, including a win in 2001 on Alabama’s Lake Martin. His best finish in 2002 was a 28th-place effort on Lake Ouachita. A native of Japan, Omori has earned nearly $210,000 through the Wal-Mart FLW Tour, the Wal-Mart BFL and the Ranger M1. Rojas put together two top-10 finishes in his first full season on the Wal-Mart FLW Tour, including a second-place effort at the Forrest Wood Open. His career earnings through the Wal-Mart FLW Tour and the BFL exceed $155,000. This is his first Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship appearance.
This year’s Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship features a setup unlike any bass-fishing championship in the history of the sport. The 48 pros who qualified based on their year-end point total will be seeded so fishing fans can keep up with their favorite anglers in a bracket-style competition similar to the NCAA basketball playoffs. The No. 1 seed will fish head-to-head against the No. 48 seed; the No. 2 seed will compete against the No. 47 seed and so on.
The top 48 pros will fish for a combined two-day weight to eliminate half the field for the semifinal round on day three. The 24 semifinalists will continue in head-to-head competition on day three, after which the field will be cut to 12 finalists.
On day four, the remaining 12 anglers will be reseeded according to their total weight from the first three days of competition. Anglers seeded No. 1 and No. 2 will compete for the first- and second-place cash awards of $260,000 and $55,000. The No. 3 and No. 4 seeds will compete for third- and fourth-place money of $34,500 and $29,000, and so on. The pro who finishes last in the no-entry-fee championship will take $2,000.
Co-angler competition will end on day three. A full field of 48 co-anglers will fish for a combined two-day weight to advance to the 24-slot final round. Weights are then cleared, with the weight on day three determining the Co-angler Division champion, who will collect $25,000 cash. The co-angler finishing 48th will receive $500.
Named after Ranger Boats founder Forrest L. Wood, the Wal-Mart FLW Tour is run by FLW Outdoors, the world’s leading marketer of competitive fishing tournaments. Wal-Mart signed on as title sponsor of the FLW Tour in 1996 and has since expanded its sponsorship of FLW Outdoors’ fishing tournaments to include the EverStart Series, Wal-Mart BFL, Wal-Mart Texas Tournament Trail, Wal-Mart RCL Walleye Circuit and Ranger M1. FLW Outdoors will award anglers as much as $22 million in 2002 through 170 tournaments nationwide.