Virtual Championship 2006: Bracket 10
Opening round – Bracket 10: Monsoor vs. Clausen
Virtual Championship 2006
Opening round – Bracket 10: Monsoor vs. Clausen
Another exciting season of tour-level pro bass fishing drew to a close in record-smashing fashion last week on Lake Champlain, leaving only the Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship on the horizon before 2006 is etched forever in the history books. FLWOutdoors.com will once again host its own “virtual championship” – a featured daily poll where readers can make their own picks and weigh in on who they think will be crowned champion during the Aug. 2-5 year-ending event on Logan Martin Lake in Birmingham, Ala.
In the days leading up to the championship, FLWOutdoors.com will ask readers to vote on who they think will advance in each of the daily bracket challenges (polls are located on the right-hand side of the FLW Outdoors and FLW Tour home pages). After each day’s votes are tabulated, the virtual championship bracket will be immediately updated to reflect the readers’ choices.
Will fishing fans correctly forecast the winner of this year’s championship? Vote each day to support your favorite qualified angler and to learn more about the 48 pros who will actually compete on Logan Martin Lake for a top prize of $500,000.
Today’s featured bracket matchup: Tom Monsoor (No. 10) vs. Luke Clausen (No. 39)
Tom Monsoor – No. 10 seed: Tom Monsoor is arguably the most adroit Mississippi River angler fishing the FLW Tour. All six of the La Crosse, Wis., resident’s FLW Outdoors tournament wins have come from Old Man River and all virtually in his backyard. Though his Mississippi mastery won’t get him far on Logan Martin Lake the first week in August, Monsoor didn’t cruise the river’s current into the championship, either. He earned his 10th-seeded berth into the big show with consistent fishing this year, placing 18th at both Pickwick Lake and Lake Champlain and 28th at Lake Murray. He also cashed checks in five of six events, using the $38,500 from this season to break the $300,000 mark in career earnings. Monsoor is by no means a one-trick pony, and he’s a quick study, having qualified for the championship the last two years in only four years of fishing the FLW Tour full-time. He shouldn’t be underestimated come championship time, and you can bet he’ll be gunning to improve on his 29th-place finish from last year.
Luke Clausen – No. 39 seed: As FLW Outdoors events have spread to the West in recent years, fishing fans everywhere are witnessing the high caliber of not only the region’s fisheries but its anglers, and in the forefront of that group is Luke Clausen of Spokane, Wash. Clausen won the very first FLW Outdoors even he ever fished in 2003 – a Stren Western event on Clear Lake – and followed it up with a top-10 in the same event the following year. But in 2004, few were prepared for Clausen to win the vaunted FLW Tour Championship on Logan Martin Lake in his rookie season on tour. Though he missed qualifying for the championship in 2005, Clausen is dialed in again this year, currently ranked fifth in the FLW Series and having fished an extremely consistent season on tour. With $688,250 already amassed in FLW Outdoors career earnings after only a few years of fishing with the organization, Clausen has a taste for winning, and everyone will be watching to see if he can reprise his 2004 championship win on Logan Martin Lake when the tour returns to the Alabama fishery to finish the 2006 season.
Virtual Championship 2006 (click for complete details and poll results)
Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship 2006 (click for more information)
Pirch vs. Ehrler
Nixon vs. Cochran
Bolivar vs. Yamamoto
Bennett vs. Hibdon
Martin vs. Berry
Scheide vs. Strader
Moynagh vs. Stricker
Herren vs. Namiki
Gagliardi vs. Monroe