OAKLEY, Calif. – The $3.88 million EverStart Series will make its first-ever visit to the California Delta May 28-31 for the season’s fourth and final Western Division event. The tournament will feature as many as 300 competitors and will pay out as much as $214,525 in cash and prizes.
The behemoth Delta, which stretches over 1,000 miles, should present a challenge to anglers not only because of its mammoth size but also its tendency to fluctuate daily from 2 to 4 feet. And with the peculiar Cal Delta changes in tide – tides are similar every two weeks – competitors can’t rely on hot spots they may have found in practice.
The Delta contains two basic types of structure, riprap and tule, with Luhr Jensen Speed Traps in olive craw, white, and crystal craw as the hot lures in late May. Persuader Blade buzzbaits in chartreuse, white or black should also be effective around the Delta’s 5,000 miles of shoreline according to local pros.
Big Break Marina in Oakley will host daily takeoffs each morning at safe light, with Wednesday and Thursday’s weigh-ins also held at the marina beginning at 3 p.m. Friday and Saturday’s weigh-ins will be held at the Wal-Mart store located at 4893 Lone Tree Way in Antioch beginning at 4 p.m. The community is encouraged to attend daily takeoffs and weigh-ins.
As many as 150 Pro Division competitors will vie for a top award worth as much as $60,400. The winning pro will receive a guaranteed cash award of $8,500 plus an Evinrude- or Yamaha-powered Ranger 519VS Comanche bass boat complete with EverStart batteries, Garmin electronics and a Minn Kota trolling motor. If the winner is a registered owner of a Ranger boat, he will receive a $10,000 cash bonus from Ranger, and if he is a participant in the Ranger Cup incentive program, he will receive another $3,000 from Ranger. The winner is also eligible to receive $1,000 from Garmin if his boat is equipped with a fixed-mount Garmin Fishfinder or combination GPS/sounder.
The winning co-angler is guaranteed a cash award of $4,500, and Ranger will award him a Ranger 519VS Comanche if he is a registered owner of a Ranger.
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 – Eastern, Central, Northern and Western – with four regular-season events each. The season culminates in 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. Western Division anglers who finish in the top 30 in the final points standings are eligible to compete in the championship. Every angler who receives weight credit in a tournament earns points, with 200 points awarded to the winner, 199 points for second, 198 points for third, and so on. These points determine angler standings.
The EverStart Series features a pro/co-angler format in which the pro supplies the boat, fishes from the front deck against other pros and controls boat movement while the co-angler fishes from the back deck and competes against other co-anglers. The field competes for two days to determine the top 20 anglers who will advance to Friday’s competition based on their two-day accumulated weight. Weights are cleared for Friday’s semifinal round, and pros and co-anglers start fresh to vie for one of 10 slots in Saturday’s final round where anglers again start at zero.
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