I am willing to step up and run the trail with as many others as possible. Get it back to being all about a good time and good lakes. Have as many Ts as possible to accommodate all schedules and get more people involved. Not one or two people running things and picking what works for them.
I agree 100% with this as well.
How does everyone feel about changing it from a "car topper" tourney only to a "trolling motor" only trial. WE already have 4-5 air craft carries that fish. Last year we had some difficulty filling some tournies. I think this would help eliminate that. We could also pick slightly bigger places that will allow more then 10-12 boats and get more boat participating.
I think part of the allure of the car toppers is being able to go to smaller less fished bodies of water. With people in true cartoppers, I think youd see less participation on the big bodies of water, I think Id be in that camp. Just so much tougher to cover water and stay positioned in a cartopper rather than the bigger bodies.
If we have two different set of tournies for big boat/cartopper I dont see the need for the cross over.
Cartoppers are already at a disadvantage to the air craft carriers due to space and casting decks, but somewhere along the line trailered air craft carriers were ok but that was before i started fishing the cartoppers so we lived with it ....adding big boats is just piling on.
I think I would be cool with it. The big boats might hav a disadvantage a little bit eba cause they would hafta haul around all that extra weight just on a trolling motor. I would also appreciate the bigger fields. Sometimes it is tough however keeping ones footing on a car topper when the wind is howling and your trying to deal with wakes. I think a few of each would be nice just to try out each.
Rich,
Believe it or not I don't think you should change much for the topper trail. I would however suggest that maybe during the off season, someone make a poll for locations next season? Ask for lake/pond suggestions from everyone, put them in the poll and take the top 15 or so suggestions from those? Obviously time is needed to give yourself or whoever volunteers to run a particular tourney time to get permits in place, so maybe keep the poll open for 20-30 days? I'm just throwing a number out there. Can be anything but should allow time for more people to be able to see it and give some input. Some folks may not log on as frequently during the "Off season", but should be able to be heard still. Just an idea or two from me.
I think personalities played a bigger part of who participated in tourneys or not and not confusion over what a cartopper is. The aircraft
carriers are here to stay, trailered in or not and everyone knows it by now, except maybe some newbies. They can always be educated on that.
Ken said it in another post that "Hopefully differences can be put aside this upcoming season and more people come out to fish together". I'll add that hopefully it gets back to being just a fun way to get together and fish, putting a little extra change in your pocket at the same time once in a while, maybe seeing how you stack up against the competition in a friendly way (if stats are kept), trading tips and pointers, not being so hell bent on rules and not trying to be or compete with the Bassmaster tourney trail. Let's get away from calling people "Tournament Directors" and having labeled "Leaders", instead have simply volunteers by name, maybe even a dozen or one for each fishing location. I'm pretty sure most people have scales and bags (Yes Shawn, I said bags!) and weights can be determined pretty easily each and every time. If you want to bring slop sinks, baskets and commercial scales, more power to you, but I don't think you need it all in order to function on a whole and have fun (in any trail or group)! Or just keep it all like before and it simply say "It is what it is!". It's like anything else. People either like it or they don't and are either going to fish the main MAFF trail all of the time, some of the time or not at all.
Just my 3 1/2 cents, no criticisms here and I hope next season is a huge success for all!
P.S. I don't think any elections are necessary.
I personally love pretending that these are the next step up from the flw and bassmasters. I think the scales are very cool. I love the friendly competition. I like the standings and stuff. (Even though I'm pretty sure I have no shot at coming in any respectable place.) I like competing with the people near me in the standings.
How does everyone feel about downsizing the # of "official" tournaments. Instead of having one every other weekend, schedule 1 a month or 1 every 4 weeks and then if guys want to throw together a "pick up" event.... cool. I know i did not do a lot of "just for fun" fishing. I can really only fish every other weekend and they were all taken up with Tournaments. So we would be looking at 7 -9 tournaments instead of 12.
I loved how many tourneys there were last year. I think I some guys want to skip a few and do some fun fishing I wouldn't see what's stopping them.
Keep standings all year and hand out tiny trophies for first second and third. We could take the top 5 or 6 bags from each team, so that people who miss a few or want to fun fish more or whatever will still be able to participate, add them together together to get the final standings. What do people think?
Also this gives people who are in a tourney and have not had a great day, even though they may not win that particular event, a reason to keep fishing hard for that day.
What do u guys think about this?
Keep standings all year and hand out tiny trophies for first second and third.
Ribbons. We should hand out Ribbons.
I dono I think it would be badass to have a trophy engraved with " MAFF 2014 cartopper champion" on it. With team name on it maybe.
Another idea is to find a way to post a picture of the "Champions" team on the home page so they can enjoy the recognition until the following season. Anything to make it fun and add a little smack talk.
What do u guys think about this?
Keep standings all year and hand out tiny trophies for first second and third.
Ribbons. We should hand out Ribbons.
Joe, can you share with us what it's like to get a light blue ribbon?
I'm sure josh or rich would be mounting the thing to the hood of the car/truck