Here is my opinion on it:
The Kiwanis Derby starts at 12:01 Saturday Morning until 4pm Sunday Evening. For either $35 if you get the ticket early, or $50 if you get it after the deadline. You get OVER 24 plus hours to fish in a "tournament". Put this into perspective: Bass tournament, or even say walleye tournaments, you are fishing 7am-3pm. say the cheapest competitive event is around $100 for an 8 hour ordeal. Being able to fish for over 24 hours at either $30 or $50 doesn't seem to be all that bad. If you don't want to pay the $50 dollars, its simple-get a ticket BEFORE the deadline-maybe they do this to try to get more people excited about the derby ahead of time and possibly get a better idea on the numbers of folks who are participating for the years event to plan things?. Plus you get a hat, and this year, they are the nicest i have seen in the last 10 or so years i have fished the event.
If your going out to fish opening weekend anyways, why not gamble $35-$50 for the chance of winning something. I am sure someone has spent 35-50 on something useless before. i know i have. You cant win if you don't participate.
As for the where the money goes, its a charity event. Think of going out fishing and donating money. its a win-win. you feel good to be fishing and you feel good to be donating. I don't see any issues with that
I will agree that the prizes are going a little slim-but the first place winner gets a pretty nice looking rig. ill be honest, I won the 2012 walleye derby. It was a 16 foot Lund with a 25 hp motor. Bare bones. In 2013, they switched to the Legend boats with a 60hp boat. the boat DOUBLED in price from $12,000-$20,000. Was i upset that the following year they doubled the value of the boat...sure, maybe a little, (as i sold the boat i won anyways and bought appliances and furniture for my new home), regardless, i went out and fished that night to fish...yup, it costed me $30 bucks back then, but if i didn't have my ticket-i would have never won...
Now a days too, companies are really tight on how much they can "donate" to events like this. With the dollar, economy and everything else in this day in age, its really hard to get "BIG" prizes. I run a memorial fishing event for my Dad. Its a fundraiser for local animal shelters, and ill tell ya: the people/companies that donate are pretty much all local, or small business because the larger companies dont do that stuff any more. its hard to get them to budge. The rich get richer. Its the small local guys that offer guiding packages, resort stays, etc that all they are trying to do is give a good product out that people might return. Getting things like motors, and large ticket items are long gone. its a reality.
If you have ever organized any type of event, party or gathering, not everyone is going to happen of how its ran. I get that. But you have to give thanks to those who help organize an event this large. So, thank you to those who help!
Just go out and fish! if you slam a hawg walleye, then hey, good on yah-but i hope you have a ticket....could get a nice boat
just my own 3 cents worth of comments.
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