One of our local Florida Panhandle anglers, Chad Prough, from Chipley is finding success fishing the FLW Series – BP Eastern Division. If you don’t know, these tournaments are the real thing. With $4,000 entry fees (yes, I said $4,000) and competing with some of the best in the business like, Scott Martin, Dave Lefebre, Luke Clausen, Tommy Biffle, Clark Wendlandt, David Walker, Steve Kennedy, Jimmy Houston and Larry Nixon, just to name a few. The $4,000 is just the entry fee for the tournament. If you fish all four days of official practice and make it to the final day of the tournament you will have been at the tournament at least nine days. So that’s nine days worth of hotel, food, gas, tackle, etc… so you better have your act together or deep pockets to compete at this level. Pay out for these events are $100,000 for 1st place down to $10,000 for 50th place. At the end of the year the top 20 from this division (along with others from other divisions) will be invited to fish the 2010, 2.5 Million Dollar Forest Wood Cup. 1st place in this event is One Million Dollars. Michael Bennett, who now lives in Panama City, won this event and a Million Dollars two years ago. There is only one level higher than the FLW Series and that’s the FLW Tour which you must qualify to fish. After three of the four 2009 tournaments, Chad sets in 11th place. And with a decent showing in the last event, Sept 16 – 19, at Clarks Hill Lake in Appling Ga. he should qualify for next year’s FLW Tour. Chad has made right at $50,000 this year in the Eastern Division including a 3rd place finish ($38,000) last weekend (Aug 16th) at Lake Dardanelle.
Chad, we are all rooting for you and congratulations on your success so far!
You can keep up with Chad by logging onto: http://flwserieseast.flwoutdoors.com/index.cfm