burkyboy

Thanks to all above for the positive feedback and spreading the word!! The 2015 Oswego Pro Am will be July 11th & 12th with Fat Nancy's Big fish friday on July 11th. Our core group of myself, Tom Burke, Tom Allen & Rob Ripka are committed to at least next year to run the event. And will try from now till then to make it bigger & better.  We welcome all suggestions and help we can get. Stuff like this above is awesome. And we will do more to advertise the event also. My contact is Tom Burke, [email protected]  and  315-391-8079

Tom

Canale's will deliver 343-3540 great food  bridge st pizza good food good prices  343-6600

Sorry I understand what you mean about not using it. But if you have your license you can't be an Amateur.   Hooknup we received your entry!! Thanks

We are nearing the last week for boats to enter the Oswego county Pro Am. Both entrants & sponsors continue to come forward!!  Sorry to BroadHorizons, I'm hoping you just talked to the wrong employee. Rob at Fat Nancy's tells me he has had entry forms printed. I did get yours and your all set! Thank You. Anyone with  questions can email me at [email protected]  Looking forward to a great event- Tom

Sorry for such late posting on Lou. The 2014 Oswego Pro Am is July 12 & 13th With Big fish Friday on July 11th.  The 2014 rules & entry forms can be found on our Facebook page.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Oswego-Pro-Am/546142425425498

Hopefully it will also be available on our webpage link by tomorrow.  

http://www.coldsteelsportfishing.com/oswegoproam/index.htm

You can also go in person to Fat Nancy's tackle shop in Pulaski, or the Oswego county Tourism office on 46 E. Bridge street in Oswego for an entry, rules or to pay to get in.

You can email Tom Burke at [email protected] and I will email you a copy of the rules or an entry form if needed. Or answer any questions.

Captain's meeting will be Friday July 11th at 6pm in the Pro Am tent behind the Quality Inn in Oswego

Highlights of changes are: Amateur entry from $300 to $250.   Amateur not required to have an observer. But may be subject to a lie detector if there's a protest.   Amateurs can leave starting point at 5:50, 10 minutes before Pro boats.    Pro's will stop fishing at 2pm be in weigh in line by 3:30   Amateurs will stop fishing by 1:30  Be in weigh in line by 3:00

Hope to see you all there!!  Capt. Tom Burke- Tournament director

Tom good job on saturday. Already looking forward to next year. We have been through enough of these to know when it comes to weather decisions there is never a 100% right call. It's always changing & never predictable. I have stood by tournament directors over the years and watched them get beat up equally by both GO & No Go decisions.  Congrats to Thrillseeker and all the top finisher's on saturday under tough conditions

I don't usually get a chance to log on much but after hearing all the fuss figured I'd better. The tourney went down great with a fun & friendly awards & eats get together with a chance to thank our charter for a good effort as well as congradulate the top finishers. I didn't get a chance to read the original comment myself but with no issues in the past or present and knowing we have all had a comment or two go astray(lol) along with the quick apology. It is certainly accepted and it's on to the A-tom-mik Invitational!  Tom-Cold Steel

Great job guys!!!

For the second time in as many years Bob Cinelli was willing to let me use his 31' Tiara the " Hotline" to fish the WHI. Saving myself & my team a bunch of money & wear & tear from running my boat from Oswego & back for the 1 day event. This year there was one catch! Bob's wife Karen had put together a team of her own. They were going to fish the WHI with Capt. Joe aboard the "Irish Thunder" But Joe had a charter on Friday. So the deal was my team would fish aboard a private boat on friday. And I would take the Girls aboard the Hotline for their practice day.

Well we not only had a great day! But I can't start to tell you how much fun it was!! Besides Karen, there was Yankee Rick's girl Melanie, my teammate Casey's girl Emily & Atommik Tom's roomie Steph.

This was a pretty easy job. These girls think putting a fish on the LOC board is child's play! Emily won the summer LOC steelhead last year. Steph & Melanie both had fish on the LOC board this year going into the day. Melanie landed a 26lb+ when we were out, but already had a higher placing Laker on the board. And Karen seemed like a charter captain who would rather rig & lift 14lb kings over the back by hand then fight one herself!

I just wanted to put a tribute & thanks out to the girls for a great day!!!

Capt. Tom

Seems like everyone had a great time at the 2nd annual WHI tourney. Kevin did a great job. Judging by that, not to mention the 2nd year in a row a non charter boat took home the big money. I can only hope that Pro Am competition is way up!

With two fields, Open & the combined short box/long box with payouts on day 1, day 2 & final. Combine the new format with the additional sponsorship money & the opportunities are very good to take home some cash & prizes!! See everyone there!

The added payouts come from adding an additional format(small box) already used elsewhere successfully. And from paying each day. Still only pays top ten. So you will need to be competitive to cash a check.

Nice Rides!! Just the thrill of owning a boat & taking care of her, what more can you ask for??

There are usually 1 or 2 kings a year caught in April in the Salmon river by steelhead fisherman. We caught one several years ago about 17lbs on the gravel with eggs coming out of her. Either 6 months late or 6 months early!

Few notes

Hopefully we will be posting the Guaranteed Niagara payout on here shortly. I think it might surprise some!!

2nd despite what some think, some of us worked very hard on trying to make a better Pro Am going forward. Despite what some Am boats think, some of what we came up with even many Pro boats weren't happy with. What got them to go along with a more spread out payout was the hope to keep Pro Am fields growing. And realizing they could get together on their own with something like a seperate, higher calcutta to make up the difference. My point is that Am boats should think about this as well. Yes you can get together and start a tournament. Many of us Pro boats had the same thought.(40 boats, $2000 a piece) But we realized that isn't the best for the communities(lodging,restaurants,stores, etc) More people equals more money!! Due to financial constraints the counties can't due as much for us as we would like. But they do allot behind the scenes that can't be measured! Organization,paperwork,logistics(weigh in,scoring,rule enforcement, advertising,staging, etc!!!) Immeasurable stuff!

What I'm trying to say is were all in this together. Get in the new Pro Am. Short box/Long Box, or Open division(and work to make it what you want)

On the other hand this is America and were all free to do what we want. Just take a reasonable look at it all before you make a decision.

Capt. Tom

Thanks for all the suggestions guys. I am investigating as we speak what can & can't be done. One thing that is already a plus is that some sponsor prizes were being divided up between the Am & Open divisions. Now they will all go to one division, along with the 100% payback of the entry fee. Are guys generally ok with keeping the open format of it essentially being 2-1 day tourneys? Although I'm hoping we can add an overall for teams that get in both days.

One more thing on No Comm. The counties still want no part of this issue. What we did last year was to have a No Comm calcutta to help solve this. Our thought this year was again to have a No Comm calcutta, but make it small. Possibly a $100 to encourage most if not all teams to get in. Teams that also want a bigger calcutta, can do another on their own.

Tom

Hi guys I am Capt. Tom Burke from Cold Steel. I am one of the lucky ones who participated on the commitee. I'm just going to go through all my thoughts on these issues.

We saw tourney numbers dwindling and wanted to try and reverse that trend. After lots of discussions We ended up focusing on trying to take what we thought were the best attributes from all the tournaments that were out there. Pro ams, WHI, Scotty's, new Atommik Inv.

We had to do this under word from the county directors that things should also be made easier from their standpoint. Due to less resources & tightening budgets on their end.

Seeing pro am fields shrink last year and the new WHI event get off to a great start caught our attention. Afterall it was a 1 division, 1 day, top place prize loaded event. It got me excited! But to my surprise seemed to excite big, small, pro & am teams as well!!

So we decided to make our top division in the 2012 Pro am series go in that direction. But wanted to keep some of what we had as well. If we were going to get a larger field in the top division we wanted to also increase opportunity. So we added another category. 5/6 fish(fields choice) and the standard 12 fish.

Then we wanted to add prize opportunities. Most tourneys offered between 10(WHI,Atommik,scotty) 20&25(pro am) Some argued for 30 or 40, while some of us pushed for and got 60.

Although that number watered down the payout for some top finishing boats, unless they swept the field. We felt it gave more chances to all, especially being paid out by 20 spots, 3 times.

As someone pointed out worst case scenario 4 good boats going on a roll could get up to 24 checks. But do the math. old pro am, 20 payouts I could win 1, leaving 19 more. New pro am, 4 guys win 24, there are still 36 payouts left!!

I don't know if this will be great? No one does. But I do know some of us put allot of time into it with the best intentions, despite what some think.

One reason for the survey is the biggest change we wanted to make is to have people feel the tournament wanted and would listen to their opinions!

Because of that and from what I have read here. My only personal goal left is to work with whoever I can, as fast as I can to enhance the open division in anyway possible. So that any current Am teams and any new teams who don't want to enter the top division will have a division that they will enter, compete and feel comfortable with.

Here are my last thoughts on what has been said:

Entry fee-Wanted to give field a choice(650/850). 95% of discussion i've heard has been $650, I think that will be it.

Rods-8 or 9? To be voted on. Most of what I have heard is 8

Morning start. We really didn't address this and I think some make valid points. I know I would not want to be in a smaller boat during a shotgun start in one of these events! I will bring it up.

Maybe I would get in and just go for the small box. But I would have to compete against a bigger boat which might get 12 then weigh in his biggest 5/6. Again we were looking at other tourneys. Scotty's allow 6 people on board, 8 rods, in canada the limit is 5 per man, and you can cull! A boat could possibly catch 50 fish, keep 30 and weigh in biggest 5 but still many small boats enter each year. Our tourney you are limited to first 12 legal fish boated.

I am not big on the chat boards. I will try and stay on here. Really appreciate some of the good responses and ideas some had. I can be reached at 315-298-2500 and will try to talk to anyone I can.

I hope this all works out well, but you never know. We are going to keep trying to make it better and get the information out there.

Tom