Draw Format Club Tournaments - Just Wondering

[BassinBobSmith]

Bass club tournaments for years (at least where I've lived in south MS and NW FL) have always been draw events. Boaters pair with non-boaters then boaters with boaters if you ran out of non's. Then it seems everyone move to a team format, or pick your partner, so the same two people always fish together. I was just wondering if that was a regional anomaly, or if the rest of the clubs across the country went that way.

 

I personally love draw events. Sometimes you pair a little incompatible but hey it's the luck of the draw. I always believed that you stop learning when you only fish with the same person all of the time. I've picked up a lot from partners that I still rely on, and hopefully some have picked up stuff from me.

 

Anyhow, I was wondering if a lot of folks moved to the pick your own partner format, and what ya'll think about that as compared to draw format events.

[J Francho]

There's a little bit of everything up here.  I fished a "draw team format" in a club for many years.  You were in a random draw, but you fished as a team for the pot.  Points were shared and accumulated for each event, and there were bonus points assigned to each angler for fish weighed in caught by that angler.  There was a boater and non boater AOY crowned at the end of the season.  A little complicated, but it worked.  I always wanted them to go to each angler weighing in limits, combining for a individual tournament pot, and crowning AOY based on total weight, but that never happened.

 

These days, I fish team opens.

[BassinBobSmith]

Sounds like it would be complicated to keep track of but if it works its cool. I always enjoyed the simple random pairing / individual score. Now, since I can't get many folks to fish with me anymore (no clue why, I'm actually a nice guy ) I fish team opens by myself, as well as an individuals trail with one person per boat.  Other than that its BFL and hopefully FLW series if I can find enough support.

[Lund Explorer]

Over the years I fished in all three formats and each has it's good points and bad.

 

The one "club" that had draw tournaments only worked because so many of the members were long term and the entire group considered the others more as friends than competitors.  Boaters and non-boaters were paired a week or so in advance, and even though each fished for their own weight, the "partners quite often pre-fished together.  Also, this club had a rule where each fisherman had control of the front of the boat for half the day.  We also always had one extra boater who either fished alone or if another boater had to drop out for an emergency, the non-boater for that tournament wasn't left on shore.

 

One of the other clubs I fished with was one of the oldest in the area, and it had always been a team format.  I enjoyed fishing with this group as my long-time friend and I always had some guaranteed days on the water together.  We both had boats and would take turns using ours equally.

 

The last group I fished with used a strict draw format and wasn't a club at all.  Needless to say, as a boater I always controlled the front half and my non-boater sat in the back.  I fished against the other boaters while he fished against the other riders.  To be blatantly honest, I really didn't enjoy fishing with this group.  There were days when 10 boaters would show up and 15 riders.  Some non-boaters expected a guided trip for nothing more than their entry fee.  I only gave this format a tryout for one year before I concentrated on the other two.

 

I would suspect that if you are seeing draw clubs turning to the partner format, it's probably due to them becoming less like the first example and sadly, too much like the last one.

[Sam]

BassinBob, here is how we do it our club:

 

Everyone has their name written on a playing card.

 

The cards are split into boaters and nonboaters.

 

The boater cards are shuffled and laid out in order of the draw on a table for the boaters.

 

The nonboaters cards are shuffled and laid out in order of the draw for the nonboaters aside the boaters cards.

 

You now have your tournament pairings.

 

Since we have around five nonboaters each year your chances of getting nonboaters is not that great.

 

We do the following for the next tournament:

 

The next tournament the cards are shuffled and laid out in order of the pull as above but with those who had a nonboaters previously placed at the end of the cards.

 

The nonboaters' cards are shuffled and then laid out in order of their pull next to the boaters that did not have a partner in the last tournament.

 

This means that if you are a boater and did not have a nonboaters in the previous tournament your card will be pulled in the stack first with the other guys who did not have a nonboaters.

 

So far this has worked fine for out club.