Want to start a tournament

[Dan C]

I have some interest in wanted to possibly start a bass tournament on my local waters. How would I go about doing this? How do I get the public involved? Can I get KBF involved? Can I get TourneyX involved? How would I find out if there is even interest in a tournament? Do I have to get department of conservation involved?
local reservoir is pepacton reservoir in deleware county NY. 
 

[Catt]

The question is how dedicated are you ?

[slonezp]

Are the work and the drama worth it? 

I would start with the local DNR looking into permits and dates. As far as finding interest, talk to guys on the lake and at the ramp. Put up some flyers in the tackle shops and boat dealers. Post on social media etc.

[NittyGrittyBoy]

2 hours ago, Catt said:

The question is how dedicated are you ?

 

19 minutes ago, slonezp said:

Are the work and the drama worth it? 

 

NAILED IT! 

[Choporoz]

KBF and TourneyX are great places to start....after you talk to DNR (or county or city), as @slonezp suggested.

 

Ask yourself if you want to fish tournaments? Or, are you interested in making tournaments available to others?  I know that many do both, but I think you should dedicate yourself to organization and leadership for the first year...or more.

Even a small club with a small schedule is going to be very rewarding, but it is going to take some work to get it done well.    Contact KBF (not through the rather public Facebook page, but email the national organization).  I have confidence that TourneyX will be easy to work with, but know that they don't do it for free.  Have you talked to regional clubs that are KBF or BASS or Hobie BASS or any other orgs? There may be a regional or (near-regional?) that you can work with....or around.

[Hawkeye21]

The very first step I suggest doing it talk to as many people as you can that run tourneys and clubs.  You can learn from them on what to do and what not to do along with the steps they took to get going.  Pretty much every club and tourney series has a Facebook group or page so you should easily be able to get a hold of them that way.

 

You should probably start a local club.  I think the best way to do that is to talk to friends and other locals to see if there is interest and then start a Facebook page or group.  Social media is very helpful for starting a club and keeping everyone informed on what's going on.

 

You'll need to talk to your local DNR to see about getting a permit.  Usually you need dates before you can do that so you'll have to have a good idea of the body/bodies of water and the times you want to have your tourneys.

 

Once you have a club established you can contact KBF and see about becoming a partnered club.  You do not have to partner with KBF if you don't want to though.

 

I recommend using TourneyX to run your tourneys.  You can set that up yourself by going to their website.  If you need help you can contact Dwayne Walley, he's the owner and is very helpful.  If you are doing a CPR tourney using TourneyX then you're going to need someone to judge all of the photos.

 

These are just some suggestions off the top of my head so there's going to be even more involved.

 

 

 

[mc6524]

I’m not sure where you are located, but some of the smaller Bass circuits are looking for an individual to be a tournament director (ABA, USA BASSIN). Tatway you would get an idea how much work it takes to run a tournament as well as get experience.  Then, if you like it, you can start your own open tournaments.