FLW ANNOUNCES OLD HICKORY LAKE AS 2018 BFL WILD CARD VENUE
MINNEAPOLIS (Oct. 4, 2018) – FLW announced today that the 2018 T-H Marine BFL Wild Card tournament will take place on Old Hickory Lake in Gallatin, Tennessee, Nov. 9-10. The two-day event, hosted by the Sumner County Convention and Visitor’s Bureau, will launch from the Bulls Creek Access at Flipper’s Bait and Tackle, located at 200 Odoms Bend Road in Gallatin, Tennessee.
In order to be eligible to fish the no-entry-fee BFL Wild Card tournament, anglers must have entered all five events within a BFL division during the 2018 season and fished at least two of them. In addition, anglers who have already qualified for a BFL regional are ineligible.
During the BFL Wild Card tournament, the full field competes both days, with winners determined by the heaviest two-day catch. The top six boaters and top six co-anglers will advance to the 2019 T-H Marine BFL All-American, held on the Potomac River in Marbury, Maryland, May 30-June 1, hosted by the Charles County Board of Commissioners and the Department of Recreation, Parks and Tourism.
An optional pot is available to anglers who elect to participate at the BFL Wild Card tournament. Entry fees for the optional pot will be $250 for boaters and $125 for co-anglers, with the top 20 percent of anglers who elect to participate in the optional pot receiving checks. There will be no official practice period or off-limits period prior to the pretournament meeting for the Wild Card. No contestant may be on tournament waters for the purpose of locating bass or potential fishing waters after the start of the pretournament meeting except during tournament hours.
Entry for the BFL Wild Card is now open and runs through Thursday, November 8, 2018, at 6 p.m. CDT. You may enter by phone on or before Wednesday, November 7, at 270.252.1000. Entries on November 8 will be taken onsite at the pretournament meeting at the Bulls Creek Access.
The 2018 BFL is a 24-division circuit devoted to weekend anglers, with 128 tournaments throughout the season, five qualifying events in each division. The top 45 boaters and co-anglers from each division, along with the five winners of the qualifying events, will advance to one of six regional tournaments where they are competing to finish in the top six, which then qualifies them for one of the longest-running championships in all of competitive bass fishing – the BFL All-American. Top performers in the BFL can move up to the Costa FLW Series or even the FLW Tour.