I was suprised the turn out was lower than normal, think it was just the economy? Maybe the weather?

my personal opinion is several were out the weekend before and realized how tough it was fishing and when you combine that with brutal winds forecast that came true, you get low turn out. we still fished it because we always fish them all, but it was really brutal...i am still feeling it from a wave we hit while running North that morning. Felt like it could have cracked the boat in half.

That's how every wave felt for us. Still had a good time though. I wish everyone fished all of them regardless of conditions, cause you never know what might happen.

If you look at the last 4 events, Falcon and Rayburn had over 230 entries, LBJ and CC both had 160. I think the crappy weather combined with the crappy lake conditions hurt it the most. Put that on top of all the other freaking tournaments going on and the numbers are not 300 liked they used to be.

We fished it as well but ran all over the lake, never really thought it was all that bad

We decided not to fish and save are money since the lake was fishing tough for us. I bet alot of others did the same thing. We are just fishing 2 of them this yr now that we cant qualify for championship with 4 events.

We fished the main lake and dam area, beat us to death, but had no other spots marked. TM had enough around 1:30 so we came off the lake. I agree with Chris G, tough fishing and weather; however can't be fair weather anglers all the time.

now that is a good one...we went about half way up the lake and both coming and going simply were brutal. like i said we always fish them regardless of weather simply because these are fun getaway weekends for us and we go no matter what. Crown Royal Fridays!

I was messing with you a little, we did run all over the lake but I run a big boat so wasnt bad.

I was just suprised at the turn out really, I thought at least 200 boats even with bad weather.

i figured...last year Cedar Creek (in July) only drew 170 and the one in 2010 in Sept only drew 149 so this appears to be about average for this lake the last few years. I bet Ray Bob is going to pull more than 200 and we all know Fork will probably get close to 250.

Maybe I need a bigger boat, CC should do it for days like that. We were spearing 3-4 footers on the TM, sure glad the bilge works

I am not sure how you guys braved the main lake after 11pm. we tried and speared two in the first 5 minutes. One of them got water up to my ankles. We have a 21 footer too. The waves were rolling pretty good and were starting to get spaced out kinda far. We turned around and just had to go fishing. As a result we sucked. LOL

Because we have no common sense. Acutally we figured if we fished the main lake and dam we wouldn't have any competition looking for fish. That was our strategy and it paid off, only problem was we didn't find any fish. LOL

Main lake was no issue here. We ran from Log Cabin to Twin to Prairie and back. Then had to go rescue a downed buddy that limped to Dons Port. I think we might have got sprayed once or twice. Slow your roll and it's nothing to move around.

We launched at Log Cabin and made the run around 6:30 to our spot and it was bad...it was even worst coming back down south at Noon. We speared a good one on the way back...like you said...we were also in a 21 footer but some of those were 2' tall and very far apart.

We almost went to the dam but I figured the wind was coming in there too strong to make it worth it.
There were not very many boats in the mid to north lake I figured most stayed south.

lol ran all over the lake!!!! What were u fishing out of a air craft carrier? The wind wa brutal on cc.

We launched from our private boat ramp in paradise bay and headed north. Water was really warm but all my spots had 2footers pounding them. Then we ran back down to lyn creek and fish docks and brush. Had all 3 bites in their. After we weighed in we had to run all the way back to paradise bay boat ramp which is past the spillway in trade winds coves. That sucked but my skeeter still in one. Piece

"lol ran all over the lake!!!! What were u fishing out of a air craft carrier? The wind wa brutal on cc."

KevinT runs a Bass Cat Jaguar and the front deck pretty much resembles an air craft carrier. This boat is 21'5" and will handle the rough stuff.

I admit to having a chuckle or two on Saturday watching some of the other boats, not a slam on the other brands but mine was actually designed with the great lakes in mind. Of course the flip side is they perform a little better than mine in the skinny stuff.


But I started this thread wondering what had happened to the fishermen, heck everyone on here is complaining about lower turnouts lower payouts and yet when a decent trail with decent payouts has an event on a DFW area lake they only drew 150 boats. I thought for sure there would be at least 200, kind of a let down really. I know lots of people dont like Cedar Creek but Roberts gets just as rough when the wind blows.

I am ready for Tawak & Fork.

Hey Kevin your right about Ray Roberts getting rough too. I kinda thought the turnout was low as well. I know some guys that have fished Champs for a long time and decided not to this year due to the schedule. But, with that said this is my first you to fish BassChamps.

This was my first trip back after a 15 year hiatus from tourneys. If I read the results right on 20 or 21 teams got paid out of 161. Seems a bit low on the percentage. Maybe that's how it is now.

I too fished down by the dam and got beat to death. Never clipped a wave though and i was in an 18 footer.

cedar creek is not fun to fish IMO. however if boat wasn't in the shop I'd a been there!

Unless they changed it you have to use a public ramp that you can access the main lake from.

The written rule for Cedar Creek did not exclude private ramps after further research.

Should this be a DQ? What do y'all think?

It was a trailering event plus I think you can launch where you want normally but you have to leave the launch site by boat under normal conditions.

I don't see anything in the rules that states or supports this.

I think you guys are right. I was thinking that the trails that trailer all the time will have a rule that states you can only use a public ramp. This was because of weather.

I would have to reread the champs rules but I "assume" as long as they launched at Cedar Creek in a part of the lake that was accessible to all it would be legal in a trailering event.

We were told that you could use any ramp you wanted as long as it had access to and from the lake without having to get out of your boat. They had a list of ramps that were usable as they went and checked them the day before but you did not have to use them if you did not want.