Walleye Challenge set for this weekend | News, Sports, Jobs

The Innovative Outdoors Walleye Challenge is a one-day tournament, using a six-fish tally by weight to determine the winner. Each team can consist of two to five anglers, and each team is allowed to fish up to nine rods/reels from the boat at one time, as defined by the NYSDEC rules and regulations for the maximum number of rods per angler. All waters of Lake Erie, including the Upper Niagara River and Canadian waters, are eligible.

This tournament is also the final leg of the Lake Erie Walleye Series Championship (LEWS) to identify a bragging rights 2023 walleye title champion. The LEWS series consists of the three top-tier walleye tournaments conducted in the Eastern basin of Lake Erie. This LEWS series for 2023 was initially set to consist of the WNY Walleye Classic at Barcelona Harbor in June, the Sunset Bay Walleye Shootout at Sunset Bay in July, and the Innovative Outdoors Walleye Challenge at Dunkirk Harbor in August.

The WNY Walleye Classic in June was canceled due to weather, so that event did not have a weigh-in and is not part of this year’s LEWS championship. The LEWS champion will be announced at the conclusion of the Innovative Outdoors Walleye Challenge. You can follow the leaderboard athttps://innovative-outdoors.com/live-leaderboard.

There is no entry fee to participate in the LEWS championship, but each tournament has regular competition registration fees — BIG FISH Friday competition options, Calcutta options and the actual competition day, where winners vie for cash and gear prizes.

Attractive and colorful hard plastic lures called stickbaits are used to fool witty walleye. It’s anyone’s guess why fish think this should be their next tasty meal.
Photo by Forrest Fisher

The current LEWS leader with 44 points is Randy Jaroszewski, with team Ice Breaker, thanks to his second-place finish at the Sunset Bay Walleye Shootout, with a six-fish weigh-in of 34.78 pounds. Tied for second place is Curtis Loveless, 33 points, with team Fishmaster and 32.74 pounds at Sunset Bay, and Bobby Rustowicz, 33 points, with team Forever Fishin, with 32.65 pounds at Sunset. Jim Klein, 32 points, with team Eye-Fish, had 30.81 pounds, and Kyle Kokanovich, 32 points, with team Ship-of-Fools, had 31.97 pounds at Sunset.

Other teams farther down the leaderboard could win the LEWS Championship with a knock-out day on the water this Saturday. The final day weigh-in to determine the LEWS champion will be an epic event for one of these teams.

The fishing hours for Big Fish Friday are 6 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., and for the main competition event on Saturday are 7 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Viewers from across Western New York and anywhere in the country can watch the weigh-in on live website-TV for both days starting at 4:30 p.m.

Visit https://innovative-outdoors.com/live-leaderboard.

The final tally for both days at the Clarion Hotel pavilion will use a certified scale system, weighing fish to the one-hundredth pound.

“We have completed research and taken time to establish a competent weigh-in process that involves a certified scale with a zero-tare start measurement, a final weight moment, and a computer-software system “tie-in” that records the fish for the team that brought it to the scale,” said tournament chairman Jim Steel.

Jim’s wife, Diane, who is a computer analyst said, “One of the most important parts of the weigh-in process is establishing zero using the tare feature of the system before starting with each new fish. Using the tare feature eliminates the weight of fish slime and microscopic debris from the fish to deliver an accurate fish weight. This eliminates doubt and dubious questions from competition onlookers.”

Jim added, “The weighmaster must zero the tare button each time for each fish, and the computer operator must verify the tare zero is zero on the computer screen to begin. When a final tournament weight can vary by one-one hundredth of a pound, this systematic, methodical process matters.”

Registrations are closed for this contest as of about one week ago. There are 52 teams in the Big Friday Fish contest and 54 teams in the main tournament competition on Saturday. The Big Fish Friday first-place winner will receive $2,600 with cash payouts to third place.

The main competition event will run on Saturday from 7 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., following pre-fish boat inspection, with the official weigh-in at 4:30 p.m. The winning team will receive $7,500 with cash payouts to 10th place, and the big fish winner on the main competition day will receive $1,200 with cash payouts to third place. If the winning team is driving a Vexus boat, the first-place prize is doubled.

Will the heaviest of the enormous Lake Erie walleye schools be caught far from shore or near shore? Will they mingle with coldwater forage looking for melt? Will they be taken hostage to the live well on stickbaits running down deep just above the thermocline using lead core line? Or, will they be fooled by the scent of night crawlers and spinner-worm rigs presented from diving-plane rigs? Or, will the winning whopper walleye be loners swimming as pelagic stragglers near the surface waiting for a shallow swimming plastic swimbait near a breakout school of alewives? The Eastern basin has sustained multiple consecutive days of heavy winds over the last few weeks, and thermal currents are not in perfect phase across many lake sectors. The tournament winners will have figured out the answers to these possibilities. Be sure to watch the live leaderboard.

The mandatory captains’ meeting will be held on Friday from 6-6:30 p.m. at the Clarion Pavilion. For more information on the rules and details of the contest, visit https://innovative-outdoors.com/event-details.