What a Great Classic!

With the new job, I cannot Blog from there so getting postings up on a regular basis will be a bit more difficult, however, I had to post with a little blurb about the latest Bergen Classic at Champlain! I missed last year's event, the first Classic that I ever missed, but I was very happy with how this event turned out this year.
First off, I extend a ton of thanks to John Giordano for setting up the Saturday night BBQ along with his partners in crime, Jack Erdei, John Williams, and Vinnie Rossi, who all helped out with the cooking and food prep. There was plenty of food and it was a nice relaxing dinner where we all were able to just kick back and relax. After a long day in the rain, it was a welcomed comfort!
Next up, congratulations to Eric Lehmann on winning back-to-back Classics. My team captain carried the load and helped me out on day two when I feared my fish were running dry. Eric always finds a way and doesn't hesitate to think against the grain sometimes. getting away from the bank, his offshore spot turned out a few nice smallies and Eric went to work on the largemouth to increase his weight. With a nice bag on day two, there was no backing into the victory. He went for it and grabbed it. Congrats again Eric.
As for the team competition, what can I say? I wrote a little about it in the tourney recap along with my last blog where I predicted the competition would be close. I thought the margin would be less than 4 pounds. How about all 3 teams being seperated by 4 pounds and Bill's team coming from behind to win by a mere 4 ounces? They had one dead fish that day and it would've sucked to lose because of a dead fish penalty! I think there was some decent teamwork and collaboration going on and that was great to see overall.
Overall, the event was one of our least expensive classics which put more into the treasury for future uses and I liked the option of being able to run either north or south. Ironically, the top five guys all fished from Crown Point and north and not much was happening south except for a few really good practice days. Going in, I was expecting a good frog bite but that just didn't pan out as good as I had hoped. Regardless, there were still quite a few nice bags caught and overall, it seemed like everyone had a great time. That makes it a very successful Classic in my opinion.