The weigh-in crew at the brand-new Moorhead, Minnesota tournament that is now known as the Marley
Concrete Cats Tournament. It was at this event that the crew first truly came together as the team.
Tournament Time: Women Make It Work
Story and photos by Brad Durick
Great volunteers make for great catfish tournaments.
One Friday afternoon in August 2020, I was in the bar that serves as headquarters for the Catfish Capital Challenge Catfish Tournament in Drayton, North Dakota. I was packing the giveaways and information into the angler bags before the meeting later that night. While I was stuffing bags one at a time, there were four anglers and their wives eating a late lunch at a nearby table. The wives couldn’t take my “boy” way of packing these bags. They swiftly pushed me out of the way and finished the job. When they finished a few minutes later, they said, “If you need anything else, just ask.”
Fast forward to 2021. These same women scheduled a day off work to be at the tournament headquarters again. This time they told me to have everything ready, and they would just take care of packing the bags. Who would say no to that? Again, they made quick work of it and asked if I needed anything else.
This time my answer was, “If one or two of you could help at the weigh-in with record keeping that would be great.” It turns out the four of them work as a team. They did point out that two of them would not be touching fish under any circumstances, while two didn’t really care. You can guess who were the record keepers.
The first morning of that 2021 tournament, I opened the scales. The women joined me a couple hours later to be there when the majority of the boats came in. One took on the job of measuring the slot fish (only two fish can be over 24 inches), one typed weights in the computer, one wrote weights on a hard copy, and one was there as needed.
During the slower parts of the day, they decided it would be fun to start judging the anglers backing trailers into the river and the loading of the boats. With in a short time, there was laughter throughout the entire weigh area as boats and fish came in. This ritual has evolved to include white boards and a grading system.
All was a success, and the tournament went as smooth as one could ask. Everyone had such a good time, they asked me if they could do it again. Now they knew the system, and everyone had their jobs.
Fast forward again to 2023. The weigh-in crew of Nicole Weber, Mary Casmey, Shannon Hartwig and Madi Estad are the mainstays of every event that I operate. They show up rain, shine or wind to make sure tournaments run smoothly. They call themselves the “SLOTS” because we have to measure all the slot fish to ensure they are under 24 inches.
Mary is usually weighmaster and slot-fish measurer. Nicole is the computer expert. Shannon keeps the hard written copy, and Madi makes sure the anglers get their weigh tickets and receipts. She sometimes is the fish releaser, too. That leaves me to make sure everything is going smooth and if they need something to go get it. (This includes picking up lunch and a quick trip to Walmart for supplies.)
There was even a conflict of scheduling for a one-day tournament that I was simply going to cancel, but they insisted they could take care of it and ran the entire tournament by themselves. They streamlined the sign-up and check-in line, ran the weigh-in and conducted an awards ceremony, all without a single complaint.
Now they run the scales and record keeping at all my events. They take care of the weigh-in and record keeping, compare notes to make sure there are no mistakes and just hand me a list of winners. They even write the checks for the anglers so the handwriting is legible. I just sign them and hand them out at the end with trophies.
These women have become part of the local tournament scene. The anglers love them for their professionalism and light-hearted poking as they come through the line. Anglers always compliment their professionalism to me. My response to them is, I am very lucky to find a crew that is this good and makes long tournament days go faster and be more fun. It is good to have the peace of mind that everything is being handled thoroughly and accurately.
If you ever attend one of my events and see me visiting and talking to anglers, helping release fish or just hanging out, you know that everything is running smoothly. I am just waiting for my cue to hand out the awards.
Great volunteers like this keep catfish tournaments running smoothly. I have always been able to find good help, but I am very lucky to have this crew. The “SLOTS”—Nicole Weber, Mary Casmey, Shannon Hartwig and Madi Estad—make my job as director easier, keep the tournaments running smoothly and keep it fun for everyone.
(Captain Brad Durick is a nationally recognized catfish guide on the Red River of the North, seminar speaker and author of the books “Cracking the Channel Catfish Code” and “Advanced Catfishing Made Easy.” For more information go to redrivercatfish.com.)
