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Branson Flooring Installer Proves Anyone Can Catch the Big One: Enters Once, Wins $100,000 Fantasy Fishing Prize

Posted on: Wednesday, 17 June 2009, 11:43 CDT

With One More Tournament to Go, Just One More Shot to Catch Big Prizes

MINNEAPOLIS, June 17 /PRNewswire/ -- If you want to catch a big fish, your bait needs to be in the water. And if you want to win $100,000 playing FLW Fantasy Fishing, you need to enter. At least once.

That's the story behind Robert Davis' miraculous $100,000 fantasy fishing win. A 52-year-old flooring installer from Branson, Mo., Davis and his wife Ruby attended a Walmart FLW Tour professional bass fishing tournament conducted near Branson earlier this spring with free tickets they had received from a former co-worker. Davis and Ruby walked up to a booth promoting FLW Fantasy Fishing, where they filled in cards with their names, email addresses and phone numbers and put their entries into a container at the promotional booth.

When Davis entered, he took advantage of the FLW Fantasy Fishing Quick Pick, in which FLW Fantasy Fishing automatically picks and enters a team of 10 bass pros on a player's behalf. It's an easy, convenient feature of the world's most popular fantasy fishing game, which is available online at www.fantasyfishing.com. The fantasy fishing teams are randomly and electronically drawn from among the 154 bass pros who compete in the Walmart FLW Tour, the world's largest and richest professional bass fishing tournament series. At any time, Davis could have changed his picks prior to each FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament by simply logging on to www.fantasyfishing.com.

From the time Davis entered in early March, his fantasy fishing team competed in three more tournaments until Davis finally hit pay dirt in the fifth FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament conducted this year. During that entire time, Davis never changed his team once. In fact, he all but forgot that he had even entered, until he received a phone call from FLW Fantasy Fishing letting him know that his fantasy fishing team came in first place immediately following the Walmart FLW Tour event presented by Pringles on Kentucky/Barkley Lakes near Murray, Ky.

Davis scored big when his fantasy fishing team scored three exactas among the top 10 finishers of the Kentucky/Barkley Lakes tournament. Davis' exactas earned him huge bonus points and allowed him to accumulate 6,228 points over the course of the four-day tournament, 312 points more than the second place finisher. Davis' exacta picks included first place finisher Team Land O' Lakes pro Keith Williams, second place finisher, David Young, and 4th place finisher, Travis Fox. Williams, a resident of Conway, Ark., won the Kentucky/Barkley Lakes tournament with 10 fish for a final-round total weight of 42 pounds even.

"This is unbelievable. I don't really know anything about professional bass fishing and this is the first time I've ever played a fantasy sports game," Davis said. "I guess this really proves that you don't need to know anything about bass fishing to win big at FLW Fantasy Fishing."

As for what he'll do with his winnings, Davis said he and his wife Ruby might finally buy a home in Branson. The couple and their three children, ages 14, 18 and 20, moved from Idaho to Branson six years ago to be closer to Ruby's family. They have been renting their current residence and the extra cash might finally give them the money they need for a down payment on a home of their own.

And with just one more tournament to go, will Davis change the team of bass pros that currently make up his fantasy fishing team?

"No, they've been good to me. I'm going to let them finish off the season for me," Davis said with a smile. "Why mess with a good thing. Who knows, maybe lightning will strike twice."

With just one more tournament to go in the FLW Fantasy Fishing season, time is running out to win some of the big prizes being offered by FLW Fantasy Fishing, including another $100,000 cash prize to the winner of the next tournament, scheduled to take place July 9 - 12, 2009, on Lake Champlain near Plattsburgh, N.Y. The deadline to enter is Wed., July 8, at 11:59 p.m. Central time.

Tulsa Mechanic Holds Onto First Place in Overall Chase for $1 Million

With just one more FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament to go, the race for FLW Fantasy Fishing's guaranteed $1 million grand prize is reaching a fever pitch. That's because after five tournaments, the top three leaders are within only 1,500 points of one another, meaning it's still anyone's $1 million to win.

But, there's a wild card that all three players fear. Triple bonus points! The last FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament of the year allows players to score triple bonus points on exacta picks, which offers those players who are lurking within the shadows of the overall leaders to spring ahead. That's what happened last year, when Michael Thompson, a 33-year-old stay-at-home dad from Minnesota leaped from seemingly out of nowhere to claim the $1 million grand prize, upsetting James Brown, a resident of Lodi, Calif., who had claimed the overall lead over three tournaments and wound up in second place overall.

Going into the final FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament of the year, Chris Chappell, a resident of Oologah, Okla., a suburb of Tulsa, holds onto his first place lead over Terry Moberly, a resident of Berea, Ky., the $100,000 winner of the first tournament in the 2009 Fantasy Fishing season. Just 20 points behind Moberly is another Kentucky resident, Jeff Short of Tompkinsville, who currently holds third place. All three rely on Player's Advantage, an online research tool offered by FLW Fantasy Fishing for only $10, to maintain their consistency in accumulating points from one tournament to the next.

Chappell, 27, is a power plant maintenance mechanic who started playing FLW Fantasy Fishing after learning about it on eBay earlier this year, where he clicked on a banner ad about the free online fantasy sports game. He's accumulated more than 30,000 points over five tournaments so far. Chappell was attracted to FLW Fantasy Fishing because of the huge prizes offered by the online game, and because it's free to play. Using Player's Advantage, Chappell scored his first win, a $100 BP gas card in the first FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament.

Moberly, 45, is a production worker at Tokico USA, a manufacturing plant in Berea that makes automobile shocks and suspensions. He's an avid bass angler, who was urged to enter FLW Fantasy Fishing by his two sons: Tyler, a student at Eastern Kentucky University, located in nearby Richmond, Ky.; and his 19-year-old son, Brandon. Both sons are avid bass anglers too, having competed in regional bass tournaments sponsored by FLW Outdoors.

Short, 45, is an avid bass angler, too, who loves the excitement of bass fishing on-the-water and off, through FLW Fantasy Fishing. A cabinet-making instructor at a local area technical school, Short learned about FLW Fantasy Fishing last year, during its first season, while fishing as a co-angler during a FLW fishing tournament.

"Following the bass pros through FLW Fantasy Fishing has helped improve my own fishing and has brought an extra spark to what I do," Short added. "I'm really excited to be so close to the $1 million grand prize."

$1 Million Grand Prize to be Awarded in Pittsburgh, Aug. 1

FLW Fantasy Fishing, conducted by FLW Outdoors, brings the world's richest bass fishing tournament, the Forrest Wood Cup, to Pittsburgh this summer from July 30-Aug. 2. The Forrest Wood Cup is the final event in the Walmart FLW Tour. Just like fantasy football and baseball, you can follow the leading money winners on the Walmart FLW Tour all season long at FLWOutdoors.com as well as on the "FLW Outdoors" television program, which is broadcast in high definition (HD) on VERSUS, the network that brings anglers the best fishing programming on television featuring the most trusted authorities on the water. The Emmy-nominated "FLW Outdoors" airs each Sunday from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. Eastern time.

In addition to the $1 million grand prize, and six $100,000 cash tournament prizes, FLW Fantasy Fishing players are eligible to win more than 1,800 additional prizes including a Ranger boat valued at $54,000, a brand new Chevy vehicle valued at $27,000, and personal watercrafts and ATVs valued at $8,000 each, and much more. Fantasy Fishing also offers $3 million exact bonus game for the player who correctly ranks the top five finishers in the Forrest Wood Cup, and a $5 million exacta bonus game for the player who correctly ranks the top seven finishers in any of the six regular season tournaments.

FLW Fantasy Fishing players can increase their chances of winning the $1 million grand prize by entering all FLW Fantasy Fishing tournaments throughout the season and accumulating a greater amount of points leading up to the Forrest Wood Cup. The next tournament in the Walmart FLW Tour professional bass circuit include:

• Tournament 6: Lake Champlain, Plattsburgh, N.Y., July 9-12, 2009
• $1 Million Grand Prize Announcement: Forrest Wood Cup, Pittsburgh, Pa., Aug. 1, 2009

The Richest Fantasy Sports Game

In its first season, FLW Fantasy Fishing took the fantasy sports world by surprise offering the first $1 million guaranteed grand prize for a fantasy sports game. And with that announcement, FLW Fantasy Fishing soared to the top of the fantasy sports world, gaining fans from 123 countries attracted to the game's $7.3 million in overall cash and prizes, the highest payout of any fantasy sports game in the world. In 2009, FLW Fantasy Fishing once again set a new standard, offering a $1 million grand prize again along with 1,800 other prizes for a total of $10 million in overall cash and prizes.

About FLW Outdoors

FLW Outdoors, named after Forrest L. Wood, the legendary founder of Ranger Boats, is the largest fishing tournament organization in the world and is offering anglers the chance to win more than $33 million through 231 tournaments in 2009. For more information about FLW Outdoors and its tournaments, visit FLWOutdoors.com or call (270) 252-1000. For more information about FLW Fantasy Fishing and Player's Advantage, visit www.FantasyFishing.com.

FLW(R) is a registered trademark of FLW Outdoors, Inc. For a complete list of rules and prizes for FLW Fantasy visit www.fantasyfishing.com.

SOURCE FLW Outdoors

Source: PR Newswire

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