[Freedom55]

I entered a boat in a c/p/r tournament last fall. There was a number of teams entered that routinely compete in the larger pay-out tournaments. Let me describe their process.

1) A measuring stick was supplied by the officials and returned afterward at risk of cash penalty for a lost board.
2) A symbol was drawn randomly from a deck of cards moments before the start and applied to the board e.g. the 8 of spades. This symbol must appear in the photographs affixed to the bump board.
3) each fish is photographed twice, once on the board in the proscribed manner and once in a "hero" shot, to a total of 5 fish entered. All non-entered photos to be deleted.
4) Total length only; to properly calculate weight by measurement a girth measurement is required and there is some wiggle room in that regard so weights were not considered.
5) Barbless hooks only.
6) Live wells inspected prior to departure

These events are self-policed. Random spot checks are conducted if there are enough officials but no one wants a competitor to gain an unfair advantage so reporting infractions can and do occur.

In my time and to my knowledge there has been only one incident of a cheat in action. An American boat entered in the Vanity Cup - $250k prize money - was found to have a monster walleye in a live well prior to departure. That boat was DQ'd and banned. Or so the story goes. I personally witnessed a boat jettisoning a dead fish on the second day at the Premier's Cup when upgrading that was on the leader board after day 1. After day 2 that boat was DQ'd and 0 weight shown. Many people saw that dead fish go over the rail apparently. There have been accusations of fizzing but no conclusive proof has been entered on the record to my knowledge. That said, we were once given a fizz kit at the rules meeting at the Kenora Walleye Open.

If you are drawing examples from U.S. tournaments you would do well to remember that this is Canada, a much smaller market and populated by teams that value their reputations. Cheats and scallywags are soon outed. Then there are the guys who bring Alberta leeches into SK. or zebra mussels from Manitoba.

The change to CPR is an effort to lower the mortality rate. It is not to curb boorish behaviour.

Free (btw- there are 18 open spots in the 2018 Lac des Isle Walleye Classic. Check their Facebook page for details)