DAYTON, Tenn. – The premier event for the world’s largest tournament fishing organization began on Lake Chickamauga Thursday morning with a local angler competing to become just the second person to win the seven-event series as a rookie.
Miles Burghoff, of Soddy-Daisy, leads both the Rookie of the Year and Angler of the Year point races through five events of the Fishing League Worldwide FLW Tour. It is the second-to-last event of the tour and stretches through Sunday with a prize purse of $860,000. The top 50 fishermen at the end of the season will compete in August’s Forest Wood Cup.
A 3 p.m., fishermen arrive with their catches at the Dayton Boat Dock on the first day of the FLW Tournament. “Lake Chickamauga has world-class features, monster fish and lots of them,” FLW Director of Public Relations Joseph Opager said. ” Miles has been a pretty special angler for FLW this year. He is leading guys who have been fishing with FLW for more than 20 years.”
Burghoff grew up in California and moved to Hixson in September 2017 specifically for fishing. He recently bought a house near Lake Chickamauga in Soddy-Daisy. The move to the region gave him access to one of the top bass fishing lakes in the country and a central location to many professional fishing tournaments.
The 32-year-old Burghoff has long wanted to be a top professional fisherman.