Major League Fishing championship comes to Table Rock Lake

Major League Fishing’s top 35 professional bass-fishing anglers will soon hold their sport’s seventh-annual championship, and for the first time, it will take place on Table Rock Lake.

Redcrest 2026 is set to take place April 17-19 with hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line for competitors.

Participants, including the top 30 anglers in the Bass Pro Tour, will compete for a $700,000 total purse and a $300,000 top prize. Officials with the Benton, Kentucky-based MLF, founded in 2011, say the championship’s economic impact to the local area is roughly $6 million.

Bass Pro Shops has served as the title sponsor for the Bass Pro Tour since it launched in 2019. The Springfield-based outdoor retailer also will host the Redcrest 2026 Outdoor Sports Expo in the parking lot at its Queen City headquarters, April 17-19. For the first time, the expo, which debuted as an added feature of Redcrest in 2022, will be staged in an open-air, tented festival setting, said Dave Washburn, MLF’s vice president of operations.

“The expo is typically held in a venue where there’s a big convention center,” Washburn said, noting last year’s Redcrest event was held in Huntsville, Alabama. “But we were fortunate to work with Bass Pro Shops to be able to kind of duplicate that convention center experience in their parking lot by building these giant tents that’ll house the expo this year.”

Fishing action from Redcrest will be streamed live all three days on MLF’s website and its app, and event highlights will air nationwide later this year on CBS.

“It’s a great opportunity that obviously Bass Pro Shops is our title sponsor, and they’re a phenomenal partner,” Washburn said, declining to disclose terms of the sponsorship. “So, to be able to bring our premier event to their hometown and fish a fabled lake like Table Rock Lake and build the expo at the granddaddy of all outdoor sports stores is just an opportunity we couldn’t pass up.”

Redcrest expectations
Washburn said he expects this year’s Redcrest to at least equal the attendance of last year’s event in Huntsville, which drew around 60,000 people, primarily at its three-day expo. At this year’s expo, attendees can shop for fishing, boating and outdoor gear from dozens of vendors, attend seminars, and meet Bass Pro Tour anglers and Bass Fishing Hall of Famers like Kevin VanDam, Gary Klein and Jimmy Houston.

Additionally, this year’s Redcrest participants will be present at an April 16 meet-and-greet event at Bass Pro Shops’ Springfield campus the evening before the competition begins. Anglers will launch all three mornings of the championship from Long Creek Marina at 1368 Long Creek Road in Ridgedale.

“Table Rock Lake is truly one of the crown jewels of America’s fishing waters,” said Johnny Morris, Bass Pro CEO and founder, in a news release. “Hosting the Bass Pro Tour Redcrest 2026 right here, in our home in the Ozarks, with the Outdoor Sports Expo at our national headquarters, is a dream come true for us. We are honored to welcome fishing fans from all over the world to experience the Ozarks and share in the fun, fellowship and excitement of this championship.”

Bass Pro officials didn’t respond to multiple interview requests by press time.

Redcrest has drawn at least 41,000 at its expos since the championship’s inception, according to MLF data. Of the roughly 60,000 in attendance last year, 37% were considered locals, defined as coming from within a 30-mile radius of Huntsville. Those coming to town from 31-75 miles away comprised 17% of the attendees, while overnight stays, defined as over 75 miles, were 46%.

Washburn said based on surveys the organization does with attendees, overnight stays are frequent at its events. Visit Springfield, Missouri, formerly the Springfield Convention and Visitors Bureau Inc., estimated 1,500 hotel nights and 3,000 visitors for this year’s Redcrest.

“I would say they’re being conservative,” Washburn said.

MLF holds more than 200 events a year in over 30 states and 13 countries through its six circuits. The Bass Pro Tour is considered the highest circuit in the league, Washburn said, adding the organization has over 50,000 members that fish in its tournaments.

In competition
Redcrest features a live-scoring format in which fish caught by anglers from their boats are weighed and immediately released. In addition to the action streamed online on MLF’s website and app, visitors can watch the competition on big screens during the expo at Bass Pro.

“They score the fish right there in the boat, Washburn said. “The fish has to be over 2 pounds to count. And then we release it right back into its natural habitat.”

Nearly 45 million minutes were streamed from last year’s Redcrest, 42% more than the prior year’s championship. Additionally, with 1.07 million video views, it was the most watched online event in the league’s history at the time, according to MLF data.

The full field of 35 anglers will compete in the two-day qualifying round on April 17 and 18. After those rounds, the top 10 pros, based on two-day cumulative weight, advance to the April 19 championship round. In that round, weights are zeroed, and the highest one-day total wins the top prize, according to MLF officials.

Highlights of the event also will be aired as a one-hour episode to air in December on CBS, Washburn said.

“Typically, it airs on Discovery Channel, but for this year’s event, we worked out with CBS to air the one-hour show,” he said, noting the date is still to be determined but will air following an NFL game.

Washburn said he has high hopes for this year’s event in the Ozarks, which he expects will be in the mix for future MLF events.

“We expect really big crowds. We expect fans to enjoy themselves and be engaged and sponsors to be pleased with their sales at their booths,” he said. “The sponsors need a return on investment, and we think we’re well situated to provide that, particularly in the Ozarks in partnership with Bass Pro Shops.”