This is kind of a lame excuse. Especially now as the USBC has taken the extra effort to go fresh oil for every squad. You control your own destiny now, and if you can't make money in brackets, it's simply you not scoring that causes it. I think it's hilarious how everyone begs for it to come east, and guess what, the entries will still be low, if not EVEN lower. I come from Alaska...and have to take "2 planes" , sometimes 3, and pay a good chunk to do it. I would say $2000 is reach for me to spend on this trip. I just got back yesterday and maybe spent $500 while I was there. Combine that with a $600 plane ticket and $100 for hotel suite (4 nights split amongst 3 guys), I barely spent over $1000. We spend the majority of our time around the bowling...whether it be sitting at the stadium watching or bowling side tournaments. If you go and dump your money into things that don't pay back, that's not USBC's fault. LOL.
This is a good point, and I'm sure that there are plenty of ways to cut costs and still make it out to the tournament. For example:
I have had to make short flights between Sacramento and Vegas for both business and personal reasons. Because of that, I've earned enough points with SWA to be rewarded with a free roundtrip flight to anywhere they fly. Rule of thumb for me is that when I get the free flight, I save it for long range flights (read: anywhere east of Denver. Unless any emergencies come up, that flight is my ticket to Buffalo for the tournament there.
That saves me nearly $800 for the flight alone, so let's chop that off of charlest's bill, making it
$1200.
To win that $200-$400 in brackets, meant you had to have spent at least $200 to get into them alone. Yes, I know, "no deposit/no return", but really.. you could go for spending less.. Let's see about dropping that to, say, $50. and I'm being REALLY conservative.
$1150.
How much are you spending on a room? Weekends had me at circus Circus for $60/night, and weekdays at $20! Let's try the weekday, for 3 days.
$1090.
That leaves the rest of the trip.. over $1000, for food and... Gambling? Really? And that other 90% has to 'dig deep'? Really?
Wash/rinse/repeat for Vegas. And also realize that gambling isn't the only exciting things you can do, especially in Vegas. I could name 5 things to do between bowling in both areas that have nothing to do with gambling.
In fact, speaking of digging in deep, by that logic, it should be better when the tournaments are
*NOT* in Vegas or Reno; that way, less money has to be spent gambling. That would make us Western guys not have to spend so much, no?
BL.