Champion's Choice, Part 1

In about two weeks I'll be headed to Oneida Lake to be a B.A.S.S. marshal at the final regular season Elite Series event of the year. I got the call about two weeks ago that a spot opened up for me (I was on a wait list for months) and jumped at the chance. I'm only entered for the first two days, with the possibility of a third day--again, a wait list process. Since I have limited resources (i.e. money), this is, to me, a pretty unique and precious opportunity to take a nice vacation and learn from the best bass anglers on the planet. The 2010 Elite schedule was released recently, and as with last year's annoucement revisions have been made; there will be no event in the northeast, as the Lake Champlain tournament was canceled for the second year in a row. That makes this chance at riding with the pros all the more valuable. Though I don't plan on being present for the final weigh in (again, money being what it is), I do plan on soaking in as many aspects of the process as I can. I have a short list of questions I'd like to ask the anglers I'm paired with. Among them are: Given that you're fishing such large bodies of water, how do you narrow down your choices of where to fish and how do you determine which spot looks better than another? What do you do in the off-season and how much do you fish? When preparing for a tournament how much time do you put in on a given body of water before it goes off-limits? How do you address (or did you address) your weaknesses as an angler? (I somehow don't imagine these guys as having weaknesses, in the sense that the rest of us think of having weaknesses.) And I think I may even ask a couple guys how sick of fishing they get during the season, if at all.