Yes, it was kind of crazy. I think that it would be hard to organise an event of this size. I know that there was some confusion at the end and the amount of ice on the water was crazy, but for the most part, I found the event to be pretty well organised. Maybe next time they should have assigned holes instead of the mad rush stampede. As far as the holes being close together, I agree. With the number of people that they have to keep together and honest I don't really know how else they would do it. There was people in line at 3:00 the afternoon before, and we arrived at 1:30am and had 100 or so people in front of us. I ended up catching 2 ling and placed 47th. As far as that part of the lake not being good for fishing, I have been very successfull in that area of the lake this year. I think that the low numbers of fish caught could be attributed to 3000+ lines in the water in such a small area. Being my first time in such a large contest it was definately an experience and I would go back.