Wayne Pearson, ESPN2 return to Olney
Host and crew visit city to film two different programs
Friday, April 15, 2005
Editor
Wayne Pearson, host of “The Ultimate Outdoors” on ESPN2, has brought his crew to Olney for the second time to film a pair of shows set to air later this summer on the network.
The host, his crew, Chamber of Commerce representatives, City Council members and the Jeff and Kent McClatchy families gathered Sunday, April 17, to enjoy a dinner of brisket, sausage and all the trimmings provided by the Olney Chamber of Commerce.
“We appreciate your group welcoming us here,” Pearson said. “You have a great community, and it’s one of the best kept secrets in Texas.”
The first show being filmed is a segment of a new reality series that has yet to get much promotion on the network.
Pearson said more than 40,000 applications from hunters wishing to be on this show were received and, through a series of reviews, were narrowed to 12. Those 12 individuals are being taken on hunts for different animals across the country, with the winner of each head-to-head competition advancing and the other going home.
After six rounds of competition, only six players remain.
For the round of competition being filmed this week, B.J. Blair of New Jersey and Tracy Howard of Virginia are here in Olney on a turkey hunt. The hunting and filming are being done this week on land owned locally by the McClatchy family.
Blair advanced to this round by winning a quail hunt in southern Georgia, and Howard advanced on a duck and goose hunt in Angleton. (TX)
After filiming and declaring a winner in Olney, the crew will go on to film new segments of the competition in South Dakota, southern Florida and northern Alabama. The final two will compete in south Florida, where an overall winner will be named. That winner will then travel to New Mexico for an elk hunt.
Pearson said the champion will be declared in July, and the show will begin airing soon afterward. Olney’s segment of the show will most likely air in August, he said, and then possibly again in November.
The second show being filmed by Pearson and his crew is “Outfitters Almanac,” which will feature the McClatchy family property and other locations of interest to outdoorsmen throughout Olney.
A large part of that show, Pearson said, will be a feature on the One Arm Dove Hunt, filmed this past fall.
That show will probably also air on ESPN2 sometime in August, he said.
ESPN, owned by Disney, is the largest cable company and reaches approximately 88 million households..
