Tournament Report – Far Out Shootout
The last boat to weigh-in (and perhaps the smallest), “Team MacAttack,” snagged the top spot at the 2016 Far Out Shootout, held May 7-15 out of the Ocean Isle Fishing Center, with an aggregate weight of 89.0 lbs. Last year they came in second place, and this year not only did they win overall, but they also took home the prizes for Biggest Wahoo, Big Fish TWT, and Overall TWT, totaling their prize money at $7,950.
Capt. William McCann explained that they have basically the same strategy going into any event, and the team puts some thought and research into the process and where they are going to fish. On Saturday morning, the team pulled out of the docks around 4:30 and broke the Carolina Beach Inlet by 5:00 am. The first catch of the day was a tuna, which unfortunately came aboard half eaten by a shark. After that first tuna catch, the team was back and forth all morning catching tuna and mahi.
The 2016 Far Out Shootout winners, Team MacAttack, with the 58.5 lb. wahoo that clinched their 89.0 lb. aggregate first place spot.
The first wahoo came in right around lunchtime, and the ‘hoo bit a cedar plug. “It was almost identical to last year’s bite, except that fish took the cedar plug with it,” explained McCann. Their big wahoo hit around 1:00 on a Mack-A-Hoo trolling plug with a ballyhoo on a long outrigger line. “Initially when it hit, it made a pretty good run. Then it seemed like it was gone, or coming back towards the boat,” said McCann, “but then he made another run, and we had to turn around and chase him down.”
“When we got on top of him and we saw him a few times, we thought initially that he wasn’t much bigger than the first wahoo we had in the boat. We had quite the fight when he got close to the boat. He didn’t like it,” said McCann. “Once we gaffed him, we saw he was much bigger than the first fish. And then on the boat, he seemed even bigger. We have a 72-inch wide bag to store fish, and he stretched the entire length of it.”
Once the fish was on the boat, McCann knew he and co-captain Whalon Huff had a pretty good shot, even though last year he caught almost the exact same size fish and came in second. McCann admitted that he experienced a bit of déjà vu.
“That stuff lingers in your mind, but we did know we had a pretty good fish and we thought we could at least beat the current leading aggregate,” said McCann.
One of the last boats in of the day, the ride in for “Team MacAttack” was fairly ugly and put the team behind getting to weigh in. “We pulled in at 7:45 pm,” said McCann, “with just a few minutes to spare.” MacAttack weighed in a 58.5 lb. wahoo, a 12.4 lb. tuna, and an 18.1 lb. mahi to take the leaderboard and redeem themselves from the previous year.
The “OIFC” fishing team came in second with a total aggregate weight of 69.35 lbs., and Team “Contagious” took third with 66.75 lbs.
For more information on the Far Out Shootout and a full leaderboard, check out www.oifc.com.
