CCFA Redfish Series 2008
Dominating the 35 boat field at the first Crystal Coast Fishing Association Redfish Tournament, Capt. Matt Lamb, of Chasin Tails Outdoors in Atlantic Beach, and his father Ray Lamb scaled a pair of red drum weighing 8.77 and 8.26 lbs. to top the second place boat by over one pound and take home over $3000.
Pre-fishing every day the week of the tournament during the tides they’d have during the event, Matt Lamb kept his eye on a perfect school of upper-slot limit reds each day; however, on tournament day, they didn’t have enough water to get to them.
“I had another place I’d caught a few Thursday,” Lamb said, “and we went there.” Finding a school of fish at the spot, a marsh area north of Morehead City, Lamb immediately caught a smaller drum, and then landed his big fish almost immediately on a Rapala Skitterwalk topwater. Deciding that the school held promise, he and his father decided to remain in the area. It turned out to be a good decision, as Ray landed the other red that made up their total on a gold spoon around 11:00 in the morning.
Arriving at the scales to weigh their fish, the Lambs were confident that their fish would do well.
“When we got there, we heard 15.5 was leading,” Matt said. “I kind of knew we had that beat, but I didn’t think we had 17.”
The fish were weighed in bags to avoid stressing them, adding approximately 1/2 lb. to each competitor’s fish.
Team NCCharterfishing.com, comprised of Swansboro Capts. Jeff Cronk and Mike Taylor, continued a mean streak in their redfish tournament season, weighing in 15.88 lbs. of reds to take second place and over $1800.
Taylor and Cronk also pre-fished extensively, but the school they hoped to fish wasn’t feeding on their flat on tournament day. Guessing that the fish were in an adjacent channel, Cronk and Taylor ran back and forth in the channel, using the motor to spook the fish onto the flat.
Once the fish swam into the shallows, they followed and culled their big fish from 56 they caught over the day, mostly on pink Gulp shrimp fished on 1/8 oz. jigheads.
Jacksonville Capt. Ricky Kellum, of Speckled Specialist Charters, took home third place, weighing in two reds at 15.79 lbs. to earn over $1000.
Kellum and teammate Derrick Barbee found their fish feeding on the shoals outside of New River Inlet, and they hooked them on topwater plugs and soft plastic baits.
