WB Spring Challenge 2008
What do you get when the area’s top two spring blue water fishing tournaments combine? A bigger, better event with only half of the entry fees. Such was the case for the 2008 Wrightsville Beach Spring Challenge, an amalgamation of the WB Marina Spring Challenge and the Cape Fear Blue Water Fishing Club’s Blue Water Open held April 23-26.
The Yamaha-powered 33T Contender “Fish Hooker” took the top overall prize in the event and the top honors in the wahoo competition with a 70.0 lb. ‘hoo they caught while fishing Friday, April 25. Capt. Ken Broomfield led the Wilmington-based team along with co-Capt. Izzy Mabry, Chip Nifong, and Paul and Pat Horning. The first place wahoo check netted them $3276.
Like much of the fleet, the “Fish Hooker” anglers elected to fish Friday and Saturday of the captain’s choice event (fish two of three days), and it turned out to be a good decision.
Trolling well to the north of much of the fleet of tournament boats around 1:00 on Friday afternoon, the “Fish Hooker” anglers got a dramatic strike.
“We were around the 300 line in 190′,” Broomfield explained. “There wasn’t much of a temperature break or many weeds, but there was a little ledge there. That big fish skied on that bait, and my jaw just dropped. We saw the fish, but Izzy heard the reel go off and got to the rod before we did.”
A ballyhoo beneath a purple/black Ilander Hawaiian Eye fooled the big wahoo, and the fish wasted no time in taking off once it hit the water.
“He almost spooled us on that first run,” Mabry said. After turning the fish from its initial run, Mabry was able to work it close to the boat in around 20 minutes. Once there, although the crew had seen the fish clear the water when it struck, they were impressed with its size.
“They had him about 40′ down when I saw him, and I was amazed,” Nifong recalled. “He wasn’t that long, but that fish was just so fat.”
After Mabry worked the fish up to the boat, Pat Horning wired it, and Broomfield planted home the gaff as soon as the wahoo was in range. With what they knew was a contender for the winning fish in the box, the anglers celebrated but continued trolling in search of a larger wahoo or dolphin.
They didn’t end up with a larger fish, but managed to bring a number of 10-15 lb. dolphin and another wahoo around 40 lbs. to the scales Friday evening. While the big wahoo took the top spot on the leaderboard, most of the boats would be fishing Saturday, so the “Fish Hooker” team couldn’t celebrate victory yet.
“Saturday we went right back to the same spot,” Broomfield explained. “We fished there south of the Swansboro Hole all day.” While the area gave up six more dolphin and a wahoo to the “Fish Hooker,” none of their Saturday fish were leaderboard worthy. Fortunately for the crew, no one landed a larger fish Saturday, and their ‘hoo held onto the tournament’s top spot.
The “Fish Hooker” anglers would like to express their gratitude to sponsors Contender and Yamaha for their supporting roles in the team’s success.
Wrightsville Beach’s “Tuna Trappe” weighed in the event’s heaviest dolphin, a 40.25 lb. bull that earned them $3276. Capt. Brian “Squid” Smith was at the helm of the new 68′ B & D Boatworks custom sportfisherman, and he described fishing the tournament as something of a “shakedown cruise” for the new boat. Along with Smith for the event were boat owner John Lancaster, John Smith, Jeremy Reynolds, and Richard Ladd.
“Tuna Trappe” also found their money-winning fish while trolling on Friday. “We actually found a weather buoy floating about 70 miles offshore near the 270 line,” Smith explained. “And there were a whole lot of dolphin on it.”
The anglers caught nearly forty dolphin while following the weather buoy as it drifted north, including the 40 pounder that Lancaster reeled in.
“We were getting them on little ballyhoo, circle hooks, and Sea Witches,” Smith recalled, “but it got to the point where we would have caught them on anything we put in the water. We’d be reeling a mahi in, and four or five others would be fighting over the bait it ate.”
Aside from the big dolphin, the “Tuna Trappe” anglers had a 32-pounder on Friday, with most of the rest of their catch in the 10-15 lb. class.
Like the “Fish Hooker,” the “Tuna Trappe” fished north of most of the tournament fleet again Saturday, catching a small sailfish, a few small dolphin, and two 20-25 lb. wahoo. A 30 lb. fish was the largest dophin any boat produced on Saturday, and “Tuna Trappe” held on to the lead.
The largest tuna weighed in the tournament came from the Wrightsville Beach-based “Box Office,” a 33′ Grady White run by brothers Tim and Joe Elphick. They caught a 36.6 lb. blackfin that earned them $3276 on Friday.
After a slow start trolling around a warm water temperature break near the Same Ole, the Elphicks made the call to head southwest to the Steeples, which turned out to be an excellent decision. They also put away their trolling gear when they arrived, opting to vertical jig with some new secret lures the brothers personally designed.
Not long after beginning to jig, they hooked up with the big blackfin. The tuna was just one of a number of fish the Elphicks caught on jigs around the Steeples on Friday, including some big snowy groupers.
Saturday, they again gunned the motors for the Steeples, this time with both trolling and jigging on the brain. They had a banner day, landing grouper, a 29 lb. wahoo, and a 30 lb. dolphin, but they were unable to add anything to the leaderboard.
Second place in the wahoo, dolphin, and tuna categories was worth $1404. A 55.7 lb. wahoo earned that prize for the crew aboard the “Frick N Fishin.” The “Slow Poke” weighed in the second place tuna, a 33.6 lb. blackfin. And “Chicken Ship” earned the second place dolphin money with a 35.95 lb. fish.
The event also featured a billfish release category, which the Atlantic Beach boat “Maggie” took top honors in for a blue marlin released at 10:34 Friday morning. The “Maggie”‘ crew, consisting of Capt. Randy Bryant, Butch Bryant, and Chris and Bryan Hendrix, were fishing their way from Morehead City down towards Wrightsville when they encountered some blue marlin action in 100 fathoms south of the Swansboro Hole.
The estimated 300 lb. marlin that earned them the release prize was actually the third blue they saw Friday morning. The first two shook the hook before Butch was able to reel in the third fish. Several hours later, a fourth blue tried to eat a teaser bait as they trolled in the same area.
The Wrightsville Beach Spring Challenge not only seamlessly combined the two usual spring offshore tournaments, it managed to do so on one of the first mild weather weekends of the year, providing the entered boats with light winds and calm seas for their 60+ mile runs to the fishing grounds. The event also functioned as a fundraiser for the Eckerd Youth Alternative Program at Camp E-Tik-Etu in Elizabethtown, NC, and counselors and members of the program were on hand to assist with the weigh-in and awards on Saturday.
Tournament organizer Rich Walter wished to thank all the event’s sponsors and participants for helping to make the event successful.
