Martini’s Hook A Hoo
Austin Aycock, Amy McMullan, and Brian Aycock with the winning 74.08 lb. wahoo in the Martini's Hook a Hoo Rodeo. The fish fell for a purple/black swimming plug as the "OIFC" fishing team was high-speed trolling near the Blackjack Hole.
Hot off a win in the 2009 SKA Nationals, the “Ocean Isle Fishing Center” team posted a wahoo of an almost identical weight to their 72.10 lb. SKA-winning king mackerel to take the top spot in the weeklong 2010 Martini’s Restaurant Hook a Hoo Rodeo, held April 17-25 out of North Myrtle Beach’s Harbourgate Marina. The 74.08 lb. wahoo earned Capt. Brant McMullan, his wife Amy, cousin Brian Aycock, and Austin Aycock not only the $18,400 winner’s check, but a full sweep, taking home the Lady Angler, Junior Angler, and Wahoo Calcutta crowns as well.
The “OIFC” crew decided to change up from their normal wahoo tactics for the event, trolling a full high-speed artificial spread instead of natural baits.
“I decided I wanted to high-speed fish with artificials,” McMullan explained. “I hadn’t ever really done it before, but we just wanted to catch wahoo, nothing else, and that seems to be one of the better ways.”
After departing the Ocean Isle Fishing Center at 6:30 on Tuesday, the quartet headed for the Blackjack Hole.
“We put lines in around 8:00 and started trolling at 12 knots,” McMullan continued. “If we hadn’t caught a fish in the first 30 minutes, we probably would have quit. It just feels weird to troll that fast.”
Catch a fish in the first 30 minutes they did, boxing a 39 lb. wahoo before they’d been trolling their mixed spread of Black Bart lures and swimming plugs for an hour.
“About another hour later, we hooked the 74,” McMullan said.
A purple/black swimming plug fooled the big fish, and 11-year-old Austin Aycock took the rod.
“When you’re pulling that fast, all the fish hit and run hard,” the winning captain continued. “The difference with the bigger fish is that they take second and third runs instead of just getting dragged in after that first run.”
Austin Aycock held on while the fish ran repeatedly during the initial part of the fight.
“We didn’t have the drag locked down,” McMullan said, “so it was pretty give and take. We were using 2-speed reels, so Austin could drop it down and grind on him. He did a great job.”
After the junior angler had fought the fish for the better part of a half-hour, he worked the 4 lb. trolling weight to the boat.
“I leadered it,” McMullan explained. “We had a 40’ 150 lb. leader from the trolling lead, so it was kind of intense for a minute. The fish was back and forth for a minute. When I got it within range, Brian stuck it and put it in the boat.”
With the fat wahoo in the boat, the anglers put out the spread and began trolling again while speculating on what the fish weighed.
“I thought that wahoo was 90 lbs.,” McMullan said. “It had been a little while since we’d seen one like that.”
Trolling the rest of the day in the Blackjack vicinity, the anglers hooked another pair of wahoo, a 35 pounder and a foul-hooked 56 that fooled the crew into thinking they had a fish nearly twice its size.
“The 56 was hooked in the side of the head,” McMullan said. “We thought that thing was huge, maybe 100 lbs. It fought twice as hard as the 74. Amy fought it for 45 minutes.”
Though their final fish wasn’t a hundred pounder, it sealed off an excellent day of wahoo fishing for the crew, and McMullan was quick to credit the high-speed technique with their success.
“Wahoo are one of the harder fish to actually land,” McMullan added. “We get really frustrated with getting big bites and losing the fish. They run like crazy, and then they’re gone. High-speeding, when they hit, the collision just jams that hook right through the bone, and if he’s on there, he’s caught.”
David Braswell and the “Gettin’ Jiggy” fishing team, from Little River, SC, locked up second place in the Hook a Hoo with a 66.86 lb. fish. Braswell and teammates Jim Crighton and Keith Gurganus fished Tuesday as well, and they began their day at the Blackjack Hole before getting a tip on the radio.
“Corey, on the BluByU, called us and said the bite was on up at the Same Ol’ Hole,” Braswell explained.
The crew made haste north to the Same Ol’, and it wasn’t long before their money fish struck.
“He hit a pink/white Blue Water Candy Jag with a medium ballyhoo,” Braswell said, “on mono.”
Gurganus took the rod after the fish bit, and he held on for a long first run.
“He hit a 30 Wide,” Braswell continued, “the smallest reel on the boat, and just melted it down. By the time we cleared the lines and turned the boat, he had run back at us. On his first swing by the boat we stuck him.”
The crew landed one more ‘hoo before heading to the scales, where they heard about the leading fish.
“We heard there was a 74 up there,” Braswell reported. “We thought ours might beat it, but not quite.”
North Myrtle Beach’s Kevin Singletary and the “Sing’s Fling” crew rounded out the top three with a 58.50 lb. wahoo, adding a 21.85 lb. dolphin to top that species’ Calcutta as well.
After running south to the Georgetown Hole without finding the water they were looking for, the team continued on and found the near-60 lb. ‘hoo while trolling a weedline in 1500’ of water offshore of the Bubble Rock. A yellow-skirted ballyhoo on the planer fooled their big fish.
Topping the event’s Tuna Calcutta was a 28.14 lb. blackfin hauled to the scales aboard the “Island Girl.”
All three winning teams wished to thank Ace Parker, Jeff Martini, and the tournament committee for putting on the event, which serves as a fundraiser for the Shriner’s Burn Center, a hospital network providing no-cost care to minors suffering from burn injuries. The 51 boats fishing the 2010 event enabled the tournament to raise over $12,000 for the Center.
