Onslow Bay Open KMT
Adam Tosto, Greg Thornberg, and Albert Tosto with the 38.22 lb. king mackerel that earned them the win at the 13th Annual Onslow Bay Open, the first king tournament the trio had fished. Their big king bit a live menhaden at the George Summerlin Reef.
“They said they knew we were rookies from how much we were celebrating,” Adam Tosto explained of competitors who saw he and Beaufort, NC’s “Honeybun” crew boat a 38.22 lb. king mackerel in the 13th Annual Onslow Bay Open King Mackerel Tournament. The ribbing must have been easy to handle, as Tosto, his brother Albert, and friend Greg Thornberg easily bested their nearest competition to win the event, the first KMT they’d ever fished.
The trio didn’t pre-fish, but elected to spend the days before the event catching bait in order to get an early start on the Saturday of competition. They did just that, heading out Barden’s Inlet and crossing Cape Lookout Shoals in time to arrive at the 1700 Rock around 7:00 that morning.
Deploying a spread of live menhaden, they put a teenager king in the boat around 8:00 and had a few more bites, but they decided to head a bit closer to shore as the wind picked up later in the morning.
“We headed for the Summerlin (AR-285) around 11:00,” Tosto reported.
Once there, he and Thornberg went to work getting baits in the water while Albert Tosto took the 25’ Sea Fox’s helm. They didn’t have to wait long for action.
“We’d been there less than five minutes when that big fish bit,” the captain continued.
The anglers’ propwash bait, a menhaden behind a Blue Water Candy skirt, fooled the king, and Thornberg took the rod after the fish bit.
“He took a long run at first,” Tosto said, “but we got him back near the boat after about five minutes.”
Though they’d closed the gap with the big mackerel, the battle was far from over.
“He came up next to the boat and we might have had a gaff shot,” Tosto explained, “but it was far away and we didn’t take it.”
The king then made a turn and another brief run, forcing Adam Tosto (who’d taken over the helm) to turn and follow it, but the fish stayed within sight.
“We were looking at the fish 40-feet away the whole time,” he continued. “It seemed like ten minutes but was probably five.”
The stalemate ended when the fish swam under the bow of the boat and stayed out of reach for several moments before making another move.
“Greg said he was coming up,” Tosto said, “and he did. Albert got a great gaff shot, and I helped put it in the boat. There was a significant amount of excitement onboard at that point.”
The anglers quickly took a measurement of the king, which they estimated at 40 lbs., then decided it was time to head for the scales at Casper’s Marina in Swansboro.
Running back into Barden’s Inlet, they took the ICW to Swansboro and arrived just as the scales were opening.
“That fish was the same length as the 41 and 44 lb. fish from the Raleigh tournament last weekend,” Tosto recalled. “We were surprised when it wasn’t a 40.”
Forty pounds or not, the king proved plenty large enough to leave the “Honeybun” name on top of the leaderboard when the scales closed, and the anglers had plenty of cause for celebration.
John Hudson and the “Justin Time” fishing team earned second place in the event with a 35.46 lb. king that bit a menhaden in the Beaufort Inlet shipping channel. The “Triple Trouble” crew secured third place in the event with a 25.70 lb. king.
More information on the Onslow Bay Open and a full leaderboard are available at www.obokmt.us.
