Added on Thursday, August 4, 2011  Fish Post

Raleigh King Mackerel Tournament

Topping an already impressive leader board with an exclamation point, Skip Conklin and Morehead City’s “Ocean Athlete” fishing team scaled a massive 60.3 lb. king mackerel to take home first place in the 27^th Annual Raleigh Saltwater Sportfishing Club King Mackerel Tournament, held July 29-31 out of the Morehead City waterfront.

Conklin, his wife Sandy, and teammate Jay Russell fish on a 28’ Mercury-powered Privateer, and they are no strangers to large king mackerel and tournament success. In fact they scaled a 51 lb. kingfish in the same event last year, but were knocked down to second by just a tenth of a pound.

After catching bait in the days preceding the event, the “Ocean Athlete” headed for where they hooked their big fish last year, the Atlas Tanker wreck east of Cape Lookout Shoals.

“We didn’t do any pre-fishing,” Skip Conklin explained. “It’s been too hot, too windy, and too expensive. But we’ve done well there in the past, so that’s where we headed.”

In an almost exact-repeat scenario, the anglers caught a pair of barracuda right off the bat, and then hooked their big king shortly after 7:00 on tournament morning.

“We were getting the lines back out from the barracudas when he hit,” Conklin said.

A menhaden on the short top line fooled the fish, and Russell grabbed the rod.

“That fish ran pretty good,” the winning captain continued, “but it was acting more like a ‘cuda than a king. It stayed down the whole time.”

The anglers didn’t get a look at the fish when it bit, so they were unaware that the tournament-winner was on the other end of the line until the fight drew to a close.

“Jay fought it for about 15 minutes,” Conklin reported, “and then it just rolled up next to the boat. I said ‘that’s a pretty nice one’ and reached out with the gaff.”

After boating the fish, the anglers did some quick measurements and knew they’d caught what they were looking for.

“I figured him in the high-50’s,” said Conklin. “I knew it was better than the 51 from last year.”

After securing the fish, the “Ocean Athlete” anglers made their way towards Beaufort Inlet and fished the day out there, wanting to get closer to the scales in case any unforeseen issues threatened their ability to weigh the huge fish in time.

“I didn’t get to see them weigh him,” Conklin said, “since I was with the boat, but when I heard 60, I got pretty excited.”

Though eight other fish over 30 pounds were weighed during the event, the closest competition to the “Ocean Athlete” king was barely within 20 lbs., quite a margin to win a king mackerel tournament by.

Kevin Radford and the “Brown Eyed Girl” crew, of Garner, NC, scaled the 40.5 lb. king mackerel that earned second place and the top spot in the 23’ and Under division.

Fishing with his father Ed and daughter Brooke aboard the Yamaha-powered 23’ C-Hawk, the second place anglers had to wait patiently for their fish.

It bit a naked menhaden around 3:00 that afternoon while the Radfords were trolling around Chicken Rock, also on the east side of Lookout Shoals.

The king came to the boat in around 20 minutes, and the anglers headed for the scales.

A 39.3 lb. fish earned third place in the event for the “Animal House” crew. “Money Grows on Trees” weighed a 38.3 lb. king for fourth, and “Logan’s Run” rounded out the top five with a 36.4 lb. fish.

The Raleigh Saltwater Sportfishing Club also held a flounder tournament concurrent with the king mackerel event, and Mike Witlach took the top honors there with a 6.43 lb. fish.

More information on the event is available at www.rswsc.org.