Rebel Pier KMT 2008
“He actually hit a bait on the other side of the pier and came about 10′ out of the water,” Frank Riego said of the winning fish in the 2008 Ocean Crest Pier Rebel King Pier KMT. “Then he went under the pier. I knew he would see my bait when he came out, and he did, and he got hooked.”
The power of positive thinking is a concept that is very familiar to most anglers, and Riego, of Raleigh, must be quite a thinker. Not only did the 21 lb. king mackerel take the top spot on the leaderboard in Riego’s first fishing tournament, the fish earned him cash, a check, and prizes worth a total of $1780.
After almost two days worth of slow fishing, with only large chopper bluefish (the third in a declining tier of fish that can substitute for kings in the event none are caught) on the tournament’s leaderboard, Riego was ready for a change.
“It had been a boring day,” he said of Saturday, May 3, the event’s second day. “Just a few chopper blues. I thought: No, I want to see a king. Then the weather changed, and they started biting as a school. Mine was the first to bite, and mine was the biggest.”
After the king inhaled the live bluefish Riego had pinned to a king rig off the pier’s southeast corner shortly after 5:00 PM, it took off, first heading out to sea, then cutting to west, meaning Riego had to negotiate his way around and between the lines of many of the other 55 anglers entered in the tournament.
After causing him to weave his way through the line, the fish went right back the way it had come, forcing Riego to perform the task again.
“He probably fought a good 45 minutes,” Riego recalled. “He was so green, and I had to control the drag. John Leach was coaching me, saying to keep the drag up so he stays hooked. He did, and eventually they were able to gaff him right by where I started out.”
When Riego had finally tired the fish enough for a gaff attempt, John Leach and Eric Montieth sank home the pier gaffs and brought the smoker king mackerel to the deck.
Although anglers landed several more kings over the next few hours, Riego’s held firmly onto the lead. He wasn’t in the clear yet, though, as the tournament anglers still had Sunday morning and early afternoon to put a fish on the board. Fortunately (for Riego), storms Sunday morning dirtied the water, and no kings were hooked until after the tournament’s 3:00 PM cutoff time.
The second king to bite after the weather changed Saturday afternoon ended up being the second heaviest in the tournament, as well as the first king decked in the event. Angler Dewey Small, of Conway, SC, hooked the 13 lb., 13 oz. fish that ultimately won him $684 just after Riego’s dramatic bite.
“I was actually fishing with a threadfin, a greenback, about the size of my hand, and that’s what he ate,” Small explained.
The king took a quick initial run, but Small made short work of the valuable fish. “I only fought it for maybe 10 or 15 minutes,” he said. “I got mine back to the pier fast.”
When Small had the tired fish close to the pier, Montieth again performed the gaffing duties. The 2008 Rebel King is one of over 40 pier king mackerel tournaments Small has fished, and the first time he’s landed a king during one.
Just barely surpassed by the second place fish, a 13 lb. 10 oz. king secured third place for Clayton, NC, angler Reggie Eason. The fish was Eason’s first pier king mackerel.
Like the winning fish, Eason’s bit a small bluefish late Saturday afternoon. Grabbing the rod, he fought the king for around 15 minutes, weaving in and out of the dozens of other anchor and fighting lines in the water.
This was Eason’s third time fishing the Rebel King, among other Ocean Crest Pier tournaments he’s fished, and his first time finishing in the money.
All three winners wished to express their gratitude to the pier’s entire staff and especially pier manager Dave Cooper for not only putting on a fine event that fattened their wallets, but for maintaining the only open pier left on Oak Island with an environment that is constantly praised as more like a family than a fishing pier.
Fishing for king mackerel from a pier is never a certain thing. A fairly precise mixture of weather, water, and other variables (ex. the presence of bait) has to come together in order for anglers to target these pelagic speedsters from a structure affixed to land. Obviously scheduling a tournament for such fishing is an imprecise science, since it must be done months in advance when no predictions about those variables have a chance of being accurate.
That said, Ocean Crest Pier’s Dave Cooper has a knack for scheduling tournaments that coincide with at least some king mackerel action, and he did it again with the 2008 Rebel King Pier King Mackerel Tournament after three successful king mackerel events last year.
Three more tournaments with at least a king mackerel category are scheduled for the summer and fall of 2008. Interested anglers can visit the pier’s website www.oceancrestpier.net for more details.
