Surf Series Trail
The Surf Series Trail is a season-long points competition that operates in the background of the five standalone surf fishing competitions that Fisherman’s Post hosts every year. Those that choose to enter the Surf Series are competing for a chance at bragging rights, as well as additional cash payouts at the end of the season.Â
The rules are simple: fish any (or all) of the Fisherman’s Post surf tournaments through the year, including the Pleasure Island Team Challenge (April), Topsail Spring Surf & Pier Challenge (May), Hatteras Island Surf Challenge (September), Pleasure Island Fall Surf Challenge (October), and Topsail Fall Surf & Pier Challenge (November), and an angler’s five heaviest fish caught over the season are calculated as their points total.Â
More than one fish can count from each of the five events. For example, an angler can count one bluefish and one black drum from a single event, but an angler can’t count more than one of the same species from any one event (an angler can’t count two bluefish from any one event).
Anglers win money at each of the five events, and at the end of the fifth event, additional payouts go to the top five finishers in the Surf Series Trail.
In its second year, the Surf Series Trail grew from 26 anglers in 2023 to 41 anglers in 2024. There was also an uptick in the quality of fish, with a five-fish aggregate of 15.6 lbs. winning in 2023, but 2024’s champion scaled 19.9 lbs.
The 2024 Surf Series Trail Champion was James Kolikas, out of Culpepper, VA. Not only did he beat out second place by well over 3 pounds, but he accomplished his five-fish aggregate with a fish coming from each of the five events.
James Kolikas, from Culpepper, VA, was the 2024 Surf Series Champion, beating out 40 other surf anglers in a season-long points competition. Kolikas is pictured with the Bluefish Division plaque he won in the Topsail Spring Surf & Pier for his 10.4 lb. bluefish, the largest single fish of his five-fish aggregate weight of 19.9 lbs.
Kolikas’ winning five-fish, in chronological order, are as follows: 2.5 lb. black drum in Pleasure Island Team, 10.4 lb. bluefish in Topsail Spring, 5.2 lb. red drum in Hatteras Island, 1.1 lb. bluefish in Pleasure Island Fall, and a 0.7 lb. bluefish in Topsail Fall.
In the 2023 Surf Series, Kolikas finished in 15th place with a total weight of 4.1 lbs.
Second place went to Dale Traxler, of Asheboro, NC. Traxler’s total weight was 16.1 lbs., and his top five fish came from 4 of the five events.
Traxler’s top five fish included a 6.1 lb. black drum weighed in Pleasure Island Team, a 4.1 lb. red drum and a 1.2 lb. bluefish weighed in Pleasure Island Fall, a 3.5 lb. bluefish in Hatteras Island, and a 1.2 lb. sea mullet in Topsail Fall. The difference between Traxler finishing in second place for the year and third place was the 1.2 lb. sea mullet that he weighed in on Sunday morning of the last event of the year.
Dale Traxler, from Asheboro, NC, finished the 2024 Surf Series in second place with a five-fish aggregate weight of 16.1 lbs., including the 4.1 lb. red drum pictured here that he weighed in during the Pleasure Island Fall Surf Fishing Challenge.
Last year, Traxler finished in seventh place in the Surf Series with a 9.4 lb. bag.
Mike Atkinson, from Clayton, NC, was last year’s Surf Series champion with a 15.6 lb. five-fish weight, and he finished the 2024 season in third place with 15.1 total pounds.
Atkinson got off to a slow start, not recording any fish in the Pleasure Island Team, the first event of the year, but then he weighed his heaviest fish of the season in the second event, a 7.9 lb. bluefish weighed in the Topsail Spring. He added the following four fish to the big blue: a 1.5 lb. bluefish in Hatteras Island, a 1.5 lb. bluefish and a 1.1 lb. trout in Pleasure Island Fall, and a 3.1 lb. black drum in Topsail fall.
Finishing out the top five was Jeff Palmer with 13.1 lbs. and Mandi Waddell with 12.2 lbs.
For more information on the 2024 Surf Series Trail, or to start planning out which individual surf fishing events to participate in in 2025, please go to FishermansPost.com.
The 2025 Surf Series Trail begins with the first event of the season, the Pleasure Island Team Surf Fishing Challenge, an event that will be hosted out of Island Tackle & Hardware in Carolina Beach over the weekend of April 11-13, 2025.
