Swansboro KMT 2008
For the second time in three years, the Hot Rod fishing team of Brett and Alan Barnes walked away with the $25,000 guaranteed first place prize money in the Swansboro Rotary Club King Mackerel Blue Water Tournament’s king mackerel division, the first event in 2008 SKA Division 2 competition. Their second win in the annual Memorial Day weekend event came on the strength of a 42.20 pound king that topped the next heaviest fish by nearly 12 pounds
Not only did they win the event by a double digit weight margin, the father/son team, fishing aboard a 25′ Yamaha-powered Contender, caught another fish in the 35 pound class that also would have earned them the big check.
The Hot Rod team didn’t pre-fish for the event, and Brett attributed the pair of big kings to a “lucky weekend,” although the formula of trolling bottom structure offshore of Carolina Beach that earned them the 2006 winner’s check came through yet again for the 2008 tournament.
The pair were slow-trolling a spot known as the Class Action ledge when they caught both fish that would have topped the field.
They landed the mid-30’s king first, and were continuing to troll the 95 foot deep area when the big king struck a naked pogy on top around 10:00. Alan took the rod with his father at the helm, and the king began a strong first run.
“It took around 15 minutes,” Brett Barnes said of the fight. “He took one long run right away, and then came in fairly steadily. It was pretty easy after that.”
When Alan had worked the king close enough, Brett planted a gaff in it and swung the 42 pound fish over the Contender’s gunnel.
With two very strong fish in the boat, the anglers reset their spread and continued to troll.
“We stayed there and fished for about another hour,” Brett explained.
A front bearing some strong north winds pushed through the area around midday, and the anglers decided to head for land as the oceanic conditions worsened.
“It started kicking up around 10:30 after we landed the fish,” said Barnes. “We had good conditions until 10:00, but then it got rough about 11:00. It was a pretty rough ride coming in. We were going to go to New River Inlet, but we decided to head in Masonboro and run up the ICW instead.”
Hitting the scales at Hammock’s Beach State Park around 3:00 that afternoon, the Barnes again wowed a Swansboro Rotary weigh in crowd with a 40+ pound king (an unusually large fish this early in the season) just as they’d done with the 43.63 pound fish that earned them first place in 2006.
Brett Barnes wished to express his gratitude to Terminator Titanium leader wire for the role they’ve played in the team’s competitive success over the past few seasons. “We’re very confident in the wire,” he explained. “It’s nearly half the diameter of conventional leader wire and twice the strength.”
Randall Edens and the East Coast Sports fishing team, from Hampstead, NC, weighed in the 29.55 pound king that earned them a total of over $10,000 and second place in SKA competition. Edens fished the tournament with his father George, Chris Gaddy, and Bill Cunningham aboard a friend’s 31′ Yamaha-powered Contender, as the team’s usual boat is in Sarasota, FL, for another tournament.
They hooked their money-winning fish while slow-trolling around some bottom numbers not far from the Navy Wreck. A live bluefish fooled the king into biting around 11:15, and Randall Edens took the rod.
“It didn’t take a very long first run,” he explained, “but it took a while to get that fish in. He was hooked in the mouth but also on the side of the head. When we finally saw the fish, we took our time with it.”
Around 45 minutes after the king took the bluefish, Chris Gaddy sank home the gaff.
Aside from the big king, the East Coast Sports crew landed another around 20 pounds and a number of dolphin over the course of the day.
The team would like to thank sponsors East Coast Sports, Yamaha, Road King, Zander Guy, Treasure Island Campground, Maui Jim, and Frogg Toggs.
The Swansboro locals aboard the Rugman were the third place SKA boat in the tournament, weighing in a 27.95 pound king worth nearly $4,000. Team Capt. Jamie Wallace fished the event with his wife Rene (who took home the event’s Top Lady Angler honors), father-in-law Bob Adams, Craig Stanfield, and Mark Springfield.
WR2 produced the fourth place fish, which fell for a pogy while the anglers were battling 8 foot seas around 12:30 on Saturday. Mark Springfield was the angler, and Jamie Wallace had to hold on to Springfield and the boat, as the rough conditions made it nearly impossible to stand up and fight a fish at the same time.
Around 40 minutes after the bite and the fourth time Springfield had it near the boat, Wallace was able to reach out with a long gaff and pluck the king from the water.
Capt. Brant McMullan and the Ocean Isle Fishing Center team took SKA fourth place with a 27.55 pound king, pocketing over $3,000. McMullan fished the event with his brother Barrett, Robbie Dial, and Rickey Beck aboard their 36′ Yamaha-powered Contender.
Their fish was part of a triple header and hit a cigar minnow beneath a light blue Cape Lookout skirt as the anglers were fishing some snapper numbers offshore of Frying Pan Tower. Dial ended up fighting the largest of the fish, and after a 15 minute struggle, McMullan was able to gaff it.
SKA fifth place and over $1500 went to Clayton, NC’s Bikini Bottom fishing team for a 24.65 pound kingfish. Fishing aboard the team’s 33′ Yamaha-powered Hydra-Sport for the tournament were Tram Captain Will Moore, Chris Banks, Dave Larue, and James Brazier.
Finding a bait pod near the 200/200 the morning of the tournament as anglers around them were landing 7-10 pound kings, the Bikini Bottom crew decided to stick with the bait in the hopes of hooking up with a leaderboard-worthy fish.
“We’d deployed ribbonfish deep and had bluefish on top, and we decided the bluefish were too big,” Moore explained. After pulling in the blues, he sent back two smaller baitfish on a “Florida double spy rig” and hooked up shortly after ward.
The 24 pound king struck around 9:45, and began to run directly into the steepening seas while Brazier picked up the rod. Getting a glimpse of the fish after its first run, he backed off the drag and let the king go while the team followed it into the waves.
After around they followed the fish for around 20 minutes, Brazier had the fish in range, and Banks sank the gaff and brought the fifth place king aboard.
Moore wished to express his gratitude to Holt, Lake, and West and the Make a Wish Foundation of Eastern NC for their roles in the team’s success.
A 22.60 pound king earned the top spot in the Class of 23′ for Chad Shingleton and Clayton, NC’s Tide One On fishing team. Fishing their first tournament aboard Shingleton’s boat, a 21′ Yamaha-powered Wellcraft with John Davis and Randy Wilson, the anglers earned $1650.
The Tide One On fish fell for a pogy trolled beneath a blue Cape Lookout Lures skirt while the crew was trolling a ledge just offshore of the 14 Buoy. Davis was first to the rod, but the king didn’t make a strong run at first.
“We were pointed offshore, and the fish just came right to the boat,” Shingleton explained. “When he got up to the boat, he took off a little bit.”
The run was brief however, and after the anglers chased the fish for a moment, Wilson was able to sink the gaff.
Staying at the area for a short time while the weather continued to deteriorate, the anglers headed for the scales when the Capt. Stacy Fishing Center broadcast a VHF warning that the winded were going northeast at 25+ on shore.
Fishing aboard the Blue Chips, Nicolas Brown, of Fayetteville, NC, was the SKA Top Junior Angler for the event, weighing in an 11.35 lb. king.
The Swansboro Rotary Club King Mackerel Tournament serves as a fundraiser for college
scholarships for local youths, and has raised over $550,000 to that end since 1991, when it became the first SKA tournament in the area. A total of 165 boats fished the event for 2008, and Tournament Committee Member Jim Davis wished to thank all of them for fishing, along with the Rotarians for all the hard work that goes into planning and hosting the event.
