Wow, what a beautiful day!!

We got off to a decent start picking away at some 2 pounders as the sun came up.

Below is a picture of the eventual winners of the tournament: Team Perros Viejo (Doug Crawford & John Beerling). Ron and I figured we must be doing something right if we were competing for spots with these ‘Old Dogs.’

This next picture is of fellow FIB’er and SWBA tournament director Eric Bent shooting a couple videos of us fishing inside a surfable lefhander.

Below are a couple of the videos EB was shooting:

We made our way around to the backside of SCI and tried to develop a pattern of what the fish were doing, and how to best catch them. It took a while and we worked really hard, in a number of different zones, throwing a variety of lures at them. Some of the nicer fish came on swimbaits with Tenacious Weedless heads and Jason had back-to-back 5 pounders on the KelpKritter – AWESOME!!

We eventually found a pack of good fish that wanted to bite, and in a matter of minutes we were culling out several small fish for 5 pounders! STOKED!!!

We moved out a little deeper and saw a bird sitting on the water. Two casts later our big fish of the day fell off the hook and into our net. YES!!!

We worked hard to cull out our two smaller fish, but one came unbuttoned at the boat, and a couple others broke off. We knew we had a decent weight and made our way back to Two Harbors, Catalina in flat-calm seas for the 4PM weigh in.

Ron walked the fish up the pier for the weigh in, interview, and photos. Our 20.49 pounds was good enough to put us in the top 10.

We were in the hunt for a top 5 finish for the tournament. Obviously that would depend on how we did on day 2 though….
After the day 1 weigh in, one boat was late for the weigh in. As it turns out, the team had capsized their boat, and had been rescued. Thankfully no one was hurt, but their boat and gear was a total loss. With their experience and an ominous weather forecast for day 2 in the front of our minds, we uneasily went to sleep.

Day 2
Sleep did not come as easily as we like, and the 3AM alarm came too early. We woke up to cold rain, and choppy seas. Ron and I made the 38 mile run to SCI again. It was windy and getting windier. We had to cut our speed in half from the day before. Conditions were not as bad the picture below, but they weren’t much better.

There were some beautiful moments in between rain/hail squalls, but mostly we had 15-25 MPH winds and 6-10 foot choppy seas. Not totally unsafe, but definitely wet, cold and uncomfortable.

Ron and I fished down the frontside of the SCI. Stoked to have caught some decent ones, and to arrive back safely. We scraped out 14.97 pounds on day 2. Not too bad considering the conditions!

We made our way home as the sun set on a very stormy day. The Catalina Channel was just as bad, if not worse than the San Clemente Channel, and we were thoroughly soaked and shivering when we got back to Huntington Harbor, but we were happy and thanking God for getting back home to our families safely.

We finished the tournament with a personal best 35.46 pounds that landed us in 9th place overall. We are so thankful to God and to our families for allowing us to fish these events.
We also thank our sponsors: Carne de Theresa, KelpKritter Baits, and Tenacious Baits for their generous support of team. Brant, Dave, and Kevin, your friendship and support is priceless!! THANK YOU!!!