thumb fishing tourney
The 15th consecutive running of this event at the Clube Nautico da Ilha de Luanda in February 2014 started with great expectations as the previous weeks had seen outstanding fishing. There had been really excellent water quality with plenty of sailfish and blue marlin.
25 teams entered the three day event which was split over two weekends, but when the boats ventured out offshore for the first day the water quality had deteriorated drastically in just 4 days. The water was murky green and the fishing did not look promising at all. However, the billfish were still there in the dirty water and by the end of the first day 15 sailfish and a blue marlin had been released which was a big surprise.
Leading after the first day were four teams with two sailfish each, Team Nautico with 950 points, Talassa with 925,50 points, Tubarões Fishing Team with 924.6 points and Docevela with 900 points. Dorado deciding their postions.
On the 2nd day the fishing got worse as did the water quality and only three sailfish and two blue marlin were released by the 25 teams. Team Calulo shot into a commanding lead by tagging a blue marlin and a aailfish to get a slam and a bonus of 800 points for a total of 2,828.2 points with one day to go. Marlinheiros tagged a blue marlin to go into 2nd place with 1650 points followed by Tubarões Fishing Team with 951.9 points. The next weekend’s final day would decide the winner but with conditions like that Team Calulo were sitting in a very comfortable position!
The final Saturday again did not look promising as the water quality was still bad but some teams found clean green water and quite a few tuna were caught. However, only four sailfish were tagged although a few marlin were lost. Team Calulo increased their lead even more with another sailfish and could have had a 2nd slam but lost a marlin in the morning. Team Unitel tagged another sailfish to add to their dorados and snatched 3rd place with 1.072,30 points from Tubarões Fishing Team. Marlinheiros had a blank but managed to maintain 2ndplace with 1650 points but were well behind the runaway winners Team Calulo who amassed a total of 3.278,20 points for an impressive victory.
Marco Queiroz from Team Calulo has been to the OWC before in Cabo San Lucas and is looking forward to taking his team to Costa Rica in 2015.
