mp_nz sports
This year we had 235 anglers fishing from 66 boats compared to 197 anglers and 54 boats last year. The sea conditions were challenging to say the least and it was a great effort on behalf on many of the boaties to get out on the water every day for eight days. The stripies were more abundant than the blues. There were lots of ‘touches’, ‘shots’ and plenty of fish lost, some very close to the boat.
Over the eight days the club tagged 23 striped marlin and weighed six blue marlin, five were weighed and two tagged.
Two black marlin were weighed, 27 skipjack weighed, five snapper, one kingi, six dolphini, 1 shortbill spearfish.
The prize giving was a lot of fun as usual with a huge crowd packed into the club and on the deck.
The speakers who were chosen to make speeches to explain why they hadn’t managed to earn any points for the club were Ed Parkinson (Shady Lady), Simon Spence (Hard Yakka), Darrin Spillane (Sidewinder), Pete Williams (Po-Cha) and Jono Gavey (Fishy Dreams).
The judges are taken from the previous winners, which were: Gerald Kemp, Ian Philpott, Rob Morris, Mark Gemmell and Mark Cross.
After the judges had conferred, they decided that the most deserving winner was Darrin Spillane. Last year’s winner, Gerald Kemp presented him with the trophy and the lovely immunity amulet.
The sweepstake was won by Mawhai with their 140kg fish. There were bigger fish weighed but the skippers had not entered the sweep. Next year the sweep will be changed to include tagged fish and a points system used to discourage the killing of fish.
The Top Boat Trophy was won by Kairos with three tagged marlin (450 each) and one mako (100) (All points earned are counted for our club trophy.)
The Top Waihau Boat as awarded by the Sport Fishing Council was Mawhai, as they only count the top scoring fish of each of the Nationals species.
The Heaviest Marlin Trophy was taken by Greg Lamb fishing from his boat Blue Leda. It weighed 208.4 kgs. Well done Greg and Floyd.
The Shearwater Trophy for the most marlin tagged went to Kairos . Reel Busy and B-Caus each tagged two marlin.
The winner of the invitation to the IGFA World Championship in Costa Rica was won by the team on Kairos. Martin Askes, Neil Philpott and Lloyd Smyth have very happily accepted the invitation and will be fishing in Costa Rica in 2015. Martin said that they managed to land only the three fish out of nine that they had on.
The Horse’s “Rear End” Trophy went to Ballistic and Hamish Kemp who managed to pop the trailer (with the boat on) off at the boat ramp.
Other contenders were the Hawke Eye team, who managed to tow a hookless lure all day after having a hit and not checking the gear.
Four subscriptions to www.seasurface.co.nz were given to NZSFC to draw out of all the anglers entered in the Nationals. Waihau Bay was lucky enough to win two out of the four. They went to Jock Brown and Catherine Warnest.
There were some outstanding catches during the week. Nerina Hermanson had an incredible week, tagging two stripies and landing a black marlin after a long fight. (unfortunately one fish was not allowed for Nationals results due to a non- approved tag being used). Her sister Emily came with the only broadbill caught nationwide for the Nationals and has since offered to donate a new trophy for the broadbill section to Council.
Some great skipjack tuna were caught on light line. Ethan Cook, one of the juniors, caught a 10kg dolphin. The best of the snapper was a 8.5kg fish landed on 10kg by Nathan Brooking.
Waihau Bay finished up as follows:
1st Team Champions Broadbill Motutere Magic
1st= Team Champion Shortbill Stumpy
NZ Champion Angler (single fish) Broadbill Emily Hermanson
Champion line weight angler Broadbill Emily Hermanson
Tag and release blue marlin Dean O’Connor and Ben Tette I each
Tag and release Spearfish Marcus Chadwick (1)
NZ Junior Champions mahimahi 2nd Ethan Cook
(This is a new junior record for the club)
1st Fly Fishing Section Skipjack on 10kg Steve Lee 2.992
1st Interclub Blue and black marlin Waihau Bay
1st Interclub Broadbill Waihau Bay
1st= Interclub Spearfish Waihau Bay
3rd Interclub Yellowtail Waihau Bay
The full results can be found at www.nzsportfishing.co.nz
