Due to drama w/our tow vehicle the "Striper" was stuck in Ensenada so Friday Steve & Ken brought down the "Little Striper" to fish the halibut division in the W.O.N. tournament. Early Fri. morning I drove down to Paradise Point to meet Capt. Ron Atwood, Tom Pak & Mike to Pre-fish with them. They were planning on heading to the Butterfly but I brought some info that pointed us towards the 390 in perfect conditions. The jigs were in about 10 min. when the B/P Yozuri & Cedar plug stopped us. I hooked up on the slide using a 4" Prizm Purple Big Hammer on a 1.5 oz silver Fishco head. Everyone got a baitfish or 2 with the sm. sardines getting bit better than the large ones. Ron pointed the boat west looking for some fish bigger than 20 lbs. We came across a few paddies & 2 of them were loaded w/sm yellows that we left biting. Tired of the lull we headed back to our previous area where we found a couple of boats all stopped. We slid in & started chumming the tiny sardines/anchovies. That started a plunker bite that we fished (releasing smaller fish) until we were plugged & tired.

Tournament day Josh, Steve & Ken on the "Little Striper" started fishing the wrecks in front of the harbor for a steady bite on sm. sand bass mostly on the 5" Silver Sardine Big Hammer. Our next spot was around La Jolla Canyon & the Torrey Pines Reef. We spent most of our time in this area along with a bunch of other boats fishing the halibut division for a few shorts & a shovelnose. A decision was made to work the inside of the kelpline back down around the point. With 2 hrs left I finally hooked a decent fish on lg. sardine that ended up @ 8lbs., which was second largest halibut of the tourney. We kept drifting this sm. sandy area in 20 ft. for raked baits & missed bites each drift. Once we drifted onto the hard bottom the slime sticks would take over. I landed a 24" on the Silver Sardine Big Hammer & Steve lost what looked to be a very good fish before we had go get back. First place was around 23 lbs. w/4 fish. The big fish was a 14 pounder also making second place w/1 fish. My 12lbs. was 3rd place. We also had 10 lbs. w/4 sandbass but it took 14 lbs to get 2nd. Ron & crew on "WitchCraft" came in with 40 something odd pounds of yellowtail & won the class by 10 lbs. He also took big yellowtail with a 16 pounder caught on a paddie between the 60 mi. bank & 390.