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Subject: "The Super Bowl of Calico Bass Fishing SWBA COC 2010" Previous topic | Next topic
bowlboyWed Jan-13-10 08:49 PM
Member since Apr 12th 2002
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#14742, "The Super Bowl of Calico Bass Fishing SWBA COC 2010"


  

          

I fished the second annual Salt Water Bass Anglers “California Offshore Challenge” Saturday and Sunday, Jan 9 and 10. It’s a 2 day, 2 man team Calico Bass tournament that launches out of Two Harbors at Catalina Island. It’s artificial only, best 5 bass for the team weighed alive and released (5 alive). My team mate was Shimano prostaffer and fellow Big Hammer prostaffer Jon Kuch.

We ran over Friday afternoon in awesome conditions. There was a predicted big swell due Saturday and Sunday and we had a couple of the fore runners of the swell lift the boat even on Friday. Fortunately there was light winds for the most part all weekend and the swell that got HUGE was still doable in a skiff.

Saturday up at 2:30 to get ready for a 4:00 AM start. It’s pretty awesome to see that many killer skiffs all lined up and ready to go. We had prefished twice for the event once at San Clemente Island and once at SBI. We had similar sized bags out of both. With the big swell, SCI was our call and we made the crossing in the dark after running up around the West end of Catalina.

Our first spot was in tight which was sketchy with the big swell, especially in the dark. When we pulled in very cautiously, all of the water was solid foam. I was wondering if there were sets big enough to close out the whole bay, so we sat in the dark just listening to thundering sets on the point. You could feel the rumble in your chest. When it finally started thinking about getting light, we moved in to our zone.

It was on right away with both of us getting fish. Jon was on fire however with the Big Hammer swimbaits and put several fish in the well. I was catching fish but they were smaller models on swimbaits and cranks. I think about the second run through our zone Jon gets a big bite. He sticks this thing and is bent hard. I go for the net and we scoop a 6.64 pounder. Oh Yeah! High fives on that one. We’ve got 5 in the tank including a biggy and we finally cull a fish or 2. The tide was going out and that spot died off so we ran to spot two for the afternoon bite.

We pull up on spot two and there is an otter reef putting up solid 10+ sets but our spot was still fishable. As I look around I see that the kelp is all laid down with a nice uphill current. Man we should be catching fish here.

While John was on fire in the morning, it was my turn in the afternoon. I was tossing 5.5 and 6.5 Big Hammers on 1.5 ounce Hammer Heads. Most of the fish came on redrum, Christmas tree and clear red. I was using Pro-cure Krill gel and Jon was using Calico Cocktail. We got in to a steady bite and I was able to put several good fish in the well including a cull for over a pound near the end of the day. I was fishing straight tied P-Line Spectrex braid in 50 and 65 pound. Just toss out that hammer down current. Let it drift back into that laid down kelp and get ripped on the drop. Really fun fishing. Weigh in on day 1 was 4:00 PM and I allowed 2 hours for the approximately 50 mile run back.

At the weigh in, everybody is trying to get a feel for the bags coming in. You see some weigh bags that are obviously smaller but then there are some that are bulging. Some teams with two bags! We got called into the pier to weigh and put 22.07 pounds (4.14 avg.) for 5 fish in the basket including the 6.62. Big fish money for day 1 was $1,000 and as it turns out our fish ended up being the second biggest fish for the day by only .14. DOH! We got ours at about 7:00 AM and team Kill Switch gets there 6.76 at 3:00 PM just before they had to leave for the weigh in. Jons fish ended up being the second biggest for the whole tournament. It’s the second year in a row that we have had the second biggest fish for the tournament, I had a 7.03 last year that got beat out by like a 7.4. Nobody remembers second place except the guy that gets it.

At the end of day 1 we were in 4th place. In fact Big Hammer teams had the top four places with team Oh Son in first with over 24 pounds and team Salty Balls in second, team PU Fishing in third and my team RedRum in fourth all with 22+ pounds. Were only 2 pounds out of first and feeling good.

Up at 2:30 AM Sunday morning and do it all over again. Except the swell has come up another 2 feet over night and there is some wind but it’s still pretty light. We decided to stick with our pran, always stick with the pran, and hopefully put up another good bag. Our first spot is pretty torn up from the bigger swell. We start working around and put a few small fish in the tank. Once again Jon gets a big bite. I’m on the net and the fish is in the kelp. Unfortunately Jon breaks it off trying to get it out. He said it felt bigger then the day 1 fish. We had a small limit and bugged out for spot 2. Spot two now has 12+ footers coming in once in a while. When we arrive and there is no current and we are on a pick bite of smaller grade fish. Unfortunately our current never showed. We were culling on the balance beam which just doesn’t cut it in one of these events. With about an hour left we had JT from Inside Sport fishing hop on the boat to film. We caught about 15 fish while he was on board. We pulled in even tighter and got into a little flury with about 30 minutes to go with 4 or 5 culls, including a good one when I put on our big fish for the day a 4.11. Hopefully we’ll get a little screen time on the show. It was fun fishing and if we had another hour, who knows. But we had a 2:000 PM weigh in to get to and it’s 12:45, with a big swell and now some more wind. We still made it with like 10 minutes to spare but we ran flat out at least half the way back.

We weighed 13.33 for day two with the 4.11 big fish. Not enough to get it done. We ended up in 8th place overall which I am very proud of. Anytime I can put up a top 10 in any SWBA event against all of those hired guns, I am stoked. The competition is very tough and you really can’t stumble at all if you want to win an event. Just putting together a 1 day bag that competes against the field is tough put doing it 2 days in a row is crazy.

Congratulations to team PU fishing that won the event with 43.83 pounds for 2 days. They took home $3,000 for first. Second was team Salty Balls for $2,000 and team Perros Viejos that came from down the list to take third and $1,000. It was awesome to have Big Hammer teams take first and second and we had 4 teams in the top eight.

I would like to thank Big Hammer, Shimano, Pro-cure, P-Line, Albackore, Fishworks, Aftco Blue Fever, Pro-mar and Tackle Warehouse for there generous support of my team.

We have the Wall Banger coming up on January 23. We won it last year and intend to return and defend our title. Then Feb. 6 is round 1 of the SWBA “Race for the Cup Series” that starts in Long Beach and has events in Mission Bay, Dana Point, Marina Del Rey, Santa Barbara and Newport Bay during the year.

Bryan

See the final results here:
http://www.saltwaterbassanglers.com/2010cocweighin.htm

Photos here:
http://www.saltwaterbassanglers.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=2905

You can watch 3 episodes of Inside Sport fishing from last years Offshore Challenge at:
www.insidesportfishing.com

http://i278.photobucket.com/albums/kk99/jtfishjunky/SWBACOCC1/COCC%202%202010/SWBACOCC%202010/COCC2010026.jpg
http://i278.photobucket.com/albums/kk99/jtfishjunky/SWBACOCC1/COCC%202%202010/SWBACOCC%202010/COCC2010123.jpg
http://i278.photobucket.com/albums/kk99/jtfishjunky/SWBACOCC1/COCC%202%202010/SWBACOCC%202010/COCC2010140.jpg
http://i278.photobucket.com/albums/kk99/jtfishjunky/SWBACOCC1/COCC%202%202010/SWBACOCC%202010/COCC2010144.jpg
http://i278.photobucket.com/albums/kk99/jtfishjunky/SWBACOCC1/COCC%202%202010/SWBACOCC%202010/COCC2010150.jpg

  

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fishtraxWed Jan-13-10 08:59 PM
Member since Jan 15th 2002
169 posts
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#14743, "RE: The Super Bowl of Calico Bass Fishing SWBA COC 2010"
In response to Reply # 0


  

          

SUPER SICK REPORT CONGRATS ON THE TOP 10.

fishtrax_65

  

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Team StriperThu Jan-14-10 04:41 PM
Member since Oct 21st 2001
346 posts
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#14744, "RE: The Super Bowl of Calico Bass Fishing SWBA COC 2010"
In response to Reply # 1


  

          

What a killer tourney, way to much fun.
Nice Showing, fun when it's tight like that.
2 day format def. takes it to the next level.





  

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