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MATER HEAD TOP SKA TEAM AT TOPSAIL... Race for Division 1 Tightens Up! by Captain Barrett McMullan

More times than not in years past the words "North Carolina kingfish tournament" were followed closely by phrases like "small craft warning" or "deteriorating conditions". Hopefully this will not jinx us, but the 2005 season up to this point in North Carolina has been the exact opposite. The weather has been as stable and stagnant as anyone can remember for most of this summer. As the season progressed the water temperatures have increased gradually with reports of water temperatures into the low 90's. With this extremely hot air and water temperature king mackerel fishing has been spotty. Peak feeding times have been occurring around the cooler parts of the day either early or late. Another trend that seems to be taking place is that most of the larger fish that are caught during the hottest part of the day are being caught in deeper water. These tendencies were further verified in this year's Topsail Offshore Fishing Club's King Mackerel Tournament. Each of the SKA's top two teams for this event caught their fish under conditions described above.

Like the weather conditions, when asked how the tournament day went, Captain Mark Yokeley said, "smooth." Mark was joined for this particular fishing adventure by Jerry Gibson and Lee Ball aboard Mark's new 34' Yellowfin Mater Head. Mark has been fishing 10 to 15 kingfish tournaments a year out of the Morehead City area for the past 15 years and also fishes on a friend's boat in the SKA Pros. His vast experience in tournament fishing and abundance of local knowledge certainly did not hinder Mark and the Mater Head crew in their search for a smoker kingfish in this event. On tournament morning the crew awoke to light winds and slight seas. The first move of the day was over to Harker's Island where they captured bait before the light of day even broke. Fresh pogies filled the livewell prompting the team to head for the fishing grounds. The first thought was to give the East Rock at Cape Lookout shoals a shot, but when the spot came into view they could see about 20 other boats had the same idea. Instead of fishing in the pack Mark made the call to keep heading north towards the 1700 Rock, which had produced fish in the last tournament for other teams. No sooner did lines hit the water than kingfish started eating pogies. In the next hour or so the crew weeded through 12-pounders hoping to pull that one hog out of the bunch. At 8:30 a.m. with temperatures still relatively cool compared to the rest of the day their opportunity came. A single pogy on the long top line became breakfast for a sluggish but healthy king mackerel. This fish apparently didn't read the manual on how a kingfish is supposed to fight because according to Mark it never made a big run and stayed deep for most of the fight. Lee Ball was on the rod unsure of what he was doing battle with, but staying focused nonetheless. After about 25 minutes the fish had worn itself out and surfaced. The crew was slightly shocked at first to see that it was in fact a king mackerel and even better it was a big king mackerel. Mark handled gaffing duties and successfully put the old lethargic stud kingfish in the boat. This tournament has typically been one that produces numerous quality kingfish and for this reason Mark and crew opted to stick it out and put in a full day. At 3:00 nothing better had hit the deck so they decided to head for the weigh-in unsure of what their fish would do. At the scales their fish pushed down a respectable 32.40 pounds. A good fish but certainly not a tournament winner. At least that's what they thought. As each boat that had fish to weigh came to the scales it became more and more clear that the Mater Head's fish was looking better and better. When the last boat had weighed, their 32.40-pounder stood up for a second place overall finish in the event and first place among SKA contestants. It doesn't always take a super stud kingfish to put you at the top. Occasionally the biggest small fish will do the job.

The SKA's second best team at Topsail took home fourth place honors in the event and was also the SKA's top Class of 23' team. William Gardner and Ken Hudson are seasoned kingfish tournament anglers having fished various Divisions up and down the east coast. William's 23' KenCraft, Hammer Head, was having engine work done during the Topsail event, which put the team into another 23-footer, Bad to the Bone. The game plan was formed largely due to the previous weekend's experience in the Snead's Ferry event. In that tournament the team elected to stay close to the beach fishing between Bogue and Bear inlet hoping to catch that one monster loner fish. They did not catch the fish, but according to William they made eye contact with the winner that somehow escaped their spread of baits. For this event fresh pogies were collected near Island Harbor and it was off to the same area as the week before. Unfortunately upon arrival to the shallow water spot the conditions had changed dramatically. Poor water clarity and a lack of bait left William and Ken questioning their plan. Very little time passed before they realized they needed to head for deeper water. Around noon the team found themselves in 70 feet of water trolling the Alphabet buoys off of Bogue inlet. Just before a feeding was about to take place aboard the boat a hungry kingfish decided to grab an early lunch from behind this team's boat. A single pogy on the long top line was the victim. William did the angling and Ken was the gaff man. A short battled ensued and like they had done many times before the mossy back kingfish was safely secured in the fish bag and made ready for a trip to the scales. A 29.26-pounder was the result, which put this team in position to make a run for the Class of 23' crown in Division 1.