With our Texas tournament season upon us, I believe everyone will be more than happy to get back to attending the normal events with all of the festivities, dinners and award ceremonies that come along with them. Unfortunately, last year with all of the uncertainties and regulations surrounding large gatherings and social distancing we werent allowed to have these functions that many considered a significant part of the big game tournament experience. We had quite a few teams that backed out of events last summer for this very reason. Many of us primarily focus on the fishing, the competition and just getting out on the water with friends and family, but it always great to hang out and catch up with other teams that you sometimes only see at these functions once a year, not to mention it also much nicer to have an awards ceremony to attend afterwards if you happen to win. The annual Lone Star Shootout in Port OConnor, July 20-25, which is the first stop in the Texas Triple Crown Billfish Series, has already come and gone with team Quantified and Capt. Justin Drummond taking first followed by Tenacious with Capt. Vincent Campia and Vamanos with Capt. Monte Love. Next is the Texas International Fishing Tournament July 28-Aug 1 out of South Padre Island. The series ends with Texas Legends Billfish Tournament August 4-8 in Port Aransas. [% oiopub-banner-24-center %] Recently, the awards ceremony for the inaugural 2020 Texas Triple Crown Billfish Series was held at Grumble Seafood Company at Fisherman Wharf in Port Aransas. Congratulations to grand champion Smooth Move, along with third place winner Walk West. On the Draggin Up we were fortunate to take second place. Special thanks to owner Chris Huele and our hard-working crew for putting together another season to remember. If they werent so passionate about sportfishing we wouldnt be out there doing what were doing. This time last year we were already experiencing some remarkable pre-season fishing on the Gulf Coast. We not only had some great blue marlin reports coming in, but we also had some record catches of bluefin tuna that were caught or released by the Texas fleet. Unfortunately for many of us this year the weather only allowed a few short windows in April and May. The few boats that did take advantage of these openings were not disappointed and scored some big tuna and early release points for the leaderboard in the Houston Big Game Fishing Club annual tournament. From what we have seen it is looking like the sargassum weed is going to be nasty in the Gulf this season as we have been getting some discouraging reports from offshore, and our beaches are already covered with it. We were pretty fortunate last year to not have much of it to deal with while fishing, but it looks to be back. Hopefully it will start to dissipate a bit before summer and we start experiencing some decent weather soon as well.
