Photo courtesy West Palm Beach Fishing Club
First Place Most Releases Overall: Miss Texas
Second Place: Priceless
Third Place: Doing It All/Hardway
A total of 153 captains around the world scored at least 100 points in one of the 95 ITB-sanctioned events held in 2020. Consisting of five divisions— Florida, Hawaii, International, Gulf of Mexico and East Coast—InTheBite’s Captain of the Year Cup is one of the most prestigious awards in sportfishing, becoming more globally recognized as the sport continues to expand its reach.
Champagne Lady. Photo courtesy Fish Heads of Stuart “The Quickie”
Fish Heads of Stuart “The Quickie”
First Place Contagious team. Photo courtesy Tim Rahn Photography
Monday, Dec. 7, 2020, Islamorada Sailfish Tournament—The 57th Annual Islamorada Sailfish Tournament kicked off at the Whale Harbor seafood buffet all with social distancing and covid restrictions in place. The sailfish action started on Friday morning and continued over the next two days concluding on December 6th.
Captain Brian Cone aboard his charter boat Contagious led anglers Mark Mitchell and Kenneth Padgett both from Charleston, NC, Travis Bennett and Andy Cone from Tavernier, FL and Greg Tolpin from Key Largo, FL to the winner’s circle with a total of 11 sailfish releases. The team took home beautiful sailfish sculptures sponsored by Caribee Boat Sales and Yamaha Outboards along with a check for $42,390.00. Over the three days of fishing 90 sailfish were released out of 103 called in hookups with over $90,000.00 paid to the winners.
We caught up with Kona’s Capt. Shane O’Brien, who placed first in this year’s Captain of the Year Hawaii Division, to talk about the past year and how he got to where he is today. O’Brien ended the Hawaii Division with 2150 points.
Tournament Wins:
The Shoe team celebrates their win. Photo courtesy Gary Graham
Bisbee’s, Oct. 27, 2020—The three Bisbee family tournaments wrapped up another record-breaking year as all three 2020 events offered from $1 million to over $4 million while conforming with Government-dictated COVID-19 protocols in Cabo San Lucas.
Photo courtesy Peter Tyson
By Rachel Chesnes
Last year’s Pelican Yacht Club Invitational Billfish Tournament was one for the books. The fleet of 30 boats caught and released a tournament record 969 sailfish in three out of four fishing days. The event also set records for the daily total boat catch and daily fleet catch of 712.
Photo courtesy Leonard Bryant
