Sunshine Coast Game Fishing Classic 2010

The weather gods smiled on the Sunshine Coast Game Fishing Classic held on the 4th to the 7th of February by blessing it with a small window of good weather.

41 Boats and 154 anglers eagerly took to the water for the first day of fishing with a handful of boats heading out to the heavy tackle grounds while the majority headed to a few of the tried and proven light tackle areas.

Day one quickly showed that light tackle was the right choice with only one striped marlin tagged and one blue marlin tagged heavy tackle for the day but with 39 Black Marlin tagged light tackle.

At the end of day one Reel Capture, Shamwari, Scalded, and Blu Reela  were tied for the lead with six Black Marlin each.

Day two produced very similar results with two Blue Marlin tagged heavy tackle and 37 Black Marlin tagged in the light tackle zone.

Sched results for the two days of fishing were 246 strikes, 196 hook ups, 80 tagged and 22 captures. The tagged fish consisted of 76 Black Marlin, 3 Blue Marlin and 1 Striped Marlin.

Competition was tight right down to the wire with only hours to go three boats (Reel Capture, Shamwari and Scalded) were tied with 8 tagged Black Marlin a piece. Peter Matthews 32’ Cabo Shamwari secured their ninth fish late in the afternoon of day two winning them the tournament and the invitation to fish the IGFA World Offshore Championship in Cabo San Lucas in 2011.

Peter Matthews and his crew, Barry Higgins and brothers Jay and Tim Graham are looking forward to representing the Sunshine Coast Game Fishing Club next year.

The lucky angler draw consisted of 80 prizes and proved to be very lucky for 16 year old Lachlan Tuckwell who won the top prize of a Horizen boat, outboard and trailer package after the first angler drawn wasn’t present to claim the prize. Lachlan has appropriately named his new boat Redraw.