The Emerald Coast Fishing team of Brant Peacher and Jeff Russell made the top ten in the IFA professional redfish tournament in Destin Florida this past weekend weighing in 11.3lbs. But, we were not the only local team to have success. Captain Brad King with South Again Fishing charters also had a great finish weighing in a two fish bag of 11.6lbs. Both teams did a great Job representing Pensacola! The winning team was the Panama City team of Jake Matney and Joey Sostheim with a monster bag of 13.9lbs!
The IFA gulf coast division makes stops in Destin, Panama City, and Orange Beach Alabama. The top teams from every division will then compete in a two day tournament of champions in Louisiana to see who will be crowned redfish champions of 2011. We are very happy to make the top ten in our first event this year. This will allow us to make a good run at team of the year provided that we have a good finish in the Panama City event. Panama City is the only event we are concerned about since we are not very familiar with those waters.
For our team…. the fishing day started out very tough. We ran 70 miles one way to a spot which had been holding good fish all week. Unfortunately, when we arrived, all of the water was gone and the fish had left. We knew that with an incoming tide it wouldn't be long before the water started pushing bait and fish back into our spot. We decided to wait it out and the decision paid off! After a couple hrs of waiting I boated the first fish which was a 25in 5lb fish. Not a giant fish like we had been catching all week but definitely a respectable one. Not long after, Jeff boated a big fish but it ended up measuring just a hair over the 27in mark so we had to release him. That was a heartbreaker! Since we made such a long run we were pressed for time and only had about 45 minutes left to fish, with only one fish in the livewell. I knew that if we remained patient we would get another good bite. I was right! With 5 minutes of fishing time left I hung what I knew was a very nice fish. I told Jeff to grab the net and about 30 seconds later we netted a fat 25 in redfish that weighed 6.3lbs! That fish definitely made the 70 mile run back to Destin much easier. We could now breath easy knowing we were heading back to the scales with a top ten finish!
Thanks to the IFA for putting on another great event! See everyone in Panama City
Stay tuned for future reports
Capt Brant
www.fishtheemeraldcoast.com
