July 29, 2011 – Hawaiian International Billfish Tournament

It’s been sometime that I’ve posted a report because I’ve been fishing the 2011 HIBT on board the Foxy Lady with Capt. Boyd Decoito and Sam Choy Jr.  This is a light tackle tournament which means we fished with 50lb and 80lb outfits – light for Kona waters.  On Monday July 25th we had a nice fish over 350lbs eat the short rigger bait on 50lb.  It sedemed like we had good hooks in her as she peeled off several hundred yards of line.  Unfortunately, the angler made the mistake of pushing the drag all the way up and we broke her off on the run.  Soon after we caught a small short nose spearfish on 50lb line.  The remainder of the day was extremely frustrating as we missed the next 4 blue marlin.  Day 2, we tagged a small blue marlin on 50lb and missed a short nose spearfish.  Day 3, was our day and we had high hopes for better days ahead.  In the morning we had a big blue marlin over 700lbs eat the short rigger on 50lb line.  Everything went well as the fish screamed out line and the angler backed off the drag to survive the run and jumps.  Unfortunately, we had about 300 yards of line out and the fish came up jumping alongside the boat creating a huge belly and we quickly broke another nice fish off.  We would end Day 3 with only one short nose spearfish.  Day 4 we struggled to get as bite.  The current had been constantly changing and there was a flurry of sporadic bites north of us.  On the last day we needed to kill a big fish or tag a bunch of small blues on 50lb line.  We would end Day 5 with only one blue marlin.  Over all, there were good numbers of fish caught in the 2011 HIBT.  Most boats caught fish everyday with a lot of missed