Of the 176 qualifying teams that competed in the Southern Kingfish Association National Championship, hosted in Fort Pierce, Florida, two teams from Palm Beach County, Florida made their way to the winners’ circle. Captain Steve Sprague of Team Tuppens used his Garmin electronics with SiriusXM® Marine weather to make a last-minute change to his game plan. “This time of year, the big kingfish should be north of Fort Pierce off Cape Canaveral, so our original plan was to head there,” said Sprague. “I saw on my Garmin chart plotter that cooler water had moved in south near Jupiter, so we decided to head down there until the water temperature came up a little. That’s where we caught a big 62.33-pound kingfish.”
It was quite the adrenaline rush for the entire team when they hooked into that king, which held to be the largest fish of the tournament. “That big kingfish ate a live blue runner. Angler Ryan Rowe was on the reel and the fight ensued. The fish came to the boat very quickly and we could see exactly why! There was a big shark after him, and we knew that if the shark took one bite, the fish wouldn’t count. Luckily, the king ran to the other side of the boat and Billy Brodbeck somehow managed to gaff the fish before the shark ate him. We were all screaming with excitement!”
Heading into day two, Team Tuppens had a solid lead, but they couldn’t let off the gas. “On the second day, we knew we would need at least a 15-pound kingfish to have any hopes of staying at the top of the leaderboard,” said Sprague. “We were seven hours into the day and hadn’t had a bite. All of us were going through moments of depression and disbelief that we were so close and probably not going to win. We decided to pick up and go even further south. By this time, we were more than 50 miles south of Fort Pierce. No sooner did we get our baits in the water, and the reel started screaming! We knew it was a good one, but the challenge is always getting it in the boat so we don’t get sharked. Jason Phillips was on the reel and Billy on the gaff. I ran the boat right on top of the fish and Billy reached out with the gaff and a 37-pound king hit the deck! At that moment, we knew we had won the tournament.”
“It was the most exciting week of fishing we’ve ever had. We were competing against some of the best fishermen in the country and for us to come in first was an incredible feeling. The stars lined up just right for our team!” said Sprague.
Fishing on Spiced Rum III for Nationals was Captain Bill Wummer, Sherri Beswick, Wayne Beswick, Freddie Joseph, Vincent Molle, Don Lamb. They began day one at the Loran Tower with a very slow bite, but caught a 15.15 lb. king on a ribbon fish. After day one they were sitting in 37th place. Bill told his crew they were only 15lbs out of 5th and anything could happen. The second day the bite again was very slow. They had a bite early and lost it and a couple bonita. Around 1:30pm in the afternoon Bill ran inside the boats about 2 miles off Juno and they got a bite on the long blue runner. The rod screamed and they knew it was a good fish.
When the fish passed the boat, they saw a shark chasing it. Wayne was on the rod and Sherri sent out a blue runner and started enticing the shark to keep it away from the kingfish. They gaffed the fish and were very excited and yelling. They talked with Team Tuppen’s and learned about their 37lb king so they agreed to run back and weigh in together. When they went to the scales, their fish weighed 44.70lbs which gave them a total of 59.85lbs; 4th place with a total winnings of over $38,000 dollars in cash and prizes.
Spiced Rum III team also won Division 10 and Top Lady Angler. Team Tuppen’s Christopher Sprague was awarded Junior Angler.