TEAM GALATI
GOES WIRE-TO-WIRE IN COSTA RICA The 2021 event also decided the winners from last season
With nearly a half-million dollars on the line going into the third and final leg of the 2021 Los Sueños Signature Triple Crown, the pressure was on each team to bring their A game.
This year, 28 of the 39 participating teams were fishing two tournaments in one: Those teams participated in the 2020 Triple Crown and, since the third leg was canceled due to COVID-19, they were also fishing to determine the top three places for Leg Three as well as the 2020 Series Champion Team, in addition
to the winner of Leg Three for 2021 and 2021 Series Champions. The stakes were incredibly high and the tension was palpable in the humid Costa Rican air.
Outage had finished the second leg of the 2020 series in the lead with 8,400 points, just 400 points ahead of Tarheel for Series Champion. Team Galati was in third overall with 7,500 points. For the 2021 Series Championship, Fish Tank was in first after the second leg with 9,700 points, followed by Team Galati with 9,100 points and Grand Slam with 9,000 points. It was anyone’s game to win or lose at this point.
The event kicked off with the third round of the popular Ladies Only Tournament, a one-day shootout held prior to the start of each leg. D.A. Sea topped the leaderboard after the three individual tournaments with 5,400 points, followed by Uno Mas in second with 4,500 points, and in third with 4,400 points was Max Bet. Kelly Weber of Max Bet was the top angler, scoring 2,200 of her team’s total points, releasing 12 sailfish and two marlin over the three legs.
In a telling sign of things to come,
Team Galati released two doubleheaders in the last seven minutes of Day One to earn the daily with 2,400 points, followed by Pura Vida with 2,100 points and
Dealer’s Choice with 1,900 points. A total of 311 sails and 18 marlin were released on Day One—not a red-hot, wide-open bite but definitely enough to keep things competitive for the fleet.
Day Two started off with a flurry of marlin, with nine of the 500-point fish released in the first hour of fishing. By the call for lines out at 4 p.m., Team Galati once again found themselves at the top of the leaderboard with 4,500 points, followed by Tarheel with 3,700, besting Eight Eights on time. A total of 350 additional sails and 22 marlin were released on Day Two.
Going into the third and final day, Team Galati had already tallied 13,600 points over three legs and secured a 1,700-point lead over Fish Tank for the 2021 Series Championship. No surprise here: Team Galati finished in first place for Leg Three, with a final count of 54 sails and two marlin for 6,400 points, followed by Eight Eights with a three-day total of 25 sails and five marlin for 5,000 points, and Dragin Fly rounding out the top three with 38 sailfish and two marlin for 4,800 points.
Each day, the tournament added the final scores for that day to the tally for the third leg of the 2020 Series, as well as
the tally for the 2020 Series Championship. After Day One, Team Galati was in first for the leg with their 2,400 points and was already 100 points ahead of Outage
in the Series Championship. After Day Two, they pulled ahead even further with a total of 12,000 points, over Tarheel in second with 11,700 points, followed by Outage in third with 10,700 points. At the end of the tournament on Day Three, Team Galati earned 6,400 points for the leg and finished first over Dragin Fly in second with 4,800 points, and Tarheel
in third with 4,700 points. Team Galati
amassed a total of 13,900 points for the 2020 Signature Triple Crown, outpacing Tarheel’s 12,700 points, and Outage’s
12,000 points. It was an incredible display of fishing performance by one of the sport’s most competitive teams, and a well-deserved victory.
But the drama doesn’t end there. Fishing with Brooks Smith aboard Uno Mas, Maria Magalhaes was named the top overall angler for the 2021 series, as well as the top lady angler. Magalhaes released 18 sailfish and five marlin during this year’s series, which marked the first time in the event’s history that a female has won the overall angler title.
NATIVE SON TOPS SAILFISH CHALLENGE Multiple inlets mean a wider boundary
The second leg of the Quest for the Crest series yielded good fishing and tight competition this year, with 193 sailfish released by the 64-boat fleet and a tournament record payout of $255,340.
The three-inlet format allowed boats to fish in a wider boundary, which worked well for several teams, including Weez in the Keys. They fished south toward their home waters off Miami and released six sailfish, enough to secure them first place on Day One and take home the dailies for a $62,235 opening payday. The team ultimately finished in second place overall and also won the charity jackpot, which supports ongoing relief efforts in the
Bahamas, for a grand total of $130,995. Rounding out the top three was The Edge with eight sailfish releases. The Texasbased team had a surge on Day Two to bring home $29,720.
However, it was Native Son who hooked up to a last-minute doubleheader just shy of the 4 p.m. call for lines out on Saturday, which sent Capt. Art Sapp and his crew over the top to earn the title of 2021 Sailfish Challenge Champions. Their 13 releases won them $255,340, the highest earnings ever for a first-place team in the Sailfish Challenge. Sapp proved that it’s the captain rather than the boat that makes the difference in success on the water. On the first day, the team fished aboard their 39-foot SeaVee, and switched it up the following day to the owner’s larger sport-fisher due to the change in weather. The debate over which boat is better obviously comes down to personal preference, but Sapp and company showed that skill is what earns you a spot in the winner’s circle.
RECORDS FALL IN SOUTH FLORIDA Cool weather and hot fishing
With a rare grand slam—blue marlin, white marlin and sailfish—the Jichi team put on a clinic of how to win a tournament during the 2021 Jimmy Johnson National Billfish Championship, which was held March 2-6, 2021.
Jimmy Johnson’s Quest for the Ring Championship Fishing Week features a week of competitive fishing across South Florida, consisting of the National Billfish Championship and the one-day Celebrity Pro-Am. A highlight of the South Florida billfish tournament season, this week of events has something for everyone, as top
anglers join together for what is always a good time with guaranteed prize money.
With fishing options available from Jupiter to Islamorada, the South Florida fishing community came together for a safe and responsible tournament featuring socially distant events throughout the week and a tournament-record-breaking 751 releases by the 76 teams in two days of fishing from four official locations: Ocean Reef Club, Miami Beach Marina, Bahia Mar and Sailfish Marina.
The guaranteed payout for the Billfish Championship is a hybrid—annually guaranteed at $1 million, with additional cash based on boat entries; this year, an additional $145,000 was paid out. Big winners this year were owner and captain Luis Isaias, along with anglers Albert Castro, Chris Gallaraga, Cap Hinkley, Jess Kunkel, Victor Paneda, Orlando Puente, Ricky Querejeta, Alex Vasquez and Manual Vidal, fishing aboard the 46-foot Jarrett Bay Jichi. They scored 26 billfish releases, including a grand slam, to bring home a total of $266,500, and entrance into Jimmy Johnson’s prestigious Ring of Honor. In second place with 24 releases was another familiar name: Capt. Art Sapp’s Native Son. They won $203,000 for their efforts in the tournament; hellREYzer was third: Owner Rey Acosta’s team tallied 19 releases, good for $73,750.