Fished BCKFC’s Redfish Rumble with Blake and Kevin this past weekend to less-than-spectacular results. I was fairly confident going in that I’d at least catch five redfish as the format calls for your five heaviest slot redfish. Right in my wheelhouse, or so I thought.

The combination of high tide and winds from the south turned the spot I chose to fish into something I wasn’t too familiar with. It was tough to come across areas of good water clarity and when I did they were deep water areas. I’m much more comfortable sight casting reds in shallow water, so I was a little lost. I did so awful that I didn’t shake the skunk off until about six hours in, it was a trout that went about 13″. I did finally see a 25.5″ redfish and I managed to get him to eat a spoonfly tied by Kevin, but by that time it was too late to weigh-in and it wouldn’t have much mattered as I’m sure others had much better luck. Big thanks to Kevin on the fly and the pictures.

Still, it was fun to get out on the water with Blake and Kevin and my poor day wasn’t shared by everyone. Kevin was out in his new Cruise and he was able to stand up and sight fish a few drum and sheepshead. Standing up to sight fish was something that he hadn’t been able to previously do out of his Tarpon and I could tell he was pretty excited at the possibilities on a good day. After having truck problems last time we were supposed to go out, Blake was finally able to take his new Cuda 12. He ended up catching a couple over slot reds and picked up around ten or so trout, with a couple of those around 17-18″. On one his line popped above the cork and the cork disappeared. I found it ten minutes later in a different spot and was able to hook the line and retrieve the trout. Unfortunately not as big as we thought when he set the hook, must have had a nick his line.

I haven’t seen final results posted from the event anywhere, except for a blurb on Kayak Fishing U on facebook: “Congratulations to Michael for his 1st place 29.75# – 5 redfish stringer @ the Redfish Rumble today!” Sounds about right, I believe Michael paddles a Jackson Cuda as well!