LUCKY BREAK LEADS VAN HORN, COOK TO VICTORY

Foul Weather Helps Team Secure Redfish Tour Championship Win

 

SARASOTA, FLA — Capt. Ray Van Horn of Tarpon Springs and Capt. Mike Cook of

Titusville took top honors in the Ranger/Mercury Redfish Tour Championship

Nov. 14-16 at Marina Jack in Sarasota. In the final day’s championship

round, the winners fished near Tarpon Key in lower Tampa Bay and caught 7.86- and

7.34-pound redfish for a 15.20-pound aggregate. Three eighths-ounce jigs

with pearl colored shad tails were the hot baits.

 

With high wind and persistent rain plaguing the day, Van Horn and Cook

decided to protect their catch and minimize the risk of mechanical problems

by heading back to port early. Arriving at the dock around noon, they sat in

the rain until the scales opened at 2:30 p.m.

 

Tournament format included two days of qualifying, after which the top 40

teams (based on a cumulative score) advanced to the championship round. As

one of the 3-day event’s most consistent teams, Van Horn and Cook finished

ninth on Day 1 with 10.85 pounds (5.06, 5.79) and 11th on the second

qualifying day with 9.38 (4.63, 4.75) for a 20.23-pound cumulative

aggregate.

 

The weekend’s inclement weather gave Van Horn a rare break that factored

prominently in his success. As a well-known big fish spot where fertile

habitat and a surrounding no-motor zone holds loads of reds nearly

year-around, Tarpon Key normally would have been flooded with other boats

from the concurrently scheduled Chuck LaMar Grand Slam Celebrity Fishing

Tournament — a St. Petersburg based charity event benefiting the Pediatric

Cancer Foundation. When this event cancelled its first day, Van Horn and

Cook had the honey hole all to themselves.

 

"We went by [Tarpon Key] and there wasn’t a boat in sight," Van Horn

recalls. "I said ‘They might have pulled the plug on [the Chuck LaMar tournament],

we’d better go over there and try.’ We pulled up to an oyster bar and caught

40 fish in about an hour and a half."

 

Second place went to Tony Ortega of Islamorada and Ron Creber of North Palm

Beach, who found 7.00 and 7.71-pound reds for a championship score of 14.71.

Ortega said a week of prefishing in Pine Island Sound had revealed several

good areas, but mullet boats moved in and stymied the spots. He and Creber

managed to squeeze enough weight out of the disturbed waters to qualify, but

on the final day the few remaining fish were too skittish to approach.

 

Moving to a point they had located in prefishing, Ortega and Creber found

success with shallow running crankbaits. Blindcasting with noisy lures

varied greatly from their preferred technique of clear water sight fishing, but

murky shallows and low light conditions offered few options.

 

"Within three casts, we had our two biggest fish," Ortega said. "That was

just about 10:30 a.m. There was a little break in the weather down there.

The sun was trying to come out, the wind laid down just enough and it was the

best bite we had all week."

 

Ortega and Creber barely qualified for the championship round by finishing

33rd with 13.12 pounds. They weighed 8.24 pounds (4.01 and 4.23) on Day 1

for 25th place, but found only a 4.88 on Day 2. The anglers overcame a

potentially disastrous brush with fate when their boat sank a day before the

tournament. After securing their vessel the night before registration day,

the anglers awoke the next morning to a 30-knot north wind and 3-foot waves

that had swamped the cockpit. With help from fellow anglers, they were able

to right the boat and spent most of the day drying their gear and rewiring

electronics.

 

Ortega said thoughts of throwing in the towel quickly yielded to the same

persistence that got him and his partner to the championship. "It was a long

year, a lot of work and a lot of miles, but it paid off," he said.

 

Placing third, Port Charlotte anglers Dan Latham and Robert Moore captured

7.00- and 7.45-pound reds for a 14.45-pound aggregate. After a Day 1 ranking

of 23rd (3.61, 4.74 – 8.35), they advanced to sixth place on Day 2 with reds

weighing 6.40 and 7.35 pounds for 13.75 pounds and a 22.10-pound cumulative

total.

 

During prefishing, Latham and Moore had established a low-water pattern with

fish congregating in the troughs of a Charlotte Harbor flat. However, with

high winds swelling the tides, they fished primarily along flooded

shorelines in Punta Gorda.

 

Bringing about a dozen reds to the boat, Latham and Moore put one money fish

in the well around 10 a.m. and added the other at 11:30. Matzuo twitch baits

and Exude Darts in Natural Shrimp produced most of the action.

 

Moore said he and his partner devised a strategy for qualifying, but altered

the plan to fit the circumstances. Initially, the plan was to leave their

big reds alone during the qualifying days and save these top-end fish for the

championship. However, when bad weather made fishing tough, they had to dip

into their stash to make the cut.

 

In fourth place, the Fort Myers team of Ozzie Lessinger and Sean McGarry

paired an 8.66-pound redfish (second largest behind 13th place Jim Taylor’s

8.73) with a 5.58 for a 14.24-pound total. Targeting oyster bars and flats

in about 18 inches of water, they threw 1/4- and 1/2-ounce Johnson Silver

Minnow Spoons. They fished the same area in Pine Island Sound each day of the

tournament.

 

"With much higher tides than normal we weren’t able to sight-fish and we

weren’t able to pole," Lessinger said. "So, basically, we picked spots where

we knew there should be fish and anchored or staked the boat out and worked

the spoons."

 

Lessinger and McGarry — tournament partners since 1995— finished in second

place on Day 1 with 12.85 pounds (5.15, 7.70). They slid three notches on

the second qualifying day with 4.33- and 5.16-pounders for a 9.49-pound total

and 22.34 pounds cumulative.

 

Finishing fifth, brothers Rodney and Terry Mish caught 7.08- and 6.63-pound

redfish for a 13.71-pound total. Opting for maximum fishing time, the Mish

brothers fished within 10 miles of the marina. Rodney said they boated their

first fish of championship round at 7:30 a.m. and culled up the rest of the

day.

 

"Our two qualifying fish were the last two we caught," Rodney recalled. "We

had moved north and were fishing a point where we found a nice school of

redfish. But then the thunder scared them away, so we decided it was time to

come back."

 

Using gold spoons throughout the event, the Mish team placed 34th on Day 1

with a single 6.35-pound fish. On Day 2, they improved to 17th on the next

day with 5.08 and 6.03-pound fish for an 11.11-pound total and a 17.46-pound

aggregate. Making his home in San Diego, Calif., Rodney flies cross-country

to join his Titusville-based brother for Redfish Tour competition.

 

Rounding out the top 10 were: Pat Stinson and Eric Bachnik (7.05, 6.63 -

13.68); Scott Guthrie and Tony Bozzella (5.48, 8.11 – 13.59); Jason Selzer

and Mark Elliott (7.10, 5.87 – 12.97); Chuck Howard and Billy Harris (5.76,

7.09 – 12.85); Bill Priesmeyer and Thomas Larkin (5.49, 7.31 – 12.80).

 

Tournament stats: 57 teams weighed fish on the first day, 71 on Day 2. The

40th place team after two days qualified with 12.23 pounds. In the

championship round, 33 teams weighed fish.

 

The Ranger/Mercury Redfish Tour, presented by Cabela’s offers tournaments in

Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. For photos and/or Tour

information, contact Tournament Director Grady Warren at (904) 733-6678 or

redtour@bellsouth.net.