Is saltwater fishing always a competition? For me, at least, I always need to measure my technical abilities, efforts, and results against something, even if it’s just another version of myself from the past.
I want to enjoy time on the water, and finding a way to quantify improvement is a big part of that. But sometimes quantifying it can be difficult. Is it more shots at fish that I’m looking for? A better class of fish that I’m catching? The best fish from the best trip of the season as a standalone trophy? Not all days on the water are created equal, and conditions are night-and-day different from one year to the next. Sometimes it’s not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison.
A good friend of mine went on the hot streak of all hot streaks when it came to king mackerel tournament fishing in the fall of 2024. In five weeks, he fished four major tournaments (all with a substantial amount of prize money to be won) and came away with two outright wins, a second-place finish, and a third-place finish. Now, he has always been good, catching big kings consistently. And he has had a good bit of tournament success in the past. But a run like this clearly states to me that he has achieved “elite” status.
He’s fishing on a newer, large, fast (and expensive) center console, but since most of the field is using similar equipment, I’d hardly say that he has an unfair advantage.
It all adds up
I think what we’re seeing is the result of experience, time on the water, and good reactions to changing water conditions, pretty much as they are changing. His wins (and near-misses) are happening against his peers, also very talented fishermen, with no handicapping of the field. I think that’s a really good way to quantify success and improvement. Is luck a factor? Perhaps, but I believe that most of the time, good fishermen make their own luck.
If you are reasonable about what you perceive your skill level to be and who you are competing against, I think tournaments are a great way to see how you stack up against other saltwater anglers. Let me stress that you have to be reasonable. Entering your fishing Jetski in the Big Rock or Carolina Billfish Tournament really isn’t going to tell you much of anything, except that trolling for billfish on a Jetski anywhere that isn’t Hawaii is a bad idea. The big, highly publicized billfish tournaments are only a good metric to measure yourself if you are fishing on a boat that is similar to what most of the rest of the field is on, and very few are fortunate enough to be in that income tax bracket. The same can be said for the most competitive king mackerel fishing tournament trails as well. If you look harder, though, there are many more opportunities to fish in competition out there. Some are a lot easier to get involved with than you think.
Greenville, SC is well inland from the coast, yet still has an impressive fishing society, the Greenville Saltwater Sportfishing Club. Years ago, I was something of a quasi-member, in that I got to go to a few meetings, and I got to fish a few club tournaments with other members. It wasn’t a huge investment or payout in terms of cash, but boy, was it fun. I think the goal in one of the tournaments was simply to outpoint a similar club from Florence, SC.
Start your own
No one got rich, but bragging rights are extremely important, too. Most importantly, I got to meet some good fishermen from both clubs and network with them. We shared numbers for a few spots and traded some concepts on ballyhoo rigging. Some of the rigging I learned was immediately incorporated into my routine. Most of the members were part-time fishermen who made it a point to stay active with the club. The relationships they made within the club gave them extra opportunities to fish throughout the year, and the tournaments served as a good measuring stick of where they were, and where they could stand to improve. It’s a great way to stay connected with your hobby, even if you are several hours away from the beach.
These clubs exist all over the Carolinas, regardless of how far you actually live from saltwater. Even if you live at the beach, there’s probably a club very close to you that could use another member. The active club closest to me, SeaCoast Anglers Association, runs an annual leaderboard for its members where you can enter a weight/measurement for any of 42 saltwater species. Is that a tournament of sorts? Of course it is.
Piers, tackle shops, and marinas often do similar leaderboards as well. It’s a great way to add a little more excitement to our sport, and it lets you know what’s attainable in the waters near you. If you want to get your name up there, you’ll work harder and experiment more to make it happen.
If you don’t like the club and tournament structure that is available to you and your budget, you could easily start your own. Get your fishing buddies together and devise your own scoring system, as specific or broad as you like. Draft your club members into separate teams and fish against the other teams once a month. Have a trophy or a championship belt that the winning team keeps and gets to display at meetings. Or maybe the winning side gets to choose the menu at the annual party and the losing team has to cook it. Your club, your format, your rules. You just have to go and do it.
A little competitive juice makes a fun and exciting sport even more so. If you stay reasonable with regards to your time constraints and budget, entering (or even creating) a tournament or two should only serve to let you know where you are with your saltwater acumen. If you can be honest with yourself about why you achieved or didn’t achieve what you wanted, you can challenge yourself to improve. Being a better fisherman leads to more enjoyable time spent on the water, which is the goal in the first place. Chances are, you are going to meet some good, like-minded people along the way. Go ahead and start planning your tournament schedule for 2025.
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