2007 U.S.A. NATIONAL FREEDIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS

 BETTER LUCKY THAN GOOD

Holding myself off the pinnacle, looking for the big cabezon that lives there, I look down to see a large lingcod staring at me. Completely unconcerned with my intrusion to his world, he rocks back and forth in the swell, waiting to see what I’m about.
As I bring my gun around to bear smack between his eyes, what pops into my head is a comment Bill Ernst made to me one time, “ I’d rather be lucky than good “.

After weeks of scouting, rough seas, cold water, white sharks cruising the area, and the fish doing they’re usual disappearing act, I was extremely grateful for the luck at this moment.

Our team this year consisted of Mike Mcguire, Alan Spehar, and myself. We had planned on starting scouting in early April, but given the ocean conditions, Alan’s new baby boy, and all the rest of life that comes along, we never got close to starting until about 4 weeks before the meet.

We were fortunate enough once again to be supported by the French company Imersion, who supplied us with all our gear, and our focus this year was to put them back on the podium by taking first place team. We all agreed that we would work toward that, and keep that in mind with our strategy and game plans.

We started seeing good counts of fish right off the bat, and on one pinnacle in the north, I located a large lingcod with a milky right eye, soon to be known on our GPS as wpt “milk eye”. Milk eye shared a big crack with a toad of a cabezone, probably 10lbs worth, and this guy was always there, hanging around, waiting for something to ambush.

Early on, we had some brilliant conditions, 63deg water, 40ft of vis, unbelievable for north coast, but we made the most of it, and covered some ground, marking reds, lings, blues, blacks and the lot. We enjoyed these conditions, knowing that it would turn, and it did, with 8-10ft wind waves, 20knots of wind, and 48deg water punishing anyone who dared attempt to scout in these conditions.
Most of the competitors who had shown up at this point chose to stay on the beach, and catch up at whatever gear needed to be mended, or suck down the lattes at the coffee shop in town. Myself, I took this opportunity to get some exercise paddling north, to see what the zone looked like under those conditions.

Oh, did I mention that there was a large white shark cruising the northern edge of the tournament area?
My buddy, Eric Bloom, the local fish and game warden, gave me the heads up on this eater in early July, saying that some locals had seen it clobber a sea lion about 5 miles north of the tournament zone, coming completely out of the water, with the pinnaped in its mouth.
About 2 weeks later, I’m scouting the north zone, and I get a voicemail from him saying he’s looking at my skiff ½ mile offshore of glass beach, with a party boat about ¾ of a mile north, and the white has been circling the party boat for the last half hour.
Oh well, what you don’t know, can’t kill you right????

As the comp day approached, divers started showing in force, and the game of who had which fish started in earnest. Seems some of the biggest fish, and best spots were known by more than a few people, but with lots of territory, we hoped to keep a couple of secrets.

On Sunday night, we threw a party at our place up river at the Dolphin Isle Marina, a funky little place, with a healthy mixed crew of retirees and commercial fisherman.
The boys from Florida made an appearance, as well as the GLACD team of Rene Rojas, Mike Pender, and Conrad Lauer. Bonnie Row, Janis Smith, Julian Cruise, Harolf Dean, Jose Santero, Mike Gower, Rusty Butler, everyone we could find came and enjoyed fresh box crab, rock scallops, abalone, salmon, rock fish, a gourmet pot luck complete with Ed Moore, the guy who made the stunning trophies for this years meet.

So, back to game day.
Mike, Alan and I had worked out our game plans, and the coast guard was nice enough to roll out they’re 47ft surf boat, and sound the horn to start the game.
I started on a spot known as “50ft ling”. We had checked the fish the day before to find it home and securely in its hole. I arrived at the wpt with 7 minutes left of travel, geared up, and relaxed to make my first drop. At 0900, I slid in the water, kicked up hill, breathed up and made the drop. There’s the rock, there’s the hole, slide down to the bottom, hit the light, and there’s the fish! I take my time, line up the fish, and pull the trigger. The shaft hits the fish right where I wanted it to, and it seems to be stoned! Cool, throw the gun out the way, grab the shaft, and start to work the fish out of the snug hole its laying in, when all of a sudden, I got nothing but a shaft in my hands!!! I quickly hit the hole with the light, but can’t see anything as its stirred up pretty bad.
I surface, breathe up again, and drop once more. There’s the hole, hit the light, no fish! Hit the other side,,,,, no fish!! I can’t believe this!
First stop, first dive, and I loose what appears to be a 17lb ling right off the bat!!!
I stay cool, and work the area for 20 minutes, but no luck.
As I paddle to my next stop, I pray that I didn’t just wipe out the teams chances at 1st place.

My next stop was Milk Eye, and this fish had been a no show the last 7 times I had checked, and as there were lots of fisherman working the area, I was pretty sure someone had caught him.
I hit the wpt, threw the hook and dropped onto the crack looking for the huge cab that lived there. First dive, no cab, no ling. Second dive, I’m checking the bottom of the crack looking for the cab, and as I scan up the crack I notice a tail silhouetted in the crack. I think it’s the cab, and start to move for it, the fish turns and shows me a profile and I realize it’s a ling. I hit him with the light, and its Milk Eye!!
One shot down the throat, and its in the board!!! Looks like I just redeemed myself for the one lost.
I move on to other stops, but no lings. Pick up a black or two, then its on to wpt cab crack.

This is where I find the ling I wrote about at the start, laying out on the pinnacle, waiving its tail around, as well as a decent cab I added it to the boat.

Things are starting to look up here, and I keep the momentum moving, paddling hard between stops, and not wasting anytime. I pick up a red, another black, and I’m trying to keep any thoughts of whites out of my mind, but when your working across a 60ft sand channel, and the knowledge of how these fish like to swim over the sand, hunting they’re prey from below comes into your head, its pretty hard to shut it off. At one point, I altered course and got back on my kayak and moved to the next spot,,,, it just didn’t feel right where I was.



It was time to meet Mike and see how he’s been doing. The inside is fairly rough, and I meet Mike near some inside pinnacles. He’s doing pretty good. A couple of lings, rockfish, and cab. I need a few more rockfish, so I head out to a pinnacle where we had found good blues, and pick up 3 to finish off my RCG of 10.

We meet Alan who has been on a paddling journey, as his big fish where not home. Al wound up starting at the harbor mouth, eating his travel time to wait for the start of the meet, but the big ling we had found there was not home. So he took off south to pick up some reds he had down around the corner. Then it was back up for another ling that was not home, back into the cove to check his start ling, no go.
Then he headed north to meet us and keep working. Alan put in a tremendous amount of work paddling the zones in an attempt to put the team in first place, and I must say it paid off.
With all his paddling, he still managed a good score, right there with what we were predicting we needed to take first team.

We all spent the last 30 minutes of dive time looking for perch, and then the paddle in to the beach. Mike and I cleared the buoys at the same time, with 5 minutes to spare. We looked behind us to see Alan coming from the point under a full head of steam, and crossed our fingers that he would make the horn. We knew Alan was the strongest of all of us on paddling, even still, a sigh of relief could be heard when he cleared the buoys with a minute to spare. He was completely wiped out, and had no fluids for the last hr or so of the meet, so I threw him a jug of Gatorade I had left.

On the beach, the usual questions started, who’s got what???

I was blessed to have my famly on the beach, waiting to see what I had caught. As we opened the hatch and started pulling out fish, people started saying we had it, but you can never count on it until the weigh in.

Unfortunately, my good friend Frank Schweninger had cracked his kayak, and after bailing it 3 times, loosing his gps in a roll, he made a run from lumbermill cove and was going as hard as he could, only to miss the horn by a minute and a half. When he opened his hatches his boat was half full of water! Frank had a very strong catch, and had been working like a madman to keep his boat afloat and make the horn.

The weigh in went well, with good weather and nice catches hitting the board. Lots of Reds, and a few nice lings. Mike Pender, working to the south, had the zone to himself and showed why its very dangerous to leave him alone in a game like this. He came in with 20 pieces, and was in the front running for most of the weigh in. Paul Castillou also had me worried, as he had 16 pieces, and a 19.5lb ling, a great catch with good reds and blacks, but in the end it was me in 1st place, Paul in second, and Mike Pender in third.
My team mate Mike Mcguire came in 4th and Dave Edlunds followed his predictions for a 5th place finish, with Alan bringing up 6th with a very nice catch.

The mixed comps was won by Robin Hie, and Brandi Easter, with Robin taking a 19.4 lb ling, and the second biggest abalone.

Amanda Ernst was the top women’s finisher, with a beautiful 19 lb ling, big cabezone, and a few more nice fish. Amanda is the youngest national’s winner ever, and promises to be a force to reckon with in the future.

Calvin Leigh and Tanya Bernie made a good showing, toughing out the cold water and rough seas to bring some very nice fish back to the beach.

The big fish contest was very close, with the top four fish weighing in from 19 – 19.9lbs.

The awards banquet was great. It was held at the Cliff House restaurant, overlooking the dive site. The beautiful one of a kind trophies created by Ed Moore were displayed with the noyo river as a backdrop. These were abalone shells we had cleaned up and shipped to him in April. Then Ed recreates the abalone, and mounts them on a rock, with shells fish ,and other flora and fauna, as close as you can get to what they look like in they’re natural environment.

In retrospect, I never expected to win the individual award. My focus was on getting the team into the first place spot. After taking my second nice ling, I started to think maybe I had a chance at winning, but never altered my game plan at all.

Although I realize my experience and hard work played a large role in our standings, both team and individual, but I also realize that luck was on my side that day.
There were at least 8 other divers that could have won this meet, so it wasn’t exactly like I was the man that day, I got lucky.

My thanks to my team mates, Mike Mcguire, and Alan Spehar, it is an honor and a privilege to team with you two.

I also want to thank our sponsor, Imersion, for supporting us over the years, and supplying us with top quality gear to aid in our win.

Also, a word of thanks to a few people who helped us. Duanne Shoemake, Danny Silveira, Glenn Mcguire, all aided in scouting and shore side help, and Glenn showing his true colors taking it one step further, with cooking, cleaning, and making the rum and cokes!!
Eric Bloom and his family graciously extended they’re hospitality in allowing us to camp in they’re beautiful front yard during our scouting runs, and Eric watched over us when we were offshore.

Thanks to Mike Gower for his dedication and hard work at making this a successful nationals, and all the other people who took on the roles of logistical support in this event.

And a HUGE thanks to my wife Michele for her support in this crazy game we all play.

Thanks to all the competitors for coming and making this a successful event also.
See ya in Rhode Island!!!