While offshore gales forced an early closure for the four day Tauranga Game Fishing Club One Base competition on Saturday, club manager Grant Holley says the competitors seemed happy enough.
“Four days continuous fishing is a long time,” says Grant.

Marlin.

“It is so much longer than when you had to come back in every day. In the three days out there, they had more fishing than in the old days when they had to come in at nights.”
It also allowed the competitors to bottom fish the change of light, says Grant, and while there weren’t a lot of game fish caught, most of them got a feed to take home which they wouldn’t otherwise have.
“They seemed pretty happy on Saturday night,” says Grant.
The wining billfish were both caught from trailer boats fishing out of Waihau Bay. The winning 187.7kg blue marlin caught was by Lawrence Flude, fishing from Gulfseeker. The fish was driven to Tauranga in the back of a truck.
The second placed bill fish, a 185.7kg blue marlin caught by Robbie Skelton fishing from XFactor also out of Waihua Bay was driven to Tauranga on the boat’s trailer, while X Factor made the sea voyage.
The third placed billfish was a 143.1kg striped marlin caught off  the Alderman Rise by Dave Lees fishing from Rodfather.
Overall there were five striped marlin caught, three blue and two marlin tagged and released.
There were 23 kingfish caught, 10 snapper and only one yellowfin tuna.
Full results are on the Tauranga Game Fishing Club website.