Flathead Classic. report.

Gaday all.
just a early update for the classic.
Its been tuff out there so far, day 1 our team only managed 3 fish for the day for 70 points, that put us in 68th position.
me personaly i was 45 points and 121st place in the seniors catagory.
Seen a few other Ausfisher's , DC and his team as well as Marty-Z , and they were doing it tuff too.
the only 1's get the big points where the southport sportfishing club members, ( the local no how does pay off )
catch rate was down on last year, the best at the end of day 1 last year was 1200 points,
this year its down to 500 points.

day 2 sore a slow start with 2 fish by 8am .
so far ive traveled about 80 or 90 nm.
we had the rain as well :-/ but that was a turning point for the fishing, from 1:30 till 3pm we managed 3 more fish all caught by yours truely. a 74 55 and a 38 for a total of 200 points for me for the day and a team total of 270 i think for day 2.
weather conditions have been atrosious, 15 / 20kns n/e up to 30kns at times. had Cloud 9 airbourne a couple times running around. allmost lost another hat, and an esky lid after 1 heavy landing, getting big air at 40mpm off the top of 1.2m chop and coming down hard on another big chop. but we saved the lid from the drink.
so far i think were in the top 40 teams . fingers crossed.
the best part is im in the draw for the big prize of the boat. ;D

ill update this further tonight after the comp.
hopefully some of the other guys will add there tails of woa.

Cheers for now Cloud 9

80 or 90nm for flathead :o ::)
i think if you talked to greg 80nm would get you to his red grounds off DI :P ;D
74cm lizard-GOOD FISH :)
whats the biggest so far?

How does the piont system work and how do you enter and what are the costs and rules ??? Please direct me to this info or give me short explanation. I decided to go to the pin for a fish on Thurs to relise the 60+ boats out there indicated the comp. was on. My usual haunts were 6 boats all in casting distance of each other :-/. Headed right to the pin entrance to check for any tailor and get away from the croud but they were everywhere. Saw a school of bait fish fleeing to the shallows of swan bay and with 2 casts with sm metals, pulled two tailor from between all the boats(some of them well inside swan bay during the rise :'(). Went to find a quiet spot and suprisingly the east of Crusoe Is was bare exept 1 boat off NE tip. 1st drift and just as the 1st bait hit bottom- Flathead soon followed by another. 2nd drift 2 again but the 2nd being released before in boat (snap). 3 flathead only 33-37cm but suprised to see most people working all other spots, 3 boats thick, constantly casting plastics. There best chance was to eventually foul hook a flathead. Plastics work well but use them on the drift while casting and flicking in strike spots. If one passes the nose of a flathead without a strike, move on or try another pattern. Fair enough no room to drift but you odds are better in a 2nd rate area all to yourself. As for me, I went fishing to get away from the crouds so I stuck to plan. Headed to Tiger mullet ch. for a couple of bream, then slipping sands and colby for a feed of whiting. A good day :)but was initially hoping to find me elusive great lizard.

P.S. Saw nobody at all giving gold bank a go. My two bob again is on the last couple of hours of the falling if everywhere else still taken, try drifting the edge of dropoffs with plastics or trawling or my sure method :-X Frogmouth pillies on double hook rig (bottom hook through gills)with light weight :-X :-X. If that doesn't get you one i'll wear my wifes undies my next trip. :o :o

Pic of my feed- notice 1 flathead missing as traded for a cold beer.

Fishin mission
I hope they aren't dusky flathead you have there at that size ???

Tony ???

yeah thats what i was thinkin tony.. duskys at 33-37cm's are well under legal size!! :-/

fair go guys, typos happen from time to time, isnt that right ;) top feed there fishnmishin

I recall about 6 months ago that one of the regulars on this site posted a similar thing related to duskys. That time it was bag limits. It ended up that he genuinely did not think he was breaking the regs as he thought they were sand flathead as he caught them all on a sand bank and did not realise that duskys were also in clean sandy areas.

Quite likely an honest mistake here.

Cheech

They look a bit dark to be sand flathead ???

Gaday all
comps at an end. [smiley=2thumbsup.gif]
will get to fishinmishin questions later.
after 2.5 days of fishing our asses off.
my total for the comp was 4 fish :-/
1st mate 3fish.
and boson 7 fish.
on the stats side of things Cloud 9 traveled 111Nm's and burned 71 litres fuel for the comp.
i drank about a caton of gold.
i made about 450'000 casts
lost about 20jigheads of verying sizes.
changed rubbers 50 times.
got rained on
nearly lost my hat.
and the esky lid.
sore couple of white points on 2 different house boats.
and met some great people from Ausfish and everywhere else.
any way here is a couple pics of things related.
1st is just my asinal for the comp, the other 2 had about half of what i took.

here is a couple of the fish we caught.and if this works there should be a pic of the first Miss Flathead 2004

and another

heres my best for the comp.

cloud 9

holly sh** thats a lot of gear for flathead, sure your not suppling a tackle shop ????
years past all i used was things called MR. TWISTER.
and bait strips ;D
jamie i see you have power baits :o what do you think of that stuff. does it have the scent release ??

yep snappa
most of what we caught was all on ether powerbaits or salt water assins flukes.
and we tried lots of stuff.
try the miss flathead again.

lol not sure if she would be plugging her title to anyone, miss Flathead ;D any piccies of the white pointers? :D

i didn't win the boat but i won a salt water fly reel from avey and some saltX reel cleaner and a pair of sunglasses from Seadog, so about $300 in prizes for me [smiley=laola.gif]
3 years of entry to finaly get somewhere.
i was 38th outright as of friday nite.
i think i got my Butt kicked saturday though.
will find out later next week on team placeing and my personal placeing.
a trying 2.5 days but i didn't have to go to work so im happy.

to answer fishinmishin's questions.
the flathead classic is a catch and release comp.
lures only NO BAIT of any kind.
points are on a sliding scale, 0-39cm 5points
40cm 20points
50cm 40points
60cm 75points
70cm 145points
80cm 185points
90cm 285points
there are other points in between the 1's listed
biggest for the comp this year was 90cm caught at curso island saturday morning.
cost of entry to comp $150 but we got diner for 3 nights + lunch saturday. a shirt wurth $60
a dozen packs of rubbers of all makes from atomic to river 2 sea.
3 hard body lures . stickers for other stuff.,
and if u catch a fish your in with a show to win the main prize of a 4.75 stessel boat motor trailer package. About $20'000. juniors have a 3mt punt with 3Hp to win
it mite sound expensive but some people race cars I fish.
anyway hope to see post on here from DC and team on there results and Marty-Z aswell.
last pic from the comp the line up.

Cheers Cloud 9

the white pointers were on the house boat in the pic behind my best for comp pic .
didn't get any on film better luck next time.
so , thats it from me time for another beer while i read some of the other stuff on here then time to crash [smiley=sleeping.gif]

Hey Jamie the C&R side of things, is it a live well type thing where you bring them back for inspection?

no digi pics
you may notic in the pics 1 has 50cent piece 1 has white card
every ligal fish (40cm up) has to be photoed with the token of the day, set out the nite before
so you cant just take pics of fish more than once
well you probably could but the complexity wouldn't be wurth while
all fish released as soon as posible.
all good fun.
im allreddy booking time with boss for next year


Cheers Cloud 9

Cheers for that info Jamie, hopefully next year i'll get a team together and enter.

Thanx for all the info cloud 9. Might give it a go next year although I'm not as successfull with plastics. Got a bit to learn. To all concerned with my flathead I honestly know that they were sand flathead. They were sandy in colour when caught and had black bars on the tail and not the spot associated with dusky or mud flathead.
I now noticed how dark they seem although if you look at the pic you will see that it was taken at night and even with the flash the highly reflective silver scales of the tailors and sand whitings heads, my foot and MOst of the smallest whiting :oseem to be a lot darker that they are. I adbide to all regulations and practice good release methods but as haven't been out for yonks :'(and in need of a good fresh feed I kept even the small but LEGAL flathead.
If I havent convinced you then I'm pleading innocent on the account of temporary drunkenness. For those of you that I have convinced, appologies will be accepted by the way of beer. PM me as for where to drop it off ;). P.S.- I ate the evidence anyway. ;D

pic

fishin mission
;) ;) ;) ;)

morning all had a decent sleep now was just working out my fuel useage for the comp i posted earlyer that i used 71 liters fuel for 111Nm's had a chance to convert to Km's 205km's which gave me a rate of 2.88Km's to the litre.
most of which was at full throttle and with the extra weight of the bow mount electric / battery and 2 other blokes fishing gear and lunch each day i was still getting 38Kn's flat out thats why the big air off some of the swell encountered.
anyway have a great day.
the Garden awaits :-/

Cheers Cloud 9

P.S anyone like to Buy the SALTWATER FLY REEL i won valued at $179 Make me an offer suited to tuna or mackeral fishing on fly?? 425B alvey Fly reel.
PM ME

Well done Jamie!
Good to see an ausfisher with points on the board!!

Regards, Tony :D :D :D

Gday All,
With Flathead Classic 2004 all over all I can really do is hang my head in shame and curse Mother Nature. I don't know where team Al-Lure-ing Lizards placed but what I can tell you is that it's somewhere near the bottom :'( I did however beat my last years total, which is what I was aiming to do :-/
Here's how our three days of competition went...
Day 1
Fished hard in all the 'right areas' incl. Crueso Is, Kalinga Bank, Duck Cr, Whalleys Gutter. Result - 1x 28cm flathead, 1 tonne of weed, minus a bunch of lures (soft and hard bodied), minus 1 xxxx straw-hat, 1 unexplained motor problem, 1 spooled line (by the prop), and 1 pi$$ed off and dejected team.
Day 2
Poked our heads out of Biggera Cr (where we stayed along with JBs team for the tornament) and were faced with 25kn of northerly against a big run-in tide. Plan was to head north again but when faced with that - no way! Took the soft option and headed south for more sheltered parts i.e. the Nerang River, concentrating on a bank just north of the Chevron Is bridge. Result = 5 flathead to 52cm, 1x shimano baitcaster spooled with braid on a G-Loomis 2-4kg rod (caught on a pink micro mullet :P ;D), and 1 slightly happier crew (considering the conditions).
Day 3
A much nicer day and hopes were high. Mixed it up with a bit of plastic chucking and some trolling at various 'pin locations. But alas the lizards were not 'Al-lure-ed' to our expectations. Result = 2 flathead to 42cm, and 1 new 'Spot X' - which I have great hopes for in the future ;)
We finished fishing at 11:30am as I had to make it to my uni graduation ceremony - and so missed the Classic presentation, later discovering that if we were present we would have scored a lucky draw prize of a bag full of lures etc :'( I thought long and hard about which was more important, uni grad or flathead classic presentation, in hindsight maybe I made a poor decision :-/ :(
All in all, not a great few days fishing/luck wise, but, when your game plan involves about 70% trolling, 4 tonne of weed in your favourite trolling areas doesn't help what-so-ever. 30kn northerlies also throw a spanner in the works. I can't make many excuses though because we fished similar areas to JB's team, The Plastic Surgeons, using the same lures and technique and they finished top 20. Well done to those boys especially JB for his top 20 individual placing too [smiley=laola.gif] [smiley=thumbsup.gif]
I enjoyed the few days staying in our little bit of Biggera Waters luxury with 'the boys' and IF I can pull a crew together, I'll definitly be back next year ;D
Cheers,
Dane
P.S. Good to meet you Jaime and sorry to the other guys who I missed out on meeting at the presentation (flattymattyb).

1 of the Nerang residents. You'll notice it hasn't been taken along-side the official comp ruler as 'the plastic surgeons' decided to loose their sticker 1st day and steal ours ::)

The G Loomis put up a better fight than the fish I caught ::)

The arsenal of our two teams ;)

Part of an area of which I have named - Spot X (how creative ::) ;D)

Apparently theres something called 'low tide' ::) ;D

Hey Great post Cloud Nine & DC was a great few days (good to meet you cloud nine) Had a great time unfortunately i didnt catch as may fish id i would have liked to but we did aight!! ;D ;D ;D Hey DC wheres the close up of my Big Gun arms? CHEERS!!!

Heres my biggest I got about 10 over the whole time

Well my team's story is much the same as Cloud 9 and DC. Not many flatties and way too much weed!

Day 1 - fished hard all day for 4 fish - team placed around 60th.

Day 2 - slept in! Lost 1 hour's fishing - by 11.30am wind was howling and we had one undersized fish in the boat. Decided to give it away (as did many others) and give 110% for Saturday. Team dropped out of 100th place.

Day 3 - fished hard for 1 fish till 12. Dropped two fish and missed many others. The bite came good after 11am and only gave us 60 mins to catch fish. No idea where team finished but is was not good!

Overall a shocking result. A good tradesman never blames his tools, but a flat nose punt and no electric motor make it pretty hard to fish in 30kt plus NE wind. But hey - that's fishing!

My team mate make the final draw and won a PENN rod and reel, mags and sunnies so that put a smile on our face.

Highlight of the comp was definitley meeting guys like Jamie and the crew from Cloud 9, and others. BTW - the Galeforce boat is an impressive weapon!

Next year a new boat and electric motor for us and a much improved result. I recommend the comp to anyone who enjoys fishing and meeting others who enjoy the same.

ALSO - hate to talk politics but consider the Fishing Party for the Senate. There is some scary stuff hapening regarding rec fishing closures throughout Oz and our sport is under attack.

Had a great time at the classic, thanks to the boys at doug burts tackle world for all the help :) Our team the Plastic Surgeons managed to get 17th overall in the teams, and i just snuk into the top 20 at 18th. I was 11th overall on first day but had a shocker on friday :(. Was pretty tuff fishing but we got 25 fish all up for 2 and half days fishin. Here is my biggest fish , an 82cm croc. Lovin it ;D

Thanks to DC for organising the unit for our teams too [smiley=2thumbsup.gif] , DC u managed to get more fish than last year so thats the main thing ;D maybe next yr u'll get that croc ur after .

Big mumma against the ruler

good fish Jason!! seams like your starting to get it all sussed out down there!! and congrats on being up there with the best.

Hi guys,

JB hats off mate top twenty you got to be happy with that sorry I didn't get to talk much I was half cut when I saw you and working hard on the other half I ended up in 95th spot for the tournament which I was pretty happy with considering I had an absolute SHOCKER biggest was only 55cm will post pics later tonight anyway Congrats on your effort.

DC yeah bummed I didn't get to catch up I saw you on thursday down the east side of curusoe but you headed off before I came over keep in touch and we will go out and slay them 1 day soon.

Cloud nine saw your car there at the presentation on sat but had no idea what you looked like (but I do now) thats my old man on your left at the lucky draw.

Anyway got to get back to work now will post again tonight

Cheers
Matty