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2009 Results

What a difference 24 hours makes when it comes to marine weather. The
first day of the Downeast Maine Shark Tournament, Friday, 8/28, I was
drifting around the shark grounds about 20 miles offshore in my little
22 foot Trophy, and it was absolutely beautiful. Surface temps were
around 72 degrees, the wind was a gentle breeze, and there were sharks,
whales, and even tuna everywhere you looked. To the south, however, we
knew trouble was on the way.

On Monday, 8/24, the marine forecast was looking very good for both
days of the tournament. Hurricane Bill had just passed through, so the
liklihood of something really bad cropping up in next 7 days was small.
Naturally, Murphy’s Law was enforced and out of seemingly nowhere
Tropical Storm Danny appeared. So by Tuesday, 8/25, we went from looking
at a great forecast both days to looking at a complete disaster
weatherwise on at least the second day of the tournament. And that’s
exactly what happened. The storm picked up speed, as if it knew it had
to get to the Gulf of Maine soon lest we have two great days of fishing.
It was as if the Humane Society had learned to control the weather, and
had created Danny on 8/24 and launched it on its northward track. It
arrived late Friday night with a fury.

Any of you that drove down to Camp Ellis pier on Saturday, the second
day of the tournament, saw how impressive Mother Nature can be. The
winds were absolutely howling out of the east, the water was ripped up
in the river all around the pier and the flag at Camp Ellis looked like
it might be torn from its pole at any moment. The seas in front of Old
Orchard and Ferry beach were monstrous, 10 to 15 foot white caps rolling
in one after another, only a few seconds apart. I remember thinking “I
hope to God that nobody went out late last night or early this morning
and got caught in this”. Thankfully, nobody had made that potentially
lethal mistake.

However, even though no one made the mistake of going offshore that second day, one of the gentlemen who fishes our tournament every year almost lost his boat on the second day due to the storm. John Murphy and his boys from Massachusetts have been fishing the tournament forever, and are always competitive. John has a Grady White, and on Friday night, he tied up on the Camp Ellis pier for the evening. Unfortunately, his stern was facing downstream in the river (East), which of course is the direction the wind blew from during the ensuing storm. His boat has a low transom with the folding door that covers the back. At the time of the storm, the door was down and the motors were tilted up. The wind and current of the flood tide along with the wind and waves, was more than the boat and bilge pumps could handle. The boat eventually filled with water and listed to the right. Click here to see a picture of it. Jerry McMillan, the dockmaster, discovered the boat Saturday morning and got busy contacting John that his boat was in trouble. When John arrived, someone with a 36' boat offered to tow it to have it self bail. However, the Harbor Master told John that it was too dangerous and that he should wait until slack tide to move it. Slack tide was two hours away, so John and his boys drove away to get a coffee and warm up.

When he returned, there were 12 guys in rain suits ready to work on getting the boat out of the water. John said these guys were amazing. The Harbor Master jumped right in and tied the ropes to the boat. Everyone pulled the rope to get the boat out of the current and around the pier. One captain and his crew of three went out on his large boat with cranes and booms and attached them to John's boat. Two other guys in another small boat kept all lines working. A pickup truck was used to vector one of the lines to pull the boat in.

John said he has not seen a group of guys getting together to help someone out as these guys did since he spent the first five days at Ground Zero. He said he wished that he could thank them again, and that we have very special friends and neighbors here in the Saco area. None of the people helping him would not take anything for their efforts, and the Captain from the large boat said that his boat broke away last year and others helped him out. He said that he was just glad to help. Another example of how fishermen and people who make their living off the ocean seem to be a close knit group, who are always willing to help out the other guy. A big thanks to Jerry McMillan and all of these guys who came to John's rescue.

Although a handful of us showed up at the weigh-in that second day
(including the biologists) no boats came to the pier during the weigh
in. There was no way that was going to happen, given the weather.
Perhaps the only thing interesting that did show up at the weigh in that
Saturday was a small, older woman with a rain jacket and a camera asking
lots of questions and taking lots of pictures. She refused to answer my
questions about what she was doing there, stating that ‘she was an
attorney’ and she knew the rules and that she could be there if she
wanted - she clearly had an agenda. Not sure if the Humane Society sent
her or if she was simply on her own Search and Destroy mission, but no
doubt her pictures and some hate-filled diatribe will be appearing soon
at a theatre * or website * near you. I hope she got my good side. I
probably should have told her that if she was an attorney, she ought to
realize that recreational shark fishing is legal.

So in the end, we had a one-day tournament this year. Twenty eight (28)
teams were signed up by the end of the Captain’s dinner at Saco Bay
Tackle on Thursday afternoon. The action was furious that beautiful
first day, and there were a total of 11 sharks weighed in Friday
afternoon at the Camp Ellis Pier - 10 large, male blue sharks and one
female thresher shark. Our team of biologists were there to dissect all
the sharks and take multiple blood and tissue samples as part of their
ongoing research on these fish. The thresher shark was of course cut up
into steaks and given to the crew of Quint’s Revenge.

The final rankings at the end of Day One were:

1. Team “Quint’s Revenge” captained by Frank Moda - 278 lb
thresher shark (417 points)
1. Team “Endorfin Rush” captained by Ed Bilsky - 418 lb blue shark
(418 points)
2. Team “Techfishin” captained by Dennis Legere - 371 lb blue shark
(371 points)
3. Team “Reel Addiction” captained by Mike Keegan - 365 lb blue
shark (365 points)
4. Team “Off the Rocks” captained by Corey Sherrill - 349 lb blue
shark (349 points)
5. Team “Seeking Fins” captained by Scott McIntyre - 342 lb blue
shark (342 points)
5. Team “Special J Shark Therapy” captained by John Shusta - 342 lb
blue shark (342 points)
6. Team “Tuna Bound” captained by DJ Creswell - 313 lb blue shark
(313 points)
7. Team “Loan Shark” captained by Steve Feinberg - 296 lb blue
shark (296 points)
8. Team “Mad Dog” captained by Chris Cantara - 290 lb blue shark
(290 points)
9. Team “Fish On” captained by Scott Hall - 227 lb blue shark (227
points)

As you can see, we had a very unusual event this year - not one, but
two ties. Quint’s Revenge and Endorfin Rush were a single point apart
for first place in the tournament, and Team Seeking Fins and Team
Special J Shark Therapy both weighed in a 342 lb blue shark, tying for
Fifth place in the tournament.

There was some small controversy about the first place tie, which was
worked out between the two teams. I had a long discussion with the crew
of Quint’s Revenge at the Run of the Mill Restaurant that Saturday
night, over a few fermented adult beverage products. This is a great
crew, consisting of Dave Curtian, Chris Cobbett, Rick Lally and Aaron
Trembley, and their captain Frank Moda. They fished on Frank's boat, the
Shockwave. Chris and Rick are both professional outdoorsmen - check out
their websites at www.northwoodsadventurestv.com and at
www.camospace.com/ncbrotherhood.

It was decided in the end that, in the spirit of fun and fair play,
that both teams should be awarded a First Place trophy. This is because
the Downeast Maine Shark Tournament is not, and never will be, a big
money tournament like the Monster Shark Tournament, where hundreds of
thousands of dollars might be on the line for first place. It’s a
tournament where around 30 to 40 of some of the most hardcore shark
fishermen in Maine, New Hampshire, and even northern Massachusetts get
together each August to have some fun and see who can come out number
one among all this fishing talent over a two day period - which is not an
easy feat.

However, although first place in the Downeast Maine tournament is
typically not lucrative money-wise, we are starting to see thousands of
dollars appear in the Calcutta each year, and of course there is always
the possibility of breaking a new Maine state rod and reel record for
the insured TEN THOUSAND DOLLAR prize we have if a state record is in
fact broken. So to minimize the chance of ever having a tie in the
Calcutta or in the ten thousand dollar state record category - or
first place for that matter - next year we will start taking 3 weights
on each shark weighed in, and the average of the 3 weights will be the
recorded weight of the shark for the official record book.

So congratulations to Capt. Frank Moda and his crew, as well as Capt.
Ed Bilsky and his crew on the Endorfin, which included Geoff Bove, Drew
Rosati, Ryan Cleary, and Shane Miniutti. Both teams received a large
first place trophy recognizing the fact that they came out on top in the
2009 Downeast Maine Shark Tournament, fishing against a lot of highly
experienced teams - something they can be proud of.

CALCUTTA

This year, we had 11 out of the 28 teams in the tournament get into the
Calcutta, and there was a total of $3000.00 in the envelope by the end
of the Captain’s dinner. Mike Keegan and his Reel Addiction crew were
confident enough to be one of these 11 teams, and their 365 lb blue
shark turned out to be worth $3000.00 to them. Neither of the two first
place teams who weighed in higher point total sharks (Endorfin Rush or
Quint’s Revenge) had gotten into the Calcutta. In addition, the nice
371 lb blue shark weighed in by Dennis and Tim Legere along with Jim
“swims with sharks” Ermoldof of Team Techfician would have beaten
Reel Addiction’s blue shark, but they too had elected not to enter the
Calcutta (FYI, this same crew landed their first bluefin tuna the
weekend after the tournament; not a bad week for them!). I’m betting
all three of these crews get in the Calcutta next year. I handed the
$3000.00 in cash to Mike Keegan and his crewman Garon Mailman at the Run
of the Mill Restaurant Saturday night. If it is any consolation to the
10 other teams that were in the Calcutta, Garon put this unexpected cash
influx to good use, buying expensive drinks all night for a very
attractive red head who was in the bar, which I think paid significant
dividends for him later on. You’d have to ask Garon, of course.

SPECIAL THANKS

There are always people who either directly or indirectly help make
this tournament work each year. So thank you to Saco Mayor Ron Michaud
and the Town of Saco for allowing us to use the Camp Ellis pier again
this year as the weigh-in for our tournament.

Thanks to Jerry McMillan, the dockmaster down at the Camp Ellis pier.
Jerry helps out with crowd control and handles the boats that dock at
the pier during the weigh-ins or overnight. I realize that the
tournament gives Jerry a lot of extra work and I appreciate what he
does!

Thanks to Peter Mourmouras and Saco Bay Tackle for helping with the
event each year, especially with arranging the clean up crew and truck
to work at the weigh-in, and getting stuff into the Captain’s bags at
the last minute, which I always fail to do.

Thanks to Bruce Haskell from Bruce Haskell Photography for giving us a
last minute deal on the nice coffee cups with the Downeast Logo that
were in the captain’s bags this year.

Thanks to Dr. James Sulikowski and his crew who take charge of the
weighing of the sharks, as well as the biological tissue sampling and
study of all sharks brought in during the event. They always do a great
job!!

A big thanks to Denise Giuvelis, a hard working young lady who each
year takes time out of her busy schedule to help out at the Captain’s
dinner, getting all the teams registered and checked in.

Thanks to Doug Ellis and Jeff Fowler from United Way, who show up each
year and donate their time by selling hats and T-shirts at the
Captain’s dinner, as well as the weigh-ins at Camp Ellis pier. Much
appreciated!

Finally, a special thanks to Ian Peacock on Team Ruthless for donating
his half of the 50/50 raffle ($150.00) to United Way. A classy gesture.