Pompano Rodeo

For the past twenty plus years I have enjoyed fishing the Pompano Beach Fishing Rodeo. It is a fun, family oriented tournament with many ways to win. This year the fishing was spectacular. We always fish on the Frick and Frack which is the 27 conch that I own with my brother Fred. Our team consisted of my wife Debbi, son James, daughter Laurel, long time fishing buddy Mike Welter, my mate Greg Braswell and his brother Chris. It was windy and rough and the fish were biting. This tournament does not place a limit on the number of lines you can fish so we had fourteen or fifteen baits out at all times and everyone on our boat was busy from start to finish both days. At the end of day one we weighed our limit of kingfish and tuna and Debbi added a nice cobia to give us 225 pounds with nine fish and put us in first place, giving us the daily! The second day was nearly as good as we again weighed our limit of kings, three tuna and James added a nice dolphin for good measure. It was good enough for second place overall in the tournament and the second place daily for the final day. The highlight of the tournament for me was the success my children Laurel and James had. Laurel won first place in the small fry division (kids 10 and under) and it was one of the greatest moments of my life watching her face light up as they called her to accept her first place tropy!!! James, as usual made his father proud, by winning the junior division (kids 11-16) by a landslide. Not only did he dominate the juniors, James was named second place angler in the entire tournament beating out nearly four hundred other anglers most of them grown men and women. We also won top family and Debbi and I were named top husband and wife. It was truly a successful tournament for us and one that I am very proud of! I would like to give a special thanks to Greg, Mike, and Chris for all of their hard work and without them none of this would have been possible.