The Hawaii Marlin Tournament Series rolled on into its fourth leg on Tuesday, with the second running of the Kona Throw Down.
Last weekend, organizers altered the format at the Firecracker Open to allow teams to start anywhere they chose at 8:30 a.m., testing input from anglers who felt that they needed to be far from Honokohau to find the fish at starting time.
In response, the fish were all caught right in front of the harbor — not far, far away.
In similar fashion, the Kona Throw Down was created with input and ideas from regulars on the tournament circuit. The Throw Down is formatted as a “big marlin” only event, where the largest single marlin over 400 pounds will be “winner take all”.
In response, the fish caught on day one were all under 400 pounds, so although nine marlin were tagged and released, no one is in the lead.
You get that sort of thing when dealing with wild animals. Make a plan or a rule, and they won’t break it — they will ignore it.
There are two more days of fishing left in the second Kona Throw Down tournament, and an elite roster of 17 teams — some of the “who’s who” of the angling world — have stepped up to the plate to vie for $283,000 total available purse.
All it takes is one marlin over 400 pounds to settle it, but the odds on that are long too. The Kona Kick Off saw four marlin over 400 pounds and the Firecracker Open produced two marlin over 400.
This is Kona. Although today produced no “big mammas,” some of the best fishermen in the world are out for 34 more boat/fishing days.
Only a couple of things are certain on the Big Island — sooner or later there will be an earthquake and sooner or later there will be a big marlin caught.