Sandy 6/26 and 6/27 Monroe County Offshore Classic and Species Challenge recap

[GAMBLER]

Monroe County Offshore Classic Species Challenge and main event recap:

Friday morning we left the creek in search of a brown for our box first.  We dropped in West of the creek in 30’.  We got the second rod down and the first rod fired with a 5lb brown.  We decided to try to hang out a little while longer and try to upgrade that fish.  A couple minutes later, the center rigger parked at 28’ with a Black UV tuxedo stingray took off with a nice 7-8 lb brown.  We turned the boat north and charged the spread over to a king/steelhead spread.  We troll North and trolled out to 250 and picked a decent steelhead and some small kings.  We trolled back into 120 and headed West.  Once we got West of Devils Nose, the screens lit up with fish.  We boxed a 10lb king and continued searching.  As we plugged West, we were marking some good lakers.  Scott and I agreed we should drop a Hammerhead Froggy cowbell with a bullfrog Gambler Rig down and try to pluck a laker while we are trolling for a bigger king.  I dropped the rig to the bottom and as it got set, the port rigger fired with an upgrade steelhead.  As we caught that steelhead, the center rigger fired with a laker taking drag. After a good battle, we netted a 21.8lb lake trout.  We pulled the laker rod out of the spread and went back to searching for a bigger king.  Around 11 am, we boated a 16lbs king.  We ended up upgrading our second steelhead with one a half pound bigger.  Going to weigh in, we felt confident we were sitting in a great position to cash a check.  At weigh in, we placed 2nd for the second time in three years.  Congrats to Derek Wager with his winning box!  

Main event:

Saturday morning we headed back to our water West of the nose.  We set down in 95’ and the screen was blank.  We bumped out to 115 and started marking fish. We plucked away at fish all morning but couldn’t keep bigger fish buttoned.  At one point we lost 7 good fish in a row.  Having a **** box, we decided to not weigh in.  Congrats to Tom Allen and his crew on an impressive win.  Thanks to Tim and Brandon for all the hard work you put into this event.  

Here is what worked best for us for two days:
-Atommik UV Grinch meat rig - with a matching e-chip I made.
-Hawks Tackle snowflake meat rig with the matching paddle.
-Hawks Tackle UV green dot meat rig behind a green dot e-chip
-Hammerhead Froggy 5/0 cowbell towing a Bullfrog regular Gambler Rig
-Stinger Stingray UV black tuxedo
-Stinger Stingray Froggy glow