The annual Northeast Florida Wahoo Shootout Tournament took place from February 7th through March 22nd. Founded in 2011 by tournament organizers Paul and Lauren Dozier, this unique event is the world’s largest wahoo tournament with 213 boats fishing this year. Teams fish two days of their choosing during that six-week time span, and the heaviest three-fish aggregate wins. They can weigh up to three wahoo per day and if more than three fish are weighed throughout the tournament, the smaller weights get dropped.
Kris Nowicki of Jacksonville and his team won the Shootout with an aggregate weight of 220.52 pounds, with three wahoo weighing 76.3, 75.08 and 69.14 pounds. Nowicki and his crew were fishing aboard Justus, his 39-foot Sea Hunter powered by triple Yamaha XTO outboards. They landed all three fish in the same day while high-speed trolling.
The waters off northeast Florida, particularly out of St. Augustine, have produced outstanding wahoo catches for years, but local experts have encountered much larger wahoo in recent years than in the past, caught by high-speed trolling and also with live bait. Wahoo exceeding 100 pounds have been landed with increasing regularity, a rare event that used to happen primarily in the winter around San Salvador, in the Bahamas. Two wahoo over 100 were landed this year, a 105.56-pound fish caught by the crew of Snatch-Um, and a 104.6-pounder landed by Loosecannon.
Nowicki and his crew won the grand prize of a new 21-foot Yellowfin bay boat powered by a 200 hp Yamaha, complete with an AmeraTrail trailer. Congratulations to the entire Justus team on an outstanding win!
Learn more about the Northeast Florida Wahoo Shootout here: wahooshootout.com
