Congratulations to all skippers, crews, and anglers who contributed to another highly successful season for Sydney Game Fishing Club. We expect to receive details of the Central Zone Presentation very soon and will advise members as soon as they become available. Looking Ahead With July comes cooler water temperatures and, hopefully, the arrival of Southern Bluefin Tuna and Yellowfin Tuna along the NSW coast. Reports from Victoria have already produced some excellent captures, and with any luck the fish will continue their migration north, becoming larger and more plentiful as they head our way. Once again, please ensure your membership renewal is paid. You certainly don't want to catch that fish of a lifetime only to discover your capture is ineligible because your membership has lapsed. I look forward to catching up with everyone at the clubhouse, on the water, or at the weigh station in the coming weeks. Tightlines President Glenn Wright
FROM THE PRESIDENT
Download your New Member Application Here https://sgfc.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/sgfc-Membership-2026.pdf
Welcome to July and the start of a new membership year at Sydney Game Fishing Club. This month you’ll notice our new look magazine cover, designed by Jamie Mackay and Stephen Pitchfork. As the financial year rolls around, it is time for membership renewals. If you have not already done so, please ensure your membership invoice is paid promptly. Remember, you must be a current financial member to participate in the Tuna Slam, which is currently underway and runs through to 29 August. Our Annual Presentation Lunch will be held on Sunday, 30 August, where we will celebrate the outstanding achievements of our members and recognise all trophy winners from the season, including the winners of this year's Tuna Slam. The Tuna Slam is just one of the many benefits of being a Sydney Game Fishing Club member. Along with access to exclusive discounts from our valued sponsors, members enjoy something truly unique – our clubhouse. Sydney Game Fishing Club is the only game fishing club in Australia with its own weigh station, fish cleaning facilities, BBQ area, kitchen, bar, and it's also full of Game fishing history. Once you receive your 2026/27 membership card, please remember to add it to your digital wallet so it is always available when needed. Present your membership card to receive discounts and benefits from our fantastic sponsors, including: Otto's Tackle World, Fishing Station, Assent Marine, IBW Constructions, Birkenhead Point Marina - 15cents per litre off the bowser price, D'Albora Marina The Spit, Marina Bayside, Pelagic, Furuno, Pantaenius Don't forget to show your club colours proudly by wearing your Sydney Game Fishing Club apparel whenever you're out on the water or attending club events. Fishing Report Sydney Game Fishing Club has once again enjoyed an outstanding season and continued its dominance throughout the Central Zone Series. Congratulations to all our members who achieved exceptional results, including: Champion Club Tag & Release Sydney Game Fishing Club - Champion Boat Tag & Release – WAWA - Champion Male Angler Tag & Release – Nicco Marsh - Champion Female Capture Michelle Eagle - Champion Junior Capture Flynn Vernon - Heaviest Tuna Michelle Eagle
Calendar of Events SGFC July 2026 1st - SFGC Tuna Slam continues + Winter Pointscore 4th - Club Meeting 25th - Committee Meeting August 2026 1st - SFGC Tuna Slam continues + Winter Pointscore 1st - Club Meeting Hypertension lures talk 29th - Tuna Slam Ends 29th - Committee Meeting 30th Sunday SGFC Club Presentation Lunch September 2026 1st - Winter Pointscore 5th - Club Meeting + Annual General Meeting 19th - Start Summer Point Score 26th - Committee Meeting
22nd 23th
2026-2027 Memberships renewals are now due, Renew your membership now and enjoy another great season
Membership Renewal 2026 - 2027
Southern Bluefin Tuna 2023 - Finfinder 120kg 2024 - Margarita 107.4kg 2025 - WAWA 76kg
The SGFC Tuna Slam runs from 1st. June until midnight 29th August 2026. To enter you must contact the club secretary (0402 615 814 ) via phone call, txt message or email (secretary@sgfc.com.au), you MUST do this before heading out to sea. The Entry fee of $300 per boat covers the 3 months of June, July and August. To weigh a fish, a minimum of 30 mins notice must be given to the weighmaster during the week and longer if possible on the weekend. Karen Wright is the weigh master (0407) 557 705. If she is not available call the club secretary. All Tuna must meet NSWGFA minimum weights. Please note all tuna points go towards your winter pointscore and to SGFC totals for NSWGFA. Updates of fish weight will be posted on Members Facebook page Fishing boundaries... Northern Boundary : 33.05.000S Southern Boundary : 35.15.000S Current Prize pool stands at $3,640 Who will be crowned Tuna slam winners for 2026
Who will be Crowned this years Tuna slam winners, the board will updated with all previous winners
TUNA SLAM Honour Board
Yellowfin Tuna 2018 - Sammy-jay 34.8kg 2020 - Obsession 55.1kg 2021 - Groundswell 57.4kg 2022 - Sammy-Jay 38kg 2023 - Sammy -Jay 68.8kg 2024 - Jigsaw 61.5kg 2025 - Connoisseur 66kg
GOLD HOOK
Some of the unusual little seahorses we find inside the stomachs of yellowfin tuna.
As humans, the marine life we see and know is often limited by how we observe the ocean. Many of the species most familiar to us live in shallow waters, where we can encounter them while snorkelling, diving, or walking along the shoreline or, species that we catch while fishing – recreational or commercial. Despite our seemingly endless ways to observe and harvest marine life, a few species still slip through the cracks. These can include smaller species too small to fit in the mesh of a net; species that live too deep for longlines but not close enough to the bottom to be caught in trawls; or species that hide within structure and rarely venture out. Just because we humans struggle to find or observe these species doesn’t mean fish do. Yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares) are notorious for finding weird and wonderful creatures that most people never encounter. Equipped with gill rakers, they can filter feed through schools of plankton and hoover up all sorts of tiny organisms. Tuna are also known to make incredibly deep dives and feed in the mesopelagic zone – the strange part of the ocean between 200 and 1,000 metres deep. Recently, after opening large numbers of yellowfin stomachs, we began finding fish and crustaceans well outside our identification skills and needed to enlist the big guns at the Australian Museum. We thought it might be a big ask to bring them jars full of tiny crustaceans and strange fish. However, when they read our request, they were overjoyed. It turns out that many new species and incredibly rare specimens have been discovered nowhere else but from inside fish stomachs, once again highlighting the remarkable ability of fish to collect things where humans cannot. To mention just a few of the highlights we've already found: a potentially new species of shrimp never before seen by science (still to be confirmed); the larval stage of a mantis shrimp that had not been recorded by scientists since the 1960s (the last specimen also came from a fish stomach, this time a kingfish); rare pelagic seahorses that we know little about and assume live amongst floating weed; and a plethora of other crab larvae that are rarely seen or collected.
Yellowfin aren’t the only fish with a knack for finding the weird and wonderful. An increasing number of researchers are no longer opening fish stomachs to study diet, the but instead are using them as tools to sample ocean biodiversity. Studies have used bluefin stomachs to investigate the biodiversity of deep-water squid and found species never caught by anglers, or opened dolphinfish stomachs to study cryptic fish communities that hide in floating sargassum. Of course, as anglers, the more common dietary items of yellowfin are probably more relevant for lure selection and even finding fish. Slimies, sauries, flying squid, lanternfish, garfish, frigate and bullet tuna, yakkas, and many more are all common in yellowfin diet. In a future article, I’ll discuss the most important prey items in yellowfin and their preferred diet. In the meantime, it might be worth throwing a seahorse lure over some patches of floating crab larvae. Yellowfin certainly seem to like them!
Yellowfin tuna like their food “rare” Tristan Guillemin
The contents of a yellowfin tuna stomach with a mix of deepwater lanternfish, larval crabs, small paper nautilus, and juvenile tropical fish species.
The contents of a yellowfin tuna stomach with over 200 little crustaceans, including juvenile mantis shrimp, juvenile crabs, various amphipod species and even a 30cm lancet fish – a toothy predator from the mesopelagic.
As the nor'easter strengthened and the moon began to rise, the fish became more aggressive. After several missed hook-ups I finally connected to a big yellowfin. I saw it thrashing on the surface with my Daiwa Cuddler in its mouth and knew it was special. Forty-five minutes later I landed my personal best—a magnificent 65kg yellowfin. Jamie: What boat do you fish from and where do you like to fish? Grayson: I fish from a Haines Hunter V16R. Between my mates we have two of them. They're small, deep-vee boats that handle chop well but have obvious limitations with space and stability. Their biggest advantage is that we can launch from smaller ramps where bigger boats often can't. Where I fish depends almost entirely on what RipCharts is showing. I'm always looking for temperature breaks, slack current, altimetry lines and, most importantly, signs of birds and bait on the day. Jamie: What's your preferred tackle? Grayson: I use an 8-foot Dramatic 15kg casting rod matched with a Daiwa Saltist MQ 14000. It's affordable, has plenty of drag and line capacity, and is lighter than the larger models. I spool it with 75lb braid and fish at least 120lb leader. Jamie: Favourite lures? Grayson: I mainly fish floating stickbaits between 180-230mm. The Daiwa Cuddler is excellent value because it comes fitted with quality hooks, although I did pull the through-wire out of one on that 65kg fish. I've also caught tuna on a cheap 200mm Temu stickbait with upgraded hooks and seen mates catch them on homemade lures. Poppers definitely have their place, particularly when fish ignore stickbaits, but stickbaits remain my first choice. I also carry a smaller lure for times when tuna are feeding on redbait or other small baitfish. Jamie: What conditions do you look for? Grayson: Weather is the biggest factor, especially fishing from a small boat, so I cross-check several forecasts before every trip. The best topwater bite I've experienced was around the new moon, with the fish becoming noticeably more aggressive as the moon rose in the afternoon.
Jamie Mackay talks to Bondi surfer, spearo and keen topwater angler Grayson Hinrichs about targeting tuna off Sydney. Jamie: When did you first get into topwater fishing? Grayson: I'd wanted to chase tuna consistently for years but never had my own boat. A couple of years ago a mate bought a small but capable boat, which let us target yellowfin seriously. A lot of friends had already become addicted to topwater fishing, so I bought my own outfit and started asking plenty of questions. I landed my first topwater yellowfin in June last year off Narooma, and from then on I was hooked. Jamie: How does topwater compare with trolling or cubing? Grayson: Topwater tuna fishing is the most exhilarating style of fishing I've experienced—provided you can find the fish. I've spent countless hours trolling lures hoping to hear a 50-wide scream, but topwater is completely different. You can spend hours idling in one area waiting for fish to show. Some people think trolling is more productive, and in many ways it is because you've always got lures in the water. But once you learn to read birds, bait and current lines, topwater becomes incredibly engaging. Watching tuna crash a lure you've cast is far more exciting than waiting for a blind strike while trolling. Jamie: What's your proudest topwater tuna capture? Grayson: Last August I caught the fish I'd always dreamed about. On a Friday night I spotted an incredible pocket of water off Ulladulla on RipCharts. My mate was overseas, so I borrowed his 16-foot boat, drove through the night and arrived just before midnight. The next morning I broke down outside the ramp because of corroded battery terminals, but after a quick fix we headed offshore. We found hundreds of thousands of muttonbirds and gannets working bait. By 10am my mate landed his first topwater yellowfin—a 40kg fish on a homemade stickbait.
TOP WATER TUNA TACTICS
Most of my topwater fish have come from 17-19°C water, while trolling fish have generally come from warmer water around 19.5-21°C. Temperature breaks are critical, and I often see tuna jumping on the cooler side rather than in the warm current. Jamie: What signs tell you tuna are nearby? Grayson: Birds and bait are the obvious starting point. It's tempting to put the trolling spread out, but staying ready to cast is often the difference between seeing fish and catching them. Sometimes a single high-flying gannet focused on something below is enough to investigate. Jumping sauries being chased are another great sign. Dolphins can be deceptive because they often look like tuna feeding, although I've caught tuna around dolphins and even seen yellowfin push bait against whales. If you can find birds, bait, temperature breaks and altimetry lining up, you've got a great chance. And one tip that surprises people—green water often fishes better than blue water. Jamie: You fish from a small boat. What safety advice would you give? Grayson: Fishing with a marine mechanic certainly helps! Beyond that, I never leave home without lifejackets, an EPIRB, VHF radio, PLB and all the required safety gear. I avoid fishing solo whenever possible, but if I do, I wear a safety line attached to the boat. When fighting a fish alone I always leave the boat in neutral. Landing a fish a little quicker is never worth risking your life. Jamie: Any final advice for anglers wanting to try topwater tuna this season? Grayson: Be ready. Always have a topwater outfit rigged and ready to cast because opportunities happen fast. Stay connected with other anglers, keep an eye on where the fish are moving and, most importantly, get out there and have a go. You won't catch one sitting on the couch.
Alex Durham’s 958-pound blue caught in 2013 set a 130-pound-class women’s world record at the time. While that record has since been broken, the passion for Kona that it ignited remains. Courtesy Nick Durham
“Kona had always been a fascinating place for me, not only because of its fishing, but because of its lure-making history,” Durham says. “Even as a teenager, I had this obsession with making lures, and Kona is where the first trolling lures were formed. After years of dreaming, we finally chartered a couple of boats in 2012 to just experience it for ourselves, and the following year Alex caught that world record you see on the wall behind me, with Capt. Chip Van Mols on the Monkey Biz II. After that fish, there was no going back. Kona became my obsession.”
From One Fish to a Historic Run: How Tantrum Dominated Kona’s 2025 Marlin Season From a life-changing blue marlin to a million-dollar season, the story behind Tantrum’s unforgettable year in Kona By David Ritchie December 31, 2025
Can one fish change the trajectory of your life? For Capt. Nick Durham—a towering yet affable Aussie who runs the charter boat Tantrum out of Kona’s Honokohau Harbor—the answer is a resounding yes. The fish in question was a 958-pound blue marlin caught by Durham’s wife, Alex, during her second trip to Kona in 2013. Not only did that fish set the 130-pound-class women’s world record at the time, but it also inspired the Durhams to uproot from Australia and start a new life together in Kona some six years later.
Tantrum gaffs a qualifying marlin during the Hawaii Marlin Tournament Series. The crew weighed three of four qualifying marlin in the 2025 series. Credit Carol Lynne
Prior to that trip, in between completing his university degree and a short but sweet stint in the corporate world, Durham had spent his adult life fishing as crew in Sydney, Port Stephens and the GBR in Australia, as well as in Tonga in the South Pacific. But after just one trip to Kona, he committed to at least one season crewing for any boat in the harbor that would take him. Fortunately, he ended up with one of the Kona greats, Jason Holtz aboard Pursuit. One season turned into two, then three. Ultimately, he crewed six years for Pursuit full time while freelancing on various boats in the harbor before he took the helm of Mike and Jodi Glimpse’s Tantrum in 2023. But it was during his time as a deckie aboard Island Girl a few years earlier that fate stepped in and he met charter angler Jeff Stafford. The two hit it off instantly. “We caught a couple of blues that first day, I think, but what I remember more is just enjoying the day with Nick,” Stafford recalls. “We liked the same music, had the same sense of humor. Everything just clicked, you know? By the end of the trip, our wives were making fun of us for our bromance.”
A Special Place While it was Kona’s lure-making mystique that initially captured Durham’s imagination and a single big fish that started his journey, it was the aura of Kona itself that hooked him for good. “What appeals to me about Kona is you can fish here all year-round for blue marlin,” Durham says. “And more importantly, you can come home to your family every single night. I value my family time. I want to be a good husband and dad. “If I wanted to fish for marlin full time in Australia, I’d have to be on the road most of the year—summer in Sydney or Port Stephens, winter on the Gold Coast, spring on the Reef. Here in Kona, I can fish all year and still pick my kid up from school in the afternoon. There’s nowhere else in the world you can do that.” Stafford got hooked on Hawaii much earlier. Owner of an electrical contracting firm in Las Vegas, he began chartering in Kona in 1986. A 400-pound blue on his first trip hooked him for life, and he’s been back countless times since. “Yeah, Kona is special,” he agrees. “You don’t need a passport. It’s safe; you can leave your family at a resort or a short-term rental and not worry. The water’s flat 95 percent of the time. And just knowing that the fish of a lifetime is out there swimming around —it’s hard to beat.”
As tall as he is friendly, Capt. Nick Durham is a towering figure at the helm. His tackle company, Tantrum Tackle Solutions, specializes in the gear needed to catch giant marlin on the troll. Courtesy HMTS / Lacey Hagler
Durham started developing handcrafted lures at the age of 18 and eventually launched Tantrum Lures as a commercial enterprise in 2017. Courtesy HMTS / Lacey Hagler
A Season of Domination Each year in Kona, a boat or two seem to get on a hot streak and separate themselves as the teams to beat. But no streak in recent memory compares to Tantrum’s 2025 campaign, when the team placed in seven of the eight Hawaii Marlin Tournament Series (HMTS) events, winning three. The team weighed three of the series’ four qualifying marlin, including a 715-pounder during the Kona Throw Down. That 715-pounder also ended up winning the inaugural Marlin Global Challenge (MGC), a yearlong winner-takes-all event with a guaranteed $100,000 purse for the largest tournament-caught blue marlin weighed by a registered team. Stafford registered Tantrum for the MGC the moment it was announced in the spring of 2025—a clear sign of the team’s confidence going into the season. That confidence was well founded. At season’s end, Tantrum finished the HMTS with just over 5,628 points—2,228 points ahead of second-place Five Star—and cash winnings totaling just under $1 million. In between HMTS stops, Tantrum also won top boat in The Pacific Cup, a five-day, 50-pound-tackle event based out of the Royal Kona Resort. And just two days before the Big Island Marlin Tournament in August, while Stafford took a day off to relax with family, tourist charter Chuck Landrum hired the boat for the day and hooked into a monster that tipped the scales at 1,039 pounds. It was Durham’s first grander as a captain—a career-defining moment. “This is only my third year as captain, so I don’t have a huge amount to compare it to,” Durham said during a celebration at the Papa Kona after the HMTS finale. “I’ve been doing this since I was 16, first as a hobby and then professionally. And even as a crewman, I don’t think I’ve ever been part of such an incredible run.”
Kimmy and Jeff Stafford pop the cork to celebrate a 566.5-pound blue that won the 2025 Skins Marlin Derby. Capt. Joe Byrum
Kona also played a role in shaping Stafford’s family story. “The first time I took my girlfriend, Kimmy, there in 2017, she cried as we left. I was like, ‘Oh yeah, this is the spot and this is the girl.’” The two married in 2019, and in 2022, when the flat just below the Durham residence came up for rent, Stafford grabbed it. Friends became neighbors. The two families merged into a cohesive unit, with the Staffords splitting time evenly between Kona and Vegas. Since 2023, when Durham took the helm of Tantrum—named after his lure and tackle brand—Stafford has become Durham’s best client. Along with mates Lee Findley and Nick Watson, the duo has formed a formidable team, fishing together at least 30 days annually in 2024 and 2025. Today, just five years since they met, that friendship has become the secret ingredient behind what both men call “a holy shit season” that will be hard to top.
While big fish at the scales get the headlines, Tantrum also consistently finishes at or near the top of the leaderboard for The Billfish Foundation’s annual tagging competition. In 2025, Durham and crew released 239 blue marlin, 19 striped marlin and 55 spearfish, most of which were tagged. Courtesy Capt. Nick Durham
www.tantrumlures.com
Friend or Client? When asked what fueled their 2025 success, both Durham and Stafford play the humble card like pros: any boat on any given day, just ran into the right fish, made the most of their shots. Boilerplate stuff, really. “A lot of people like to think there’s some secret,” Durham says. “For us, it comes down to the number of days we fish. A lot of this fleet splits time between owners and charters. We’re a busy charter operation, so we’re out there a lot. The amount of time we have on the water, especially leading up to tournament season, gives us momentum.” They both credit their time together in 2024 for setting up 2025. That year, Tantrum caught more than 350 blue marlin during Kona’s historic run of small fish, winning two HMTS events along the way. “The previous year was really good,” Stafford says. “We committed to fishing all the tournaments together that year, got our system dialed, and we caught some people’s attention. That momentum carried right into 2025.” So, at this point, is Stafford a friend or a client? Durham just laughs. “The coolest thing about this team is it feels like you’re just going fishing with your mates,” he says. “It doesn’t feel like you’ve got a client on board. I run a strategy by Jeff in the morning, and he’s always like: ‘Don’t worry about me. You just do what feels right.’ “As a captain, that’s huge. In tournaments, there is a lot of pressure to perform, but the last thing you want to worry about is whether the client is happy, or if you need to entertain him, or whether he is ready for the bite. With Jeff, none of that ever enters my mind, which is a huge weight off my shoulders.”
First mate Lee Findley, Capt. Nick Durham, and gaff/tag man Nick Watson powered Jeff Stafford’s victory as Hawaii Marlin Tournament Series champion in 2025. Not pictured: top trophies for The Pacific Cup and the inaugural Marlin Global Challenge. Courtesy HMTS / Lacey Hagler
Kona’s year-round fishery for blue marlin, set against the dramatic backdrop of the Big Island of Hawaii, attracts some of the world’s best anglers and crews. Calm conditions usually prevail, allowing omnidirectional sonar units to mark marlin from great distances. Courtesy HMTS / David Ritchie
Keys to Victory When pressed for specifics, both men cite the boat itself, a G&S 41, as a competitive advantage. Durham notes that Kona’s conditions—calm water, short runs—make smaller dayboats a valid option for serious charter operations. “G&S makes a robust fishing machine,” he says. “Look at all the famous record fishing operations through history: The Madam and The Hooker, the Hookin’ Bull, the French Look. They’ve all opted for G&S. This hull did a lot of record fishing in its previous life as Spirit of Pilar for Enrico Capozzi. There’s a reason record chasers go for these boats: maneuverability. I like driving like a lunatic on big fish. I get a lot of enjoyment out of it.” Durham also finds joy in constantly tinkering with his methods, adjusting drag settings, rpm for sound, lure selection, and every other aspect of preparing for a bite. “I don’t necessarily think we got way more shots than everyone else,” he says, “but I do think we were pretty good at making them count. That’s just been a case of refinement on the back of lots of hours on the water.”
September—which, right on cue, Tantrum won. LaGrone joined the crew, family and friends when tournament director, Lacey Hagler, presented their trophies on the Hawaii Big Game Fishing Club stage. Stafford’s path to victory has been long and winding, but it also showcases that in Kona, the winner’s circle is open to anyone. Find a crew that you click with and put in your time on the water. Success just might follow. And as for the bromance? It’s not slowing down anytime soon. With his share of the 2025 winnings, Stafford put a down payment on a home just down the street from Durham. The renter is now a resident, and after a season packed with big fish and bigger moments, Tantrum enters 2026 as the team to beat in Kona. How will they follow up this year’s success? “The plan is to not let victory defeat us,” Durham says. “We’ll come back hungry as ever next year.”
No Replacement for Teamwork Durham is quick to credit his team for his successful run. Findley, his first mate, is quiet but razor-sharp in the cockpit. Watson, who joins during tournaments as the gaff and tag man, also brings strong mechanical skills, adding muscle and experience when it matters most. “I’d much rather have a great team than a team of greats,” Durham says. “As talented as these guys are, the real magic is how well they blend together as a great team.” And, of course, none of it happens without Stafford in the chair. “I try to be the best weak link I can be,” he laughs, in his typical self-deprecating fashion. An extrovert with a quick smile and a disarming charm, Stafford nonetheless carries a competitive chip on his shoulder. “We have some serious fun, but we take our fun seriously,” he says, as if citing a personal ethos. He carries a strong competitive drive into everything he does, from business to coaching his son’s little league team and now to tournament fishing. “This all really started in Cabo San Lucas,” he says. “It was only a two-hour flight from Vegas. I’d fly down Friday afternoon, fish for stripeys all day Saturday and Sunday morning, and be home for work on Monday. After that, I started doing the Central America thing and stumbled onto a really good team in Costa Rica.” That team was the ACY 63 Stephanie Lee, captained by Tony Carrizosa. He happened to hire one of the sport’s best, Capt. John LaGrone, as a freelance mate the same year that Stafford arrived. “Standing next to Johnny in the cockpit for 10, 12 hours a day, day after day—you can’t help but learn,” he says. “We swept the dailies in the Los Sueños Signature Triple Crown back when they were two-day tournaments. It wasn’t the same thrill as feeling 65 pounds of drag on a 130 like we fish in Hawaii, but getting 50 or 60 shots a day provides a lot of practice and perspective. You get over the missed ones quick and focus on execution. That experience made me a better fisherman.” Stafford chose a different path than his peers. “I’ve been tempted to buy my own boat and settle somewhere,” he says. “But I decided to spend my money chartering the best teams at the best places instead, getting a strong education along the way. Dead bait, bait-and-switch, lure-fishing for blues, live-baiting for blacks—that diversity of experience has made me a more well-rounded angler.” Late in 2025, Stafford paid homage to LaGrone by inviting him to fish as a guest aboard Tantrum during the HMTS finale—the It’s a Wrap Tournament in
PH100 Paul Barning Memorial Tournament 2026 Proudly Sponsored by Seakeeper!
Saturday morning was something truly special, with all the boats, families and friends lining the esplanade for the shotgun start. A moment that won't be forgotten anytime soon. thank you Everyone!! Not long after lines in, club boat Teaser got the action started, capturing an incredible 247kg Blue Marlin on 37kg line — an amazing fish and so close to taking out the $200K prize. There were some outstanding captures across the weekend, including: Wet Dream — 239kg Whaler Razorback — 225kg Mako Junior angler Annilise on Ally Hunter — 93kg Blue Marlin …and plenty more great fish landed and released. Saturday night at the Royal Motor Yacht Club Woolooware was fantastic. We can't thank the club enough for their ongoing support, incredible facilities and staff. With over 200 people at the presentation on a Sunday night, it really shows what our club and its people are all about — something pretty special. A huge thank you to all of our amazing sponsors, especially Seakeeper and Shimano Australia — your support makes this event possible. Results: Champion Boat – Tag & Release Billfish Wawa — 5 billfish (5 on 15kg, 1 on 60kg) — 65,000 points $10,000 + prizes Runner Up – Tag & Release Billfish Kalasta — 4 billfish on 15kg — 46,000 points $3,000 + prizes 3rd Place – Tag & Release Billfish Black Listed — 2 fish on 37kg, 1 on 60kg — 24,500 points $1,500 + prizes Champion Boat Capture Razorback — 2 Mako (98.5kg on 8kg & 223.5kg on 15kg) — 21,000 points $10,000 + prizes Runner Up Boat Capture Wet Dream — 239kg Whaler (15kg) — 14,280.25 points $3,000 + prizes 3rd Place Boat Capture Teaser — 247kg Blue Marlin — 9,895.35 points $1,500 + prizes Champion Lady Angler – Tag & Release Hayley Bonicci - Prizes. Champion Lady Angler – Capture Hayley Bonicci — $2,000 Hermes Voucher Champion Junior Angler – Capture Ally Hunter — Blue Marlin
Champion Boat Tag & Release Huge congratulations to Team WAWA on taking out Champion Boat Tag & Release at the Port Hacking GFC tournament! Paul Barning Memorial With 50 boats and some sporting conditions out on the water, this was an outstanding achievement. Well done again to Team WAWA @porthackinggfc @nswgfacentralzone #gamefishingtournaments #TagAndRelease
Champion Junior Capture Angler at the Port Hacking GFC tournament Paul Barning Memorial Congratulations to Analiesn Aslanian on Ally Hunter — 93kg Blue Marlin fishing her first tournament and taking it out.
Mon to Fri: 6.30am - 3.30pm Sat: 7.00am to 12.00pm
SAINTLY WHISPERS