LOWRANCE SOUTH AFRICA Issue 24 | Page 38

THE LIGHT TACKLE BOAT CHAMPIONSHIP (February 9th-18th) Many thanks to Joseph van Huyssteen, who wrote this article – from which we’ve taken excerpts! The Light Tackle Boat Angling leg of the games took place in Mosselbay over a six-day period with Day 1 and 2 set aside as practice days. This time round only the Senior South African, Namibian and Zimbabweans teams were represented. As part of this Games, a festival competition was also held, with two Ladies and one Invitational Senior Team - consisting of Protea anglers who’d previously fished in the senior team. More about the fun part of the competition later. Victorious Protea Side – World Games LTBA winners SALTBAA has been attempting for years to anchor LTB angling on the FIPS-M world calendar and this competition was a showcase to achieve this long-time goal. FIPS-M sent two people to evaluate our style of fishing and they were impressed with the amount and size of fish landed on 4kg line. The LTB angling rules were adapted to be more fish friendly which resulted in no gaffing at all, completely taking the blood sport element out of it. Furthermore, in the FIPS-M tradition, only the allocated bait given to every angler could be used, which had the anglers complaining bitterly about the amount. In the end it worked out well. Catches mostly consisted of Hammerhead and Hound Sharks but a few edibles were also in the mix. Landing big fish with a scoop net is not easy and congratulations to Arend Brink from Namibia for his Cob of 30kg and Anton Williams for landing a 21Kg Diamond Ray. These were the two biggest fish of the competition. As the favourites, the South African senior team did us proud to walk away with the gold medal but on Day 2 Namibia came close. Zimbabwe won Day 4 clinching the silver medal.