Another hot, tough day of fishing in the 55th annual Iberia Rod & Gun Club Saltwater Fishing Rodeo was rewarded around 1:30 p.m. Saturday when something big bit the dead croaker on the business end of his fishing line at an undisclosed location. Oubre, captain of Absolut Addiction, a 24-foot Fish Master, set the hook and reeled in a 36.2-pound redfish that moved into first place in the Inside Division.
That redfish, as it turned out, was 0.1 pounds heavier than one brought in earlier by the bull red master himself, Chris Kapp Jr. Kapp dropped by fishing rodeo headquarters and bumped his own 34.8-pound bull red he caught Friday into second place with a 36.1-pounder.
  
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However, Oubre, whose crew included Treve Oubre, Tee Blue Landry, Jason Broussard and Tookie Lasseigne, wasn’t counting on his catch to move into first place.
“Nope. We weighed it and the redfish weighed 34 pounds in the boat. I never imagined,” he said.
Will Oubre’s 36.2-pounder be a winner worth a cash prize when the scales close on the three-day fishing rodeo at 1 p.m. today?
“I hope so. We’ll find out tomorrow,” said the veteran fisherman who was in much better spirits before leaving fishing rodeo headquarters.
Late Friday afternoon, after a frustrating day on the water, he said, “They just never turned on where we were. We don’t know what we’re doing tomorrow.”
What they did Saturday morning was ride through Southwest Pass, fish all the way to the east and then all the way back to the west to catch three bull reds, including the big one, a 32-pounder and a 28-pounder.
Mostly, though, they hooked and got rid of many gafftopsail catfish and sharks.
“We couldn’t find speck (speckled trout) one. That’s what we fished for all morning,” Oubre said.
Inside Division competitors had mixed reviews on fishing conditions and success on the second day of the event, a day that started with boats waiting for fishing rodeo officials to open the scales at 10 a.m. It was a busy start, weighmaster Mackie Boudreaux said.
“This morning we had a couple of Runabouts and a couple of Offshore boats come in. The next thing you know, it’s 1 o’clock,” Boudreaux said after the scales closed at 6 p.m.
“It flew by,” IR&GC fishing rodeo chairman Chad LeBlanc said about the morning rush. “They had boats waiting for us when we got here.”
One of those boats rewrote the leaderboard in the Runabout Division. Southern Hunter, skippered by the fisherman who won the Runabout Division’s Boat Captain’s Award in 2007, Brennan Bishop, dominated the second day of action like few boats have in the fishing rodeo’s history.
Bishop’s crew -- which included his father, Bret Bishop, defending Runabout Division Best All-Around Fisherman and brother Christopher Bishop, Brandon Walmsley, John Bishop and Corbin Bishop -- stuck 19 of a possible 30 fish on the leaderboard. Eight of them were first-place fish going into the third and last day and four of them belonged to Christopher Bishop.
Mike O’Brien added another speckled trout to the leaderboard Saturday and padded his lead in the race for the Inside Division’s Best All-Around Fisherman. O’Brien weighed in a 3.9-pound speckled trout that moved into second place behind his first-place speckled trout of 5.4 pounds, which he caught Friday.
O’Brien continues to set the pace for the individual title with 469 points, comfortably ahead of Riley Muffoletto, with 308 points, and Ryan Bonin, with 247 points.
No Mo Money still has the inside track, by a landslide, for the Boat Captain’s Award. Skipper Heith St. Germain’s crew built up the lead Friday and goes into the last day with 662 points, followed by Priority 1, with 308 points, and Oubre’s Absolut Addiction, with 289 points.
Caleb Evans and Austin Lipari made the most impact on the Junior Division leaderboards Saturday, although Taylor Hebert kept her lead for the Best All-Around Fisherman.
Evans, fishing with his father, Bo Evans, weighed a 31.5-pound redfish that took over first place and bumped Hebert’s 26.8-pounder into second. Evans also had a third-place redfish at 23.2 pounds and two third-place fish when the scales closed Saturday.
Austin, who went out with his father, Brian Lipari, put first- and second-place speckled trout on the leaderboard at 3.30 and 2.80 pounds, respectively.
Hebert’s accumulated two-day total in the point standings grew to 569 points. Evans moved into second place with 435 points and Wesley Arnold with 318 points.
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