The 56-foot Viking Legacy and angler Richard Richardson brought a 972.7-pound blue marlin to the scales Friday at the Bastante John Uhr Memorial Billfish Tournament in Rockport.
The fish broke the state record held since 1988 by James Farrow, which weighed 876.5 pounds.
The big marlin hit a live tuna being trolled as bait. The fish was 137.5 inches long and had a girth of 74 inches.
The Legacy, based out of Houston, was captained by Kevin Deerman, along with owner George Gartner, of Houston; Galveston’s Jeff Owen and Cameron Plaag; Corpus Christi’s Michael Fitzpatrick; and Houston’s Richardson, Colin Ocker and Ruben Ramos.
“It hasn’t even sunk in,” Deerman said.
The fish was caught about 130 miles off of Port Aransas.
Deerman and the rest of the crew won’t have a lot of time to think about the last week — they are fishing the Poco Bueno tournament this weekend in Port O’Connor and the Lone Star Shootout several weeks from now.
Read the complete story on this awesome fish in the next issue of Lone Star Outdoor News, out Friday, July 25.
Photo by Larry Doorman.
1 comment
Wish they would of let it live!
Comments are closed.