Supreme Champions: Team Supreme Reels In a Victory at the Bay Point Billfish Open
The Gulf Division’s Heaviest Hitters Make 2024 SFC Season Debut, Shake Up Division Leaderboard
Saturday night at the 2nd Annual Bay Point Billfish Open looked like there was a linen sale in the Gulf of Mexico, with all of the white and blue release flags raised high above Point South Marina, and one team reigned supreme when all of the flags were added up.
Capt. Chase Lake and Team Supreme took home the victory at a jam-packed open field with a whopping seven billfish releases, including five blue marlin, a white marlin and a sailfish.
“It was an incredible 72 hours on the water,” said Capt. Lake. “We worked around Thursday’s conditions and were able to get on ‘em on Friday and Saturday."
“It was a fiberglass battle on the water,” said Gregg Trenor, Team Partner of Southern Charm / All In. “We were riger to riger chasing the same marlin mark as Chase Lake and Team Supreme. It was a close battle all weekend long and unfortunately we couldn’t catch up to their early lead.”
Team Southern Charm / All In finished in second place with four blue marlin releases in the tournament, notching critical points for what quickly became a shuffling leaderboard in the SFC’s Gulf Division standings.
Both Team Supreme and Southern Charm All In made their 2024 SFC Season debuts in a field that included 81 of the top sport fishing teams in the Gulf of Mexico.
Home Made (3rd), Breathe Easy (4th), and the combination of Miss Ma’am (T-5), Panhandler (T-5) and Miss Mary (T-5) rounded out the top five in the catch-and-release division. Gulf powerhouse team A Work of Art also finished in the top ten with two blue marlin releases, a white marlin and a sailfish release – good for 8th Place.
SFC superstar Jaselyn Berthelot of team Rising Sons found the podium once-again, harvesting the yellowfin tuna that tipped the scales at 181.8 pounds and broke the tournament record for the heaviest tuna in competition history. Berthelot also walked away with the Bay Point Billfish Open’s “Top Lady Angler Award.”
And perhaps more importantly, team Rising Sons released a blue marlin in the tournament, good for T-14thplace – a clutch release that puts them 1,000 points ahead of Team Supreme in SFC’s Gulf Division.
SFC requires participation in two qualifying events in order to be eligible for the Gulf Division Championship and 12-team Zane Grey Championship Playoffs in Cabo San Lucas, MX. Three teams achieved that mark at the Bay Point Billfish Open – Rising Sons, Lifeline and Miss Maysen.
Teams in the Gulf Division still have two Qualifying Events remaining in the 2024 Season, including a “win and you’re in” competition at the Hurricane Hole Invitational, July 24-27, and the Gulf Division Championship which will be hosted at the Mobile Big Game Fishing Club’s Labor Day Invitational, August 29 – September 2.
Sport Fishing Championship heads into the “Northeast Atlantic Swing” next week with back to back-to-back Atlantic Division competitions tucked inside a 77 nautical mile radius. The first stop on the swing is the Oak Bluffs Bluewater Classic, July 9-13.
The 12-team Zane Grey Championship Playoffs will be a “tournament inside of a tournament,” hosted alongside the Zane Grey Championship Invitational in Cabo San Lucas, October 19-21. Invitational registration is available online at www.sportfishingchampionship.com, and the field will be limited to 30 of the league’s top teams – including the 12 teams selected to participate based on their 2024 SFC Season resume.
Media Contacts:
Courtney Hueston
Director of Marketing
305-335-2613
courtney@sportfishingchampionship.com