Bob Morris and Jamie Havard circa 2001I got into the game in 1996 with the Jacksonville Jaguars triple challenge tournament which was put on by Grady Warren who had run a couple of "slam" tournaments previously where anglers fished for redfish, trout, and flounder.
This particular tournament had a VIP event and I fished that with my longtime friend and current tournament partner Capt. Jamie Havard. We were both greenhorns back then but felt that we were pretty good armed with a jig/curly tail and a Mirrolure rolling in my Hewes 16 Bayfisher. Unfortunately, we didn't get a limit and donated our entry to Mike Phillips who took the prize of a rigged Ranger Boat.
Another buddy of mine, Ted Berkstresser, was a heavyweight on the SKA Kingfish circuit but he also liked inshore fishing. I told him about our bad day in the VIP tourney and he suggested that we join up to fish the general event on Saturday. I agreed and we went on to nail down a 6th place finish in the Slam division using a combination of live finger mullet and hard plastic lures. With a nice paycheck, the spark ignited and 13 years later I'm still fired up about tournaments.
Grady Warren continued to run the triple challenge format events every spring and fall and I fished them all with either Ted or Jamie and we always managed some kind of check but never a win. In the meantime, Scott Aston had started the Inshore Fishing Tour which was a live bait/artificial lure points series and I fished that with Ted. We did pretty well and cashed a few checks - I particularly remember a cold weather March event where we took 4th but finished behind 3 of Jacksonville's best (at the time) - Jeff Dry, Mike Phillips, and Roger Bump who all weighed in monster trout between 6-9 lbs.
In 2000, the birth of professional redfishing occurred when the all artificial lures IFA Redfish Tour was launched by Grady Warren in Jacksonville. Capt. Chip Wingo teamed up with me for that one and we were big on the Mirrolure Top Dog which was relatively new to the scene. Looking back, we were too into it because we both threw it all day long and had numerous blow ups but no hook ups. It was one of my only "skunks" in a pro level tournament.... We travelled to Titusville, St. Augustine, and Sarasota that year but never cashed a check. It was, however, cool to get outside of Jax and see some different waters.
In 2001, I decided to run the Redfish Tour full time and hit all of the events. I had a new Hewes 18 LT with a 150 Yammie so I was ready to roll but I didn't have a committed partner. So, I took whoever could go which included my lucky Irish neighbor Danny Hoey who was a longtime surfer and fisherman but had little lure fishing experience. He was a fun guy to travel with which is half of the battle when you're on the circuit which was nice. We did Key Largo and Sarasota together and then made the ride right after 9/11 to Lafitte to win the first ever pro redfish tournament in Louisiana. The other tour stops were Tampa, Venice, Titusville, and Port Charlotte so a lot of miles were logged on the Chevy.
The Jax boys were pretty solid on tour with guys like Jeff Dry, Larry Miniard, Rick Thacker, Jim Romeka, and Bill Pittman all travelling and making money. I think a lot of our successes can be tied to the fact that we were ahead of the curve thanks to the Triple Challenge tournaments and the Inshore Fishing Tour series - a lot of our guys had several tournaments under their belts before hitting the road.
Thanks for reading - I will be continuing this history in upcoming blogs.
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