tournament program

A Sabalo is a Tarpon
(Megalops Atlanticus),

they can be 2 or 3 meters long and can weight over 90 kilos... and could fight you for hours!

The Veracruz Yacht Club holds this year its XXXV annual Tarpon Tournament...

Below, there is a list of past Tournament Queens, some of them might even be grandmothers by now.

In this same list you will find past Champions and weights of Tarpon they hooked to win the Tournament.

Club record is a Tarpon of 91.000 kilos (abt 200 pounds) set during 1994 Tournament.
 

YEAR	Queen	CHAMPION	TARPON wt. in Kilos
1966	Rosalia Malpica Mancera	Manuel Beltrani Nájera	61.600
1967	Virginia Ruíz Ortíz	Camilo Requejo Alvarez	70.000
1968	Ma. Emma Lambreton	Santiago Schleske Sánchez	72.000
1969	Ma. Eugenia Bracamontes	Hugo Mabarak Palacios	71.000
1970	Lourdes Malpica	Luis Requejo Alvarez	52.200
1971	Maribel Barquin	Francisco Mantecón Alvarez	56.800
1972	Marina Mabarak Palacios	Santiago Schleske Sánchez	52.100
1973	Martha Schleske	Felipe Fernández Ceballos	58.000
1974	Alicia Urgueola Graham	Abelardo Coello de Jesús	27.200
1975	Nelly Fernández Ceballos	Camilo Requejo Alvarez	67.600
1976	Ma. Eugenia Mabarak Palacios	Raúl González Jiménez	45.000
1977	Guadalupe Pazos de la Torre	Valentín Ruiz Ortiz	48.000
1978	Ma. del Pilar Mabarak Palacios	Luis Requejo Alvarez	68.000
1979	Elvira Lucia Ruiz Ortiz	José Barquín Sáinz	47.600
1980	Margarita Rementeria del P.	Abelardo Coello de Jesús	71.200
1981	Ma. del Carmen González de M.	Jorge Sempé Minvielle	63.800
1982	n/a	Aurora Alvarez de Sempé	75.900
1983	n/a	void
1984	Marisol Aja Otegui	Iván Gutiérrez Zamora	50.000
1985	n/a	Máximo Velázquez	86.000
1986	n/a	void
1987	Georgina Malpica Ortiz	Eugenio Collado	88.400
1988	Martha Requejo Rodríguez	Ramón Abascal Zamora	88.200
1989	Lilia Rodríguez Melgarejo	José Lezama Torres	82.200
1990	Mercedes Martinez Schleske	Manuel Rodríguez Pignol	71.000
1991	Ma. de Lourdes Requejo Pereda	void
1992	Ma. Verónica González Díaz Mirón	Luis Requejo Alvarez	64.400
1993	Mariana Pazos Gómez	José Martínez Gómez	74.000
1994	Elda Schleske Shepard	Luis Requejo Rodríguez	91.000
1995	Ivonne Pazos Navarrete	José Raúl Delgadillo Vázquez	80.000
1996	Mariola Gil Lastra	Manuel Rodríguez Pignol	85.000
1997	Ma. Eugenia Deschamps Santillan	Gerardo Gil Lastra	79.100
1998	Mariola González Núñez	Carlos Maroño Acosta	79.000
1999	Perla Celeste Sánchez Machin
2000	?	José Diaz vega	88.300

Excerpts from Capt. Robert McCue's:

"Research of the tarpon fish has been minimal compared to some other species of fish. This is because tarpon has no food value. In Florida for instance, most of the tarpon research has been funded by private funds and via the state's revenue generated by the sale of Florida tarpon tags.

Tarpon are prehistoric animals, traveling the warm seas back as far as 125 million years ago. They are one of the few fish known to possess an air bladder. This unique organ allows them to actually breath from the atmosphere. They obtain this air by "rolling" on the surface and taking a gulp. Tarpon use this exclusive feature to survive in fresh water and oxygen depleted, stagnant waters.

The air bladder plays a key roll in the survival in juvenile tarpon life, permitting them to exist and mature in places where only they can survive, thus preventing their natural enemies from reaching them. The air bladder is a gift to tarpon anglers from the fish gods. Tarpon rolling makes finding and fishing a wee bit easier.

Shortly after the first moon in spring, adult tarpon begin to show up along our coast. Some speculate tarpon migrate north from the Keys. I too believe some fish do make this migration. However, I theorize they also migrate from the continental shelf 125 miles offshore, where they winter in the warm waters of the Gulf Loop, or perhaps they come straight from the Yucatan, Mexico due west.

During this early spring show, tarpon most often enter the large bays of Tampa and Charlotte Harbor,  and the first grass flats inside major passes. These waters are most often a few degrees warmer than the still chilly gulf and supply the food source for these hungry fish. The migration continues all through April, May and June all along our beaches, passes and flats. This migration to the shoreline is related to some sort of pre spawn ritual.

Tarpon often display a courtship in which they "mill" or "daisy chain." Often they are very much preoccupied in the show of affection, and can be very temperamental, particularly around the major moon phases. During these moon phases many of these tarpon break off and head offshore to spawn near the continental shelf. I believe they make the journey quickly, all the while more tarpon are moving in. The spawned out tarpon will return inshore a few days later after completing their business. Tarpon are true lunar fish"...

. ..... well.... if you are a Tarpon fan you'd better pay a visit to Capt. Robert McCue's site by clicking his logo image above right.

But then again back in Veracruz, you could also get hold of some of these big fish.