As the IGFA Great Marlin Race prepares to begin on its third continent – Australia – co-chairs Jason Schratwieser of the IGFA and Dr. Randy Kochevar of Stanford University are already enthused about the outcomes. “These are the kind of results we dreamed about when we first launched the Great Marlin Race program back in 2009,” Kochevar has said.
They have good reason to be so excited: the last satellite tag to pop up from the first IGMR event in San Juan, Puerto Rico in September of 2011 surfaced 4,776 nautical miles from where it had first been deployed in a blue marlin. “This may be one of the longest, if not the longest, marlin tracks ever recorded on an electronic tag,” Kochevar continued. “To have a marlin swim from the Caribbean all the way across the Atlantic and across the Equator to Africa reminds us how much we still have to learn from them.”
The good news continued in February, when the IGMR took place during the South African Deep Sea Angling Association Classic. The first IGMR satellite tag ever to be deployed in the Southern hemisphere was sent out in a blue marlin by Riann Chalmers aboard Big W on the first fishing day. A second satellite tag was deployed by Eric Visser in another blue on the second fishing day, but rough conditions prevented more from going out during the event. Although the tournament has ended, local anglers will continue to deploy the tags until all of the sponsored tags are at sea.
The IGMR action is continuing this month in Australia during the Australian International Billfish Tournament and the Gamex Billfish Tournament. Updates can always be found at http://igmr.igfa.org.
