The one that got away in the SFA

On an early September morning, five people boarded a fishing boat bound for the wide-open waters that lie to the north of Saipan with one goal in mind: to catch the biggest fish possible before 6pm.

This wasn’t just any morning in the Fall, this was Sunday, Sept. 12, the final day of the 20th Annual Saipan International Fishing Tournament, and Lt. Gov. Diego Benavente, wife Vicky, brother Ronald, Gene Weaver, and Joe Taijeron were on a mission.

Early into their voyage, the crew of the Victoria had a bountiful harvest of tuna. In fact, the team hauled in over 100 lbs of tuna before the boat’s captain decided that he had seen enough, and was ready to go after a much bigger catch.

“It was nice. We were catching three or four at a time. We were just going crazy on them. It was like boom, boom, boom, boom,” said Weaver.

Trolling the seas to the north of Marpi Reef, the captain of the Victoria finally got his wish. At 12:45pm, one of the boat’s five lines hooked onto something big. It was a marlin that had found its way to the striker, the smallest of all of the lines.

“I knew that it was a big fish; even when we first hooked up, that it was between 500-1,000 lbs, and in the back of my mind, I knew that we needed at least four, maybe five hours to fight that, and we really didn’t have that,” said Diego.

For the next two hours and 15 minutes, Ronald, Gene, and Joey took turn reeling in the monster marlin, while Diego kept the rod straight and the beast behind them by manning the wheel because the Victoria doesn’t have a chair. By Weaver’s account, the trio rotated an exhausting 21 times at the reel.

Three times the crew spent an hour to bring in roughly 90 percent of the 1,000 yds. of line, only to see the fish look up at the boat and take off with another 90 percent.

“After an hour of pulling it back, inch-by inch, he decides to go and takes the line. There’s nothing you can do, you’ve just got to let him take,” said the captain.

This was not the first time that Benavente hooked a marlin, and he spoke of a blue marlin in his collection that was over 400 lbs. He had heard of a lot of fish that were caught above that required at least 4-5 hours to be brought in successfully.

Time was passing by rapidly during the fighting, and the captain had to weigh the crew’s chances of tiring out the marlin against the time that it would take to return to Smiling Cove.

“At about 3pm I told the guys that we were going to have to start risking it, and though the fish was still not ready to come in, still not tired, still very green,” said Diego.

The captain felt that his team had to start taking the risks and take the gamble of reeling the fish in early because, at the time, he was sure that they needed at least two hours to get back into the marina in time to qualify by 6pm.

“I asked them to start dragging it in and to get to it. I told the guys to try to bring in a green fish, that we’d try to gaff it, and try to bring it in the boat and qualify. When we were reeling it in, my instructions were to make sure that we have at least two guys on the leader wire, so the two guys that grabbed onto the 250-lbs leader wire were my brother Ronald and Gene.”

The marlin was so powerful, that with the two strong guys holding the leader, he swam from the back of the boat toward the front of the boat, and just kept going.

“These guys just held on until it snapped. Normally when you get to the leader, you have a thick enough leader where you can turn that guy’s head and bring it back, and I was standing by with a gaff, ready to gaff him if they brought that fish’s head back to the boat. He didn’t turn that head, he just swam away slowly. Even after it snapped, he just swam away—like one motion,” said Diego.

According to witnesses, there was only about 8-9 inches of a 20’ leader remaining when the fish broke off. Whether or not the leader wrapped around the fish during a roll, chances are that this was definitely a sizeable marlin.

“It was heartbreaking. I don’t think that the team has recovered from that loss. Every time I think about it I get that sick feeling in my stomach. We had a very good chance of bringing that fish in.”

Weaver said that he knew that the team did all that they could with the marlin, considering the deadline to qualify for the tournament.

“The only thing that we could’ve done differently would have been to hook the fish earlier. The marlin was real green and he was going to do whatever he wanted to do. No questions about it,” he said.

To battle so well for so long, and to come up empty understandably leaves a competitor of any sport with a feeling of sorrow.

The Lt. Gov. explained what bothers him most about the adventure: “I guess what really hurts so much is that we have put in a lot of work and practice by going out there and preparing for this. It’s also something that we look forward to every year because it’s such an exciting tournament. All year round we’re looking forward to this trip—getting the boat ready, getting the reels ready, getting the guys ready—and we were that close,” said the captain.

Though the tournament has passed, and the prize has already been awarded, the Lt. Gov. is not ready to let the marlin go just yet. After spending the better part of his free time in the past year working on getting the Victoria ready, he plans on heading back out onto the seas in search of the one that got away.

“We are going to go looking for him. We know exactly which area, we know what he likes, and we will find him there. This time, we’ll take our time, and if we have to come in at 9-10pm, we will bring him home—we will wait until he is good and ready to get in the boat.”