BARRA OPEN presented by
Open on Lake Awoonga them and a week later they’re gone. When we are chartering, you nearly need to start from scratch every time,” he said. The team had found a couple of solid patterns the week leading up to the event – one on topwater frogs and another on deeper, schooling fish. Both patterns seemed to slow right down during the event. “The frog bite may have died due to boat traffic, but
Dean likes throwing Slick Rigs and Zerek Live Mullets to the more open water fish while Dean prefers to cast a Molix 140 Shad into the weed edges and rip them out. SAMAKI’S COMEBACK TO THIRD Team Samaki, Tommy Wood and Josh Lowry, donutted the first two days of competition, but a final day 4-fish bag (4/15, 41.13kg) rocketed them up to 3rd
BARRA AUSTRALIAN OPEN
last day that we ended up fishing a weed edge where the barra were hemming bait against the edge,” said Lowry, “The fish were biting the soft plastics as we cast them along or out from [and winding back into] the weed edge.” The bait of choice was a 6” paddle-tailed plastic with a 5/8oz head that Josh fished on a Samaki C12 7021BMH rod and Shimano Curado 150DC reel loaded with X
Kris Lassig is from Biloela, but sure knows his way around a barramundi. His first fish cracked the pattern for the boys.
Winners of the Venom Rods BARRA Australian Open take home $5,000 cash and get the perpetual trophy for the following year. There’s smaller trophies that they get to keep as a memento as well. the deep fish should have held up,” Gooch mused. Gooch’s gear was exactly the same that he uses on his charters. In the baitcast department a Combat V2 ATC reel matched with a Venom 6kg rod while in the spin arena it’s an ATC4000 reel and a 15-30 Bladen-Tails rod.
of the teams that look like they may also compete in the rest of the Zerek BARRA Series throughout the year. MITTLEHOUSER’S MAMMOTH When news of Leon Mittlehouser’s 124cm (30.27kg) barra hit social media, it went viral. Thousands of people saw, liked and shared the beast that came from the
pole and there was a fair proportion of the fight where we thought that we were going to lose it, but this was a fish that was just meant to be. It swam away strong and it’s still in there for someone else to enjoy down the track,” Leon concluded. It gave him serious bragging rights over teammate, Liam Jones, from
place and the $2,000 cheque that accompanied it. The bag was anchored by a 106cm (15.27kg) barra that Wood landed in the dying minutes of the competition. “We’d spent two and a half sessions targeting hundreds of deeper fish that we could see on LiveScope and it was only late on the
EXTRA PORTRAIT PIC NEEDED PLEASE
Team Samaki’s Tommy Wood shows the fish which cracked their pattern on the last day of the tournament.
Dean Silvester and Corey Gooch (Team Gladstone Fly and Sportfishing) finished a solid second place. Braid PE3 line and a 66lb Slim & Strong FC leader. “Once we found what the fish were doing, the bites came much more easily. We’d only had seven follows and two bites before we did this,” Josh continued. The result gave the pair a great start in their BARRA Team of the Year campaign – they were the highest finishing
mouth of Futter Creek. “It’s definitely a PB and the lure’s been retired already to the wall,” Leon said. Despite the fact that this was the team’s only fish, its sheer size was enough to land them 4th place and a healthy cheque, as well as a Venom rod. “The fish went around the electric, the LiveScope
LJ’s Compleat Angler, who was still to land a metre-class fish from the lake. If you drop into the shop, remind him of it! Full results can be found on www.abt.org.au and a massive thanks to L Wilson and Co and their Venom Rods brand for making the Open one of Australia’s most lucrative BARRA events. MAY 2023 111
