The 23rd All Victorian Game Fishing Tournament was held at Port Welshpool on the weekend of 26 and 27 November.

Forty-four boats and 111 anglers entered the competition and given forecasts of 20 to 30 knots winds, this was quite a good show.

This year was the first time the Calcutta was held for boats entered in the competition. This is a new concept to gamefishing tournaments in Victoria but has proved popular in other states. The winning boat is determined by a points scoring system based on the weight of fish weighed-in. Large minimum weights applied to all species so there were not many fish eligible for the Calcutta.

The winning boat was Surreal with a total of 8.9 points.

On Saturday morning, boats were slow to get on the water with 30 knot southwesterly winds making conditions rough and unpleasant. For those who ventured out there were plenty of gummy sharks taken with many boats bagging out by lunchtime. No gamefish were captured or tagged on the Saturday.

On Sunday the wind had eased to 20 knots and most competitors were on the water before 9am. The gummy sharks from the previous day had disappeared, but quite a few snapper were caught in the 2 to 3kg range. There were two game sharks tagged on Sunday, a hammerhead and a bronze whaler.

The weekend brought our Juniors and Small Fry category to light with some great catches.

There was also and with a great social evening on Saturday night enjoyed by all of the competitors.

This event would not be possible without the help of our major sponsors being Bill Collector Charter, Crawford Marine, Shimano/Dunphy Sports, Alpine Country, Alberton Roadhouse, Port Welshpool Hotel, C&A Canvas, Alpine Country, Cranbourne Bait and Tackle, Gollers Sport Store and Picton Hopkins & Sons.