Heffernan and Green grab Redfish Series lead

Duo one of only two teams to hold onto top-five spot after today’s Walmart FLW Series Western Division action in Rockport, Texas

ROCKPORT, Texas – Since 2005, teammates Paul Heffernan of Fair Oaks Ranch, Texas, and David Green of Boerne, Texas, have dreamed of making a top-five cut in the FLW Redfish Series. Well, today they can finally cross one long-term goal off of their list. Bolstered by a two-day catch of 32 pounds, 4 ounces, the team not only turned in their first top-five performance in four years, but grabbed first place in the process.

“I’m just glad to finally be fishing on the last day,” said Green, whose team leapfrogged from third to first place after today’s competition. “Our highest-ever finish was 10th place and we’ve never made the top-five before so we’re pretty happy right now. Finally being able to break through feels great.”

While plenty of day-one contenders had a difficult time on the water and ultimately failed to qualify, Green and Heffernan kept their cool and eked out a first-place finish heading into Saturday’s all-important finals.

“It’s surprising,” said Green of his team’s finish after the second day of competition. “I really thought we’d struggle to get into the top five today. There were a lot of big weights yesterday and I thought a lot of those teams would repeat today.”

The team said that they targeted schooling redfish after making a 50-mile one-way run toward the upper lagoon area near Corpus Christi.

“We’ve basically fished the same school two days in a row,” said Green, whose team employed Berkley Gulp Shrimp in 3 to 4 feet of water to land the majority of their catch. “The only problem is that a lot of people know where our spot is – it’s pretty popular. If there are too many locals there (Saturday) we might have to go and try something different.”

However, the team said that if that’s the case, they still have plenty of backup locations to make a strong run at the title.

“If we can find our schools and there isn’t too much pressure on them, we’ll stay,” said Green. “But if things don’t work out there, we have several backup spots where I think we can still catch 14 pounds pretty easily.”

Mock and Curry net second

Skipper Mock of South Padre Island, Texas, and partner Eddie Curry of Port Isabel, Texas, moved up from seventh place to second overall on the strength of a two-day catch totaling 32 pounds, 3 ounces.

“This is the heaviest weight we’ve weighed in in four years with the Redfish Series,” said Mock of his team’s 16-pound, 9-ounce stringer recorded in today’s competition. “We’ve been waiting a long time for this. It’s about time. It absolutely feels great.”

However, the team acknowledged that qualifying for the finals wasn’t easy by any stretch.

“We only had three fish the whole day,” said Mock. “We caught a nice 8 1/2-pounder right off the bat and then we caught a 6-pounder. But we didn’t catch another fish for two to three more hours. We wound up moving to a new spot and then those storms hit us hard. But just as we’re planning on running for cover, we landed that last big fish. Basically, we grinded it out today. We’re just fortunate that two of the three fish we caught happened to be the right size.”

Mock and Curry said they targeted redfish on Berkley Gulp Shrimp after making a 34-mile one-way run south near the JFK bridge/Flower Bluff area.

“We know there are some good fish in our area,” said Mock, whose team is now only 1 ounce off the overall lead. “And I think we can catch about the same amount tomorrow. We have two or three different spots within a mile of each other. Hopefully we’ll have enough fish to win this.”

Team Folgers climbs to third

Situated in eighth place heading into today’s competition, Rockport natives Todd Adams and Tommy Ramzinsky stormed back into the finals with a two-day catch of 31 pounds, 6 ounces. However, while the majority of the field headed south for the second consecutive day, Adams and Ramzinsky headed due north.

“Ninety percent t of the field went south today and we went north to St. Charles Bay,” said Ramzinsky. “It was nice because we didn’t have a lot of boat traffic and we avoided most of the bad weather they had down south. For us, the conditions were really pretty good.”

The duo said they used a combination of Top Dogs topwaters and Bass Assassin Swim Tails with a black and chartreuse tail to land the majority of their catch.

“We’ve been targeting a couple of small schools in the morning and casting to bait swirls in the afternoon,” said Ramzinsky. “If there is a little bit of chop on the water, we’re throwing topwaters. But if it’s calm, we’re going with the swim tails. But over the past two days our bite has really been shutting down at about 11 a.m.”

However, while weights have pretty much been all over the map for the majority of the field, Adams and Ramzinsky said they’ve been happy with their consistency so far.

“You always want to catch over 16 pounds,” said Ramzinsky, whose team recorded totals of 15 pounds, 9 ounces and 15 pounds, 13 ounces over the course of two days. “But we’re happy with how consistent we’ve been. Hopefully three days of consistence will pay off for us.”

Culpeppers set sights on repeat

Having qualified for the top five in fourth place, the brother tandem of Kris and Jonathan Culpepper are now officially in position to defend their 2007 Redfish Series Rockport title. And they couldn’t be happier.

“I was really hoping to have a chance to defend our title,” said Jonathan Culpepper, whose team landed a two-day total of 30 pounds, 11 ounces. “We fished as hard as we could all day long. I’m just happy it worked out.”

Like most of the teams that headed south today, the Culpeppers had to brave some stormy weather as well as a few anxious moments.

“It was definitely tougher today than yesterday,” said Jonathan Culpepper. “It was a definitely a lot windier; the conditions were tough. But it’s days like this that you have to get through to win a title.”

The Culpepper said they targeted redfish in 3 to 5 feet of water with Berkley Gulp Shrimp equipped with a 3/8-ounce jighead.

“Honestly, it was a good day of fishing for us,” said Jonathan Culpepper, whose team made a 55-mile trek to the Upper Laguna Madre area. “We caught between 15 and 20 fish. Hopefully we can do the same thing again tomorrow.”

Best of the rest:

Rounding out the top-five FLW Redfish Series finalists were the father-son duo of Darrell and Robert Walter. The team ultimately landed a two-day catch of 30 pounds, 5 ounces to remain less than 2 pounds off the overall lead.

Saturday’s Wal-Mart FLW Redfish Series action continues during tomorrow’s takeoff, scheduled to take place at 7 a.m. Central Time at the Saltwater Pavilion at Rockport Beach Park, located at 810 Sea Breeze Drive in Rockport, Texas.