TBF District 13 is made up of Delaware, Washington DC and Maryland. This year Semi-Finals was hosted by Maryland and we launched out of Millard Tydings Memorial Park. The 3 states totaled 36 boats and co-anglers, bringing 72 competitors (brothers and sisters) together chasing their dreams to reach the Federation National Championship. The week of leading up to the Semi-Final, the weather was in the 80’s, water temperatures were in the 70’s and anglers were reporting that the weather was awesome, and the fish were “chewing”.
Friday, October 6th we have reports of foul weather with small craft advisory for both days with wind gusts up to 30 mph and rain throughout the two days. We contacted the National Tournament Director, Randy Sullivan to discussed that it should be a decision made at the ramp the morning of the competition. Most important thing is that angler safety was the TBF’s first priority. I wouldn’t say that the weather condition was our friend the two days, but we were able to fish.
With the tough conditions of 40-to-60-degree weather with very strong winds both days, we had some really good results. The winner in the Boater’s Division was Thomas Bavaro III (MD) with 34.94 lbs with Second Place, Danny Rodriguez (MD) with 34.5 lbs. These gentlemen represented Maryland well. Our co-anglers had some awesome results as well. Edward McGinness (DE) came in with 25.67 lbs to win the co-angler division and our own Paul Badders (Md/Tournament Director) came in with 24.31 lbs to take 2nd place. It was a tough couple of days of fishing with some really good results.
Congratulations to the winners and I want to thank everyone for their participation. I also want to send out a special thanks to everyone that helped me along the way in making this a successful event:
Sara Dixon (DE Tournament Director), Brian Barnes, Steve Wiseman, Randy Sullivan, John Sison (DC TBF President), Gary Brandt (DE TBF President), the Ladies at the TBF main office (who I only called 50 times this year) and all my directors in Maryland. Thank you all, you guys are the best.
