I've Never FEARED For My Life While Fishing.....UNTIL NOW!!!

Today we are heading to Pompano Beach, Florida for the Extreme Kayak Fishing Tournament Summer Slam Part 2. This is one of the biggest kayak fishing tournaments on the east coast all year. With east coast kayak fishing you want to be prepared for everything. So I got everything that I needed loaded up into my F-150 Lightning, got the puppies loaded and the wife and I headed south. We safely arrived a little bit after dark and got settled in to the Airbnb and I spent the evening making rigs for tomorrow's tournament, not knowing that the following day would be one of the most harrowing experiences of my life. It is not a good morning. It is stormy, thunder everywhere. Let me wipe my lens off. That helped Benny maybe. We got everything down there, getting ready to lock the Lightning up. So we are unloaded. It was pitch dark when we were unloading so we are ready to go. So we are going to get down there. We got to get a coast guard inspection done before we launch and then once the coast guard inspection is done then we just wait for 645 and we can take off. But it is looking pretty sporty out there right now. Hopefully it calms down a little. Instead of launching at the shotgun start, I decided to wait a few minutes and watch a few kayaks go before me to see how the surf was affecting the kayaks to give me a better plan for launching. You ready? So Mikey and I decided to launch and then we had to head over to the bait boat to pick up our baits. Yup. Right top Nick. Get in there. Okay. I'll pedal your ass off. Give you a shot. Thanks buddy. Yup. And so a day of fishing that I will remember until my last breath had begun. So I had to pull up to the bait boat and get loaded up on my bait and then we would start fishing. What a bunch of s**t. Yes sir. Oh perfect. Thanks bud. Take it easy. Alright. You guys have a good one. So then we started heading out to deeper water to get rigged up and start fishing. The sargasm was horrible. Even when you got a mile off the beach there was still sargasm everywhere. So we were having to use weighted rigs to get our bait down below the sargasm. So for trolling I've got a spinning and a conventional set up and they're both on chaos rods. I want to thank chaos rods for supplying me with rods for this tournament. I love them. They work great. So got my bait set and we started trolling. While I was rigging up my baits Mikey decided to go in a different direction so I was flying solo now. It wasn't until I was close to two miles out and about two and a half hours into the tournament that I even got my first bite. Alright. We're on guys. Alright. We're on. Let's go. I apologize for the wind noise but I didn't want to put my lapel mic on until I was sure the rain had stopped. I knew fish were going to be scarce to come by today so I wanted to make sure this one didn't get tangled up in my second line so I was trying to clear my line while fighting the fish. This usually results in a big cluster and it was too late. He was already in my other line so I knew this was going to be a complete mess. You can already see the other line is getting mixed up into my reel. It really turned into a big cluster. But all that mattered was I still had the fish on the line. Truth be told there's no way I should have landed this fish. Usually when your lines get tangled up like this one of the lines cuts the other or you get a break off. Me. I made the decision to just cut the other line, lose my rig, lose a lot of line and just try and get this fish in. That was what mattered. So I got the other line cleared. Ok. Let's have the gaffer ready. I just had to pull my weight off because the rubber band didn't break so once I got that off I was clear to land the fish. Now we're free. Let's go. Alright we got a king snipey on the board. Two bottom monster. Just glad to be on the board now. So the ice was broke. I was on the board and I was ready to get busy and catch some more. So I was down to one rod because my other trolling rod got super tangled in backlash and I was trying to clear the line. So I decided to just go with one weighted rig, drop it and see what happens. Sorry I had one camera rolling and it died when that fish hit. But you didn't miss much. I caught another king about the same size so I got two fish in my bag now. I'd been keeping an eye on the radar all day and there was a storm system that was building to the south that was moving our way earlier but the futurecast showed that it was going to dissipate long before it got here. Well it didn't dissipate. It just got bigger and stronger. Looking at the radar now, I decided it's time to pack up and get ready to head in. So the plan was to troll all the way in to give me a chance to get that third king mackerel and at least maybe a chance to place. But all of that changed when I felt this big swell come up from behind and I decided no more trolling, let's get in. Alright guys, sorry, tournament sucked, the bite was non-existent, we're getting rained out and see a big storm about to hit. So in a span of about two minutes the weather went from this to this. I was a little over two miles out when I decided it was time to head in. So by this time I'd made it maybe a quarter of a mile. This is where everything started to unravel. I hit a wave and my kayak slapped the water and when it did the force broke the back right hand arm of my seat. Right there. Now I'm in big trouble because I cannot sit straight up and balanced in the middle of my kayak. In case you were wondering, I am wearing a life jacket. It's an auto inflate around my waist but you can't see it because my shirt's covering it. So right about now is when I'm starting to get a little bit worried. I changed my line of thinking from I need to get back and get these fish weighed to I need to make it back to shore alive. So the seat breaking on the right side was really bad because I had big swells coming from behind me and then I had cross swells from the wind hitting me on the left hand side forcing me to lean really hard to the left to keep the kayak straight. You really get an idea of the wind speed here when you see the spray from the kayak go completely sideways through the air. It's never a good thing when you hear this on the radio. And then it happened. Luckily, I was prepared for this. I've practiced many times flipping the kayak and getting it back upright. So I got my kayak flipped back over, climbed back on top and had to do an assessment. Those cross swells hitting the kayak while I'm trying to get back on top made it very difficult. I did have most of my gear tethered to the kayak so I didn't lose a lot. I did have one rod that I forgot to hook the leash back up and I lost it. But I did lose two vital things that I didn't notice because of the chaos. I just noticed my fish bag was back behind the kayak. At this point with the broken seat, I decided it wasn't worth it to try and go back and retrieve the bag. I just wanted to make it safely to shore. And still over a mile out, I had a long ways to go. It just felt like every 30 seconds the swells were getting bigger and the wind was getting stronger. You can see that the seas are just getting rougher and rougher and I'm having a harder time keeping my balance with the broken seat. I'm leaning really far to the left on these swells to keep from flipping again. And then before I know it, another side swell gets me. After having already been through this once, it didn't take me as long to get the kayak flipped back over because I was getting a lot of practice at it. You can see here I'm using the fins to flip it and I'm using my knees as leverage to get it back over the top against that strong wind. Looking back, it would have been smarter to have gone around to the other side of the kayak and used the wind to my advantage to have it help me flip it. But like they say, hindsight is 20-20. So I got flipped back over, got started pedaling, trying to make it back to shore without flipping again and had the realization that I had lost my radio. At this point, this is the first time I've been on the water and I've actually been scared and worried that I wasn't going to make it back to shore. The intensity of the wind and the rain just kept picking up. It was almost getting to the point where I couldn't see my landing point on the beach. The swells kept getting bigger and my stamina was waning. I was exhausted from the constant pedaling and having to flip the kayak. The only thought in my head was please don't let me flip again. But it was inevitable. And you can see here in slow-mo how hard I was leaning to the left to try and stay upright. But it just didn't help. And I even tried to jump off before the kayak flipped to try and keep it from flipping over. But the wind would catch the kayak and flip it over whether I jumped or not. I had reached the point of pure exhaustion. I was really starting to doubt whether I was going to make it back or not. Now the exhaustion was starting to affect my balance. I was just about to the point that I was going to activate my inflatable life vest. I got back up on the kayak and then I thought it's a miracle. There's a boat right there passing in front of me. I knew they wouldn't hear me yell but I tried flagging them down and waving. But they were trolling and I think they were caught up in their trolling lines and didn't even see me at all. In my extreme state of exhaustion I had forgotten about my air horn that I had. I could have signaled them but I was so tired I was not thinking clearly. Then at that point it became clear to me that it was going to be 100% up to me to get back to shore. For some reason that realization just gave me a little boost of energy and hope and I started pedaling like a madman. I could barely see the shore but I was determined as ever now to make it. As you can tell I made it back. I'm okay. It was quite an experience. I made it back to shore. My cameras died right after that last clip so I didn't have any footage of getting to the beach and all. I was the second to last person back in the tournament and Mikey and Ryan were waiting there for me. They were worried. They were glad to see me and I was glad to see them. I'm glad that was over with. So yeah it was exhausting. Learned several lessons that day. I should never have untethered my radio. Those portable radios when they get water and splashed you got to hold it right up next to your mouth to talk so anybody can hear you once they get water on them. So I need to get a longer tether next time I get a radio. I still had a great time. EKFT puts on a great kayak tournament. I mean it was professionally run. Everything was great. When we launched the conditions weren't great but they were definitely doable and fishable. There's no way to know that the weather is going to blow up like that. It was just luck of the draw. I did make it back in time to check in fish but unfortunately I didn't have my fish. But congrats to the guys that won and placed. Great job. Learned a lot of lessons this trip. So I hope you guys enjoyed the video. Don't forget to like and subscribe and I'll see you on the next one. Tight lines everybody.