Gold Coast game fisherman Sammy Hitzke has finally ticked the solo blue marlin box on his new boat the Han Solo, hooking two fish over a single rough day on the shelf and converting the second on a Fat Boy Lures 1431 head before tagging and releasing what he estimated at a 100–120 kilo blue.
Hitzke posted the trip to his Sammy Hitzke Fishing channel, describing it as a chance to chase down a personal milestone that has eluded him since he upgraded boats roughly a year ago.
"We're going to put in a full day chasing a solo blue marlin. No one else on board. I'm on the Han Solo. I've got three heavy tackle outfits," Hitzke said in his pre-dawn opening sequence. "I've had this boat for coming up or pretty much a year now and I've had a few chances but yet to tick the box. We've got black marlin, stripe marlin and I've caught blue marlin out of this boat, but I haven't done it solo. And that's one of my most favourite things to do. It's such a challenge."
The forecast called for 10 to 15 knots of easterly, which Hitzke flagged as one of the reasons he had stepped up to a larger hull. The trip out was slow, with wind chop on top of a residual swell pushing his arrival on the shelf to nearly nine in the morning. Three rods went in with a Fat Boy Lures spread—a 12-inch 1431, an 11-inch bullet in a flying-fish pattern and an old-faithful Lumo C4 tube.
The first hookup came on the Lumo C4 in the long-corner position. The fish lit up the gunwale within minutes.
"Pretty tame bite," Hitzke said as the fish ran. "I was just up the front. I was going to get a teaser out. The one time I haven't been sitting at the helm the whole day."
He leaned on a tactic he had picked up from West Australian deckhand Sean, fishing off Exmouth. "Sean learned over in WA, Exmouth fishing with one of the greats over there, is go light on them and then once they try and dive down then give them all the drag," Hitzke explained mid-fight. "You give them the drag from the start, they get used to it. They just want to pull against you. But like a puppy dog, if you lead them along, and they do something wrong, you give them a kick up the bum."
The technique worked for a while. The fish stayed high, kept jumping, and Hitzke recovered most of the mono back onto the reel. Then, with the tag pole in hand, the hook backed out.
"There's nothing wrong with that hook point. That is just unlucky," Hitzke said. "I was just putting that tag in the pole. It was taking line. Must have just been sitting on that exact right angle and then he turned. Holding the pressure in and then the hook has come out."
The replacement fish was different in every way. It ate the Fat Boy 1431, made a startling first run and then dropped deep, settling into a low-range stalemate that turned the fight into a winch.
"That is a run. Holy. Well, that didn't take long, guys. That didn't take long at all," Hitzke said as line peeled. "Got the leg shakes on. That is a serious amount of line out. Time to get to work."
The fight lasted long enough for Hitzke to switch tactics through several deep cycles—up-current pulls, side angles, repeated touch-and-go to 30 metres before the fish boofed sideways and stayed under. Eventually a tail appeared on the surface and the leader came in clean.
"That is a hell of a solo blue. Tails going. Right. Let's get this one done," Hitzke said as he tagged and released the fish, which he estimated at 100 to 120 kilos. "We did it. We ticked off the solo blue marlin, one from two. And I dare say the one that we did land was a darn sight bigger than that first one we hooked."
Hitzke pulled the spread shortly after, mindful of the easterly building behind him and the long run back through the Gold Coast Seaway. PFD and PLB stayed on for the trip in.
"Make sure you got your safety gear sorted because it's the easiest thing to sort," he said in his sign-off, "but I'll tell you what, if you end up in the drink, it's going to be the most valuable thing you got on you."