In a scene straight out of Old Man and the Sea, aside from the massive sportfish boat, top of the line equipment and crew, the Floor Reel was awarded with the top prize of a whopping $6.2 million payout.
Eat your heart out, Santiago.
Despite the tournament’s namesake, the winning fish caught by angler John Ols was a blue marlin that weighed in at 640 pounds. Because of strict minimum length and weight limits imposed by the tournament (70”/70lbs for white marlin and 114” for blues) of the nearly 600 marlin caught throughout the tournament, only two were eligible for weigh-ins.
Ols’ marlin was the only one that met both length and weight requirements and he was awarded top prizes for both the white marlin and blue marlin divisions.
Oh and the stacks of cash that came with it.
“The blue marlin from the Floor Real left no doubt when it was measured at 118 [inches] in the boat before electrifying the crowd while tipping the scales at 640.5 pounds,” officials explained in a news release. “It proved to be the only qualifying billfish and wins most of the money for both white and blue marlin.”
The meager $6.2 million prize makes last year’s $4.45 million payout look like child’s play – which was a record breaking award as well.
Aside from Ols and the crew from the Floor Reel, two other boats from this year’s tournament were newly-minted millionaires as well. In the tuna categories Ro Sham Bo and Reel Tight, both out of Ocean City, brought in $1.7 million and $1 million in prize money respectively for their 200+ pound tuna catches.
