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It was Saturday, July 22, 2006, Day 2 of the 20th Annual Oak Bluffs Monster Shark Tournament held on Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts.

A hurricane had passed south of Nantucket two nights earlier and had delayed the start of the first day's fishing. Friday had been rough with 8 - 12 foot seas and a sullen overcast laced with intermittent showers and thunderstorms. The boats had a later-than-usual departure time on Day One and it had been a rough slow slog out and back to the fishing grounds 40+ miles south or east of Martha's Vineyard. Some boats even chose to stay put on Friday, in hopes of catching a true monster on Saturday and capturing the $100,000+ first prize.

Saturday morning we awoke to thick overcast, fog and occasional rain showers or lightning-filled squalls, but significantly diminished winds. It was still blowing, just not as hard as it had for the past two days. Everyone was tired and battered from Day One and was looking forward to a more tolerable and productive day. The tournament was still wide open, and the right fish could win it all.

We chugged out of Oak Bluffs Harbor at 4:30 AM with a crowd of boats. Pointed our bow at Cape Pogue and began the roughly 15 mile run around the "Vineyard's" eastern shore. Turning the corner at Pogue we turned down Muskeget Channel to head through Wasque and out past "The Hooter," the outermost buoy about 8 miles south of Muskeget Channel. The eastern sky was brightening to show a "dirty" day ahead.

The chop in the shallow protected channel was tolerable, and we expected the normal steep confused sea at Wasque, but as we cleared the southeastern tip of "The Island," the obscured sunlight showed steep seas marching towards us pounding and breaking on South Beach and the Wasque Shoals. If anything, today was even worse than yesterday!

The seas on Friday had been huge, but today they were not only big, but also steeper and closer together. Those steep towering waves and their short interval was going to make for another long slow slog. As we passed "The Hooter", the GPS still showed 40 miles to go and an ETA of just over 3 1/2 hours. Some crewmembers sought refuge in their bunks below while others tried to find comfortable, and dry, seats on the bridge or in the cockpit.

The autopilot wasn't going to be much help in these seas, so it was going to be an even longer day for the helmsman, Christian, our captain. Like piloting a runabout in rough seas, Christian was on and off the throttles, climbing the steep seas then

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