The fourth annual Gulf Coast Classic for the FFI concluded on the first weekend in May.  There were at least several hundred people that attended on Friday and Saturday.  Multiple fly tiers exhibited their skills.  There were several lectures and the Gulf Coast Fly Fishing School had the privilege of participating again this year.

The first event that was presented that has never been presented before was an instructional course on Spey Casting by certified instructor Tom Dempsey.  This was to introduce the basics of two-hand casting for the fly fishing angler…a new set of arrows for his quiver when he goes after fish. Spey casting is an incredibly versatile way of catching fish and once it is tried, many of our students are hooked forever.

In addition, Thomas Dempsey gave a lecture on common casting errors and how to correct them.

A. J. Rosenbaum from the New Orleans club and President of the Gulf Coast Council did a fantastic job at organizing this and presenting another epic Fly Fishing Classic. We look forward to it next year.

The Gulf Coast Fly Fishing Club members were asked several months ago about conducting a seminar on casting for the Magnolia Fly Club in Clinton, MS. On October 9, 2025, Tom Dempsey and Richard Montgomery journeyed to Clinton, MS, to run a seminar on casting for the Magnolia Fly Fish Club. There were 14 who received a packet of information and brochures produced by the GCFFS on various topics of casting.

It was a beautiful day in Clinton, MS, for our gathering at Brighton Park.  The topics covered were the pickup and laydown, roll casting, casting with opposite shoulder, and shooting line.  In addition, there were several breakout sessions done to help individuals with some of the problems the members were having.

After the morning session, a lecture was given on “The 5 Essentials of Fly Casting” and a fly casting quiz was given to the members with cash prizes for the winners.  After the afternoon session, everyone gathered and gave some feedback on the seminar.

From the participants it was a huge success and followed the principles of GCFFS to continue education and to participate in local events that help our fellow anglers to become better casters and fishermen.

Every year for the past 7 or 8 years the New Orleans Fly Fishing Club has hosted a fishing tournament to remove the invasive species Cichlid Rio Grande from the canals and streams in the New Orleans area.  This fish was thought to be introduced into Florida waters from Texas in 1941 and the first species was caught in New Orleans in 1989.  It was thought to have been released from someone’s aquarium.   In 1996, the first recording of any significant catches was made of the Rio Grande Cichlid and now they have become a nuisance, crowding out the native fish in the canals and streams around New Orleans.  They seem to be prevalent in the city park, Lake Pontchartrain and Bayou St. John.

This is the only Cichlid that is found in the U.S.  Cichlids are basically overgrown goldfish.  The most common one that most anglers are familiar with are Peacock Bass which are found in Brazil.  They are extremely territorial and tend to run out native fish.  They are voracious eaters and will eat anything from carnivorous to vegetarian.

About 6-10 inches long at the most, these little fish show a purplish iridescent scale that changes color in the sunlight. 

They will readily take a fly which has made the Rio tournament in New Orleans a special event every fall.  This year 285 Rios were caught by some 30 anglers. The headquarters was the No Wake Outfitters hosted by A.J. Rosenbaum. After the weigh in at noontime, everyone told their fish stories and enjoyed a meal of Jambalaya.

This is a very unique tournament and should be put on your bucket list if you live anywhere halfway convenient to New Orleans.  Remember the Rio Grande Rumble.

On June 7^th, 2025, the Gulf Coast Fly Fishing Team (“GCFFS”) represented by Todd Dempsey and Jake Koffler fished in the 6^th Annual Tripletail Classic and were named Grand Champions of the tournament finishing with the lowest combined “cup” score to take the overall win.  This catch, photo, tag and release tournament is held yearly at the height of tripletail season and benefits the University of South Mississippi’s Gulf Coast Research Lab with the research they are conducting on Atlantic Tripletail. There are three categories that anglers are scored on: 1. Largest fish, 2. First Fish, and 3. Most inches. The tournament committee takes the finishing place of each team in each category and adds them together and the lowest scoring teams wins the tournament. The GCFFS team won the tournament with an overall cup score of 4 points finishing in First Place in Largest fish (1 pt), First place in Most inches (1 pt) and second place in First Fish (2 pts).

Anglers from Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, Texas and beyond made up the 88 anglers that competed on 34 teams. The fishing area runs from Pensacola to Gulfport providing a plethora of opportunities for teams to locate tripletail in different types of environments like tidelines, crab buoys, floating debris, and more.

This years tournament started with a bang with one team, 4 time champions “Zululand”  catching and submitting a tripletail only 2 minutes after the tournament opened at 7a.m.! The GCFFS team submitted their first catch 2 minutes later to claim second place in the “First Fish” category with a submittal at 7:04 a.m.  Another fish caught by the GCFFS team just before 8 a.m. came in at 18 inches and held on to win first place in the “Largest fish” category. Usually much larger tripletail are caught that are in the mid 20 inch range but none were this year. An almost 3 hour gap ensued before the GCFFS team located the next tripletail they landed and tagged. The GCFFS were able to land 7 fish in total for a combined 95 inches to take First place in the most inches category.

A strong west wind made conditions challenging for most of the afternoon however that did not seem to have an effect on the fish or their desire to bite. Multiple teams battled rough conditions and some called it a day early.

A large thank you should be given to the tournament committee, especially Lance Slater and Capt. Sam Glass of Flyway Charters. They worked extremely hard to set up and run this fantastic tournament and served as emcee for the Captains Meeting the night before at Ralph and Kacoo’s located on Mobile Bay on the causeway. After the tournament, the awards ceremony was held at the same place at the Captains Meeting, Ralph and Kacoo’s,  downstairs with live music, a full bar, and exceptional food. Lance and Sam handled all of the duties related to handing out awards, raffle winners, and information related to the tournament. All the fisherman who competed in the tournament were appreciative of their efforts for the weekend and commented on how well run everything was. The GCFFS looks forward to participating in the 7^th Annual Tripletail Classic in 2026.