Mate Baresic, spearfisherman of club Periska from Ploče, is the new Croatian Champion.
Baresic obtained 194.52 percentage points during two-day fishing in the western Istria water in the Championship organized by the Croatian Federation of sports fishing in the sea and hosted by club Erik Radin from Novigrad. Second was Stjepko Kesic and third Boris Reinić.

The best 3 with boatmen Mario Bakotic Zile, Daniel Gospic amd Marino Reinic

“Conditions were very different from other zones and other competitions, because it was in shallow waters, visibility was not very good, and the fish moved a lot. There was not enough fish to say it was safe and you would catch it a hundred percent”, commented Mate Baresic, “I did not know what to expect, but after the first day I saw I had the chance to win the medal. In the first hour I expected to win the medal, but then there were several problems and I thought I missed the opportunity, but in the end I saw that there was not much fish around and that I had a chance.”

Second place in the competition between 23 spearos from 15 clubs was won by Stjepko Kesic (Strozanac Podstrana) with 191.12 percentage points, while third was Boris Reinić (Luben Rijeka) with 154.01 points. In the best five positions were also Roberto Mastromauro (Erik Radin) and Dario Babić (Luben Rijeka).

Stjepko Kesic day 1
Boris Reinic day 1

This championship was special because the best Croatian spearfisherman Daniel Gospic was not among the competitors. Gospic has retired last year from official competitions and  the era after Daniel Gospic has so officially started, as he has been a national champion for the past five years. Gospic was still in the competition, but as a boatmen for the new champion Mate Baresic.

The two-day championship was interesting and uncertain. Early in the beginning, favorites were Roberto Mastromauro and experienced Boris Reinic, and then Mate Baresic and Stjepko Kesic.
But the first day after five hours of fishing the best was the oldest competitor, the 54-year-old Boris Reinic. Reinic has shown that he can only be in the veterans, but he is still in shape and can compete with competitors half his age. The Doctor from Rijeka caught 18 fish – blactail bream, forkbeard, seven mullets, three goldline, five wrasses, rainbow wrasse, and two congers, giving him 25262 weight points.

Boris Reinic day 2

Second and third were Baresic and Kesic, and the difference was eight grams in favor of Baresic. Baresic caught 13 fish – wrasse, rainbow wrasse, three brown meagre, eight mullets and five congers for 23878 points, while Kesić had ten mullets, one goldline, one wrasse, one rainbow wrasse, two brown meagre, a white seabream and three congers, worth 23870 points.

Mate Baresic day 2
Stjepko Kesic day 2

Fourth was Dejan Mickovic (Marlera Liznjan) and fifth Dario Babic (Luben Rijeka).
On the second day, Reinic had bad luck because two hours after the started he broke the engine of the dinghy. It took an hour to get a replacement boat on which he did not have his gps with positions and he was forced to go to the shallow and catch what he could, but this dumped him out of the title fight. Yet he managed to catch enough to win the bronze medal.

Results day 1

The winner of the second day was Mate Baresic with 17226 weight points, as he brought nine fish – six mullets, three forkbeard and five congers. Stjepko Kesic was the second with 16646 points. Kesic brought 12 fish – ten mullets, one forkbeard, one rainbow wrasse and two congers to the scale, while third was Roberto Mastromauro with 15198 points. Mastromauro caught one rainbow wrasse, one mullet, four forkbeards, and five congers. Among the first five on day two were Dario Babic and Danijel Pizentic (Koromacno).

Results day 2

The most valuable fish was a mahi mahi of 2608 grams caught by Dario Babic and the heaviest was a conger of 8130 grams also from Dario Babic.

Dario Babic with mahi mahi and conger

Final results