Blast from the Past -Will's 788 lb Hammer

The year was 1989 and the University of Miami was having it's second annual shark research tournament so we decided to battle the likes of Rene de Dios,Capt Ron Schatman,Jorge and Lazaro from Casablanca Seafood,and an assorted group of top notch Islamorada Charter boat captains used to catching big Tigers,Makos and an occasional Great White from the Islamorada Humps.The previous year Capt Schatman had won the tournament with a 711 lb Tiger that his son Jeff caught also at north Bimini.So Bimini it was ;if there were no boundaries set up we had plenty of expierience fishing the Bahamas so we decided to try and knock out the rest of the field with a Bahamian Monster.My brother Jorge,Luis Iglesias,Luis Kattou and I were the team that was going to venture to the Bahamas for 4 days of non stop shark and snapper action. We left on a thursday on my 25 foot Rampone open fisherman to set up and anchor on the ledges of north rock where the water drops from 75 feet of depth to over 400 in less then a quarter mile.After two days in the sun catching assorted small caribean reef sharks and some small tiger sharks in the 300 to 450 lb range we were like raisins in the sun well toasted and starting to get on each others nerves.The last night on the boat everyone was fast asleep and we had freshly snagged rays for bait out on all 4 rods.Everyone is sleeping in whatever little space they can find on the floor of the boat littered with fishing equipment pots and pans clothes ,old mushed bait it looked like a bomb had fallen in the boat.I was laying by the transom closest to the motors and Lui Iglesias 12/0 that he had borrowed from Julio Terzado starts to to scream with a fast paced hit .I wake up quickly and yell out for Lui to wake up he's getting a hit and he tells me "Wlli you get it PLEASE i'm burned out man"so my brother grabs the rod before i can reach it and the spool is spinning so fast the reel is almost backlashed so i try to grab the reel from my brothers hands and say "he told me to get the rod and i heard it first"he sets up and the monster takes off for the deep ledge ,i wrestle the rod from my brothers hands and tell him to let go of the anchor this fish is huge and will cut us off if we don,t hurry.He starts the engines and by then this shark is smokin the 12/0 and everyone is up and scrambling to lift the anchor but it's stuck on the bottom and they can't budge it.I give the order "cut the anchor line let's go hurry please this shark is HUGE"The reel is more then half empty when we are loose from the anchor and following the beast that is headed into the deep blue.I ended up fighting the giant hammer for close to an hour and a half and when we get it boatside we are amazed at the width of the head and the size of this huge hammerhead shark.We stick a big flying gaff in it's open mouth and secure the roap to the cleat.VICTORY ,,,,,,OUR BIGGEST SHARK EVER!!!!.We thought it weighed about 550 lbs but when it was hoisted up on the scales it tipped 788 lbs.A half hour before the the end of the tournament while we waited at the Holiday Isle dock for the final weigh ins Capt Ron Clark called in a Huge Mako shark they were bringing in from the hump.The shark weighed 832 lbs and beat us out of first place by a mere 44 lbs.