Geelong Freedivers Inc. runs a season-long spearfishing competition, the Club Spearfishing Championship (CSC). The CSC is open to all GFD Inc. members only.
The CSC allows participants to weigh in fish that they take during the course of their regular, recreational spearfishing outings in Victoria. This format provides a structure for members to get involved in a club sanctioned competition when time, distance, or Covid-19 prevents them from being able to otherwise participate in other club events. The CSC rules outline a number of safety obligations of participants that are required to ensure CSC activity is covered by the members’ AUF insurance.
There are many species on the scorecard, which are broken up into three categories for scoring. Top-tier fish will achieve a maximum score of 15 points, middle-tier fish a maximum score of 10 points, and lower-tier fish will receive a maximum score of 5 points.
A leader board is occasionally presented to show the heaviest of each species, but final scores are not released until the clubs’ awards night, in August; no competitor knows the score of any other during the course of the competition.
This competition is as much about competing with yourself as it is competing with others, and to encourage you to target a wide variety of Victorian species, where different tactics and equipment need to be employed, and different areas need to be covered in order to capture each of the different species.
To win the CSC aggregate will require a season-long commitment to seek, and register, many fish species. One good fish can still win a ‘best in species’ prize, and every single entry goes into a draw to win a prize. The more species you enter, the better your chances are of winning as unlike other competitions, a handful of ‘great’ fish may not beat a catch consisting of a greater number of different species.