It's not often that a fisherman gets a standing ovation for his catch.
However, when Destin's Mark Rountree made it to the beach behind Sea Oats Motel aboard his paddle board dragging a gaffed cobia in one hand and paddling with the other, he was greeted by a round of applause from about 70 beach goers who watched him tangle with a 74.5-pound cobia Sunday morning.
"It was just one of those days where every thing went right," said the 48-year-old Rountree, who is a personal trainer.
Fishing for pompano aboard his 12-foot Bote paddle board, Rountree spotted a cobia about 30-yards behind him swimming west.
Although he was out pompano fishing, and had caught two, Rountree says he always has an extra rod in the holder with a cobia jig just in case.
He pulled up anchor from his pompano spot and paddled in pursuit of the cobia.
Once he got close enough, he cast toward the ling and put it in the sweet spot.
The cobia took the bait. Rountree set the hook, and he was off to the races.
"It spun the board around and headed offshore. The board was skipping," Rountree said.
"It blistered out about a 100 feet of line."
After pulling him for about 50 to 75 yards, Rountree dropped anchor on the cobia.
"I had 20-feet of line on my anchor; just enough to hold me," he said.
On that initial stop from the weight, "it threw me forward a couple of steps on the board," he said.
"It started peeling drag. It was a little sketchy for a second."
Nevertheless he was able to put some pressure on her and get her alongside the board and put a gaff in her.
"I stuck her real good," he said.
But then he said, "What have I done?" when he saw that the cobia was half the size of his board.
The fish was too big to pull up on to his board, so with the cobia on a gaff in one hand, he paddled his way back to the beach about 100 yards.
"I had so much adrenaline going I didn't feel a thing," Rountree said.
After about 15 minutes of paddling he made it to the beach where he was greeted by a standing ovation from a small crowd that had gathered on the beach.
He was then able to get the cobia strapped to the front of the board and paddled down to a friend's nearby beach service who had a four-wheeler and a trailer to haul it up to his truck. He drove it down to Fishing Fleet Marina and it weighed in at 74.5 pounds.
Looking back at the whole episode, Rountree said, "I'm just dumb enough to try any thing. But it was as cool as you would think it would be."
He had cobia for dinner Sunday night and plans for pompano Monday evening.
"I'm living the Destin lifestyle," he said.