When circle hooks came in, copper wire and chin weights went out, at least off the southern Panama coast. Back in the mid-1990s, Tropic Star's expert bait riggers in short order adapted their techniques to create deadly weapons from ballyhoo sporting circle hooks. Armed simply with rigging floss and a needle, deckies like Alexi Inglish (also spotlighted in Andy Hahn's June, 2006, Sport Fishing feature on the venerable Panama belly strip) transformed fresh ballyhoo into durable pitch baits.

Two requirements guided the evolution of this rig: It needed to hang together during repeated casts and take its lickings from tire-kicking sailfish — but also had to skip easily and enticingly enough for the sail to swallow the entire bait, allowing the circle hook to lock into a jaw hinge.

Though Tropic Star's boats rely heavily on the belly-strip rig, many sails are caught on ballyhoo; in fact, in many instances a ballyhoo ready to throw gets the fish. Just one of many scenarios where this proves useful involves sailfish trying to take down a live bonito put out for marlin. Frustrated by not being able to eat the relatively large prey, such sails become prime candidates for a well-rigged, well-thrown ballyhoo pitch bait. 

Though this step-by-step instructional might appear at a glance to be a complex process, don't be fooled. Rather, be good: The mates at Tropic Star can go from zero to rigged in 60 seconds — or less. Practice does make perfect.

How well do these pitch baits work? Chris Dinwiddie, Tropic Star's "saltwater concierge," as he likes to term himself, says they work well enough that most mates use this basic approach when rigging ballyhoo. (Dinwiddie cites some variation from mate to mate, noting that "there's more than one way to skin a cat.")

But the basic process is very much like Alexi Inglish does it — and no one does it better.

Next: Complete Instructions