Most of the fishing award ceremonies I’ve seen have the lucky angler dancing around the “what’s the secret” portion of his coronation. Fishermen are a closed mouthed lot, and those that do it for money are pretty tight lipped – as the color of their bait may mean a couple extra zero’s in their income.

Honesty? We’re not prepared for that – so when the winning fellow strides to the podium and announces, “A rattletrap tipped with Pizza Crust?” … it’s time to pay homage.

Soldiers often were creative with bait, Combs said. Whole bagels. Sausage. Breakfast burritos from MRE rations. Dates. The local stone-baked flatbread. Some regular fishermen prefer Froot Loops.

The first Baghdad fishing tournament was filmed for posterity by Reel Time Productions, whose staff took 300 sets of donated tackle to host the event in one of Saddam’s private lakes.

A 14lb carp proved the winning fish, but based on the smiles – it wasn’t the only winner.

For the soldiers in Iraq, fishing is “a chance to get out in the air and sit around the lake, and at that point, they could have been anywhere in the world,” Combs said. “They could have been in Ohio fishing on the banks of the river. It’s just a little bit of normalcy for them in a place that is anything but normal.”

It’s nice to see the fellows get a little break from the mayhem.