Fishing for a win

Kat the Fish
- Photo by Kinsee Morlan

The long, tubular, water-filled race track has room for just two fish at a time. It’s a one-on-one single elimination race, the rules state. You get to pick the fish from the tank and assign him or her a creative name.

No side betting, the rules continue. No giving fish alcohol or anything else.

“Rule number four says, No eating fish,” says Worldcup Goldfish Racing host Rick, at a race a few weeks ago. “I’ve seen someone accidently almost drink their fish. That girl, she was eliminated for almost harming the fish.

“If the fish is here and you squirt here, they swim best,” Rick continues, picking up a squirt bottle and doing a quick demonstration.  “When you actually hit them with the water, I think it confuses them…. So, squirt behind the fish.”

It’s clear that Rick’s tips are not just to benefit the small group of jockeys who’ve begun to assemble. Rick is mainly concerned about the fishes’ welfare. 

“We don’t poke them; we don’t pick them up and throw them. We treat them well,” he says before letting anyone pick a fish. “These fish are champions and, if they want, they can hang with us as long as they live.”

The jockeys line up and, one by one, carefully choose their fish from a tank of about two dozen. This one small choice will ultimately decide the outcome of the night. There are no reigning jockey champions in Worldcup Goldfish Racing, it turns out, but there are indeed a few skilled fish.

The races are somewhat exciting. One by one, jockeys grab their squirt bottles, plop their fish in the track and squirt their way toward the finish line. Speedy Gonzales and Kick Butt were no match for a fast little guy named Kat the Fish, who easily swam his way to a win.

The winning jockey said she had a good feeling about Kat from the moment she laid eyes on him.

“I just knew he was the best,” says a smiling blonde gal with an Irish accent. “I saw him swimming around in the tank and I looked him in the eye and I said, Yep, that’s the one.”