“When regulations have you down, just go a little deeper.”

That was the text message that arrived in my phone last weekend from Jay Travis. Accompanying the text was a picture of a 35-pound yellow edge grouper -- a deepwater grouper not typically caught.

My curiosity led me to get the story.

Along with fishing partners from Team Seaveeche, Brian Beukema and Danny Pool, these guys aren’t your normal anglers. I asked, “how deep?” Travis’ response shocked me: “765 feet.”

These guys love to fish in uncharted waters, way past the range of most boats. They do it well too, winning multiple tournaments with the 2011 Crosthwait being the most recent.

With a good weather forecast, they planned a deep trip aboard their 29-foot single engine Seavee. They wanted to head past the typical depth of red snapper and gag grouper, which are no longer in season. They plan every trip out, carrying all safety equipment, including a life raft, EPIRB and satellite phone.

“We left at 9 a.m. and returned at 11 p.m. We ran 155 miles one way to a ledge we found last year and had never fished. It is a 30-foot vertical wall,” Travis said. “We only had a few hours to fish, and we didn’t get there until 3 p.m. The fish finder lit up, and it was absolutely loaded with fish.”

My immediate thought was that these guys had to be using electric gear as the shear depth and cranking required would be extremely tiring.

“We fished only conventional tackle: Shimano 30 wides with 100-pound power pro. Obviously, this is very labor intensive, so we were exhausted after only a few hours,” Travis said.

Dropping at that depth is made easier with braided line as the lack of stretch allows every bite to be felt.

“We caught tilefish, porgies, yellow edge grouper, Warsaw grouper, snowy grouper and kitty mitchells, then left as the sun set. The total running time was 11 hours, and fishing time was about 3 hours,” Travis said.

Not bad for a 310-mile round trip in one day.