Y'all ever feel like your rod is sprung?

[The Rooster]

I know what you're thinkin', and shame on you! 

Seriously though, yesterday I got in a fight with about a 10 pound catfish that decided my 1/2 oz Booyah spinnerbait looked good enough to eat. I'm estimating the weight, and even the length cause it was too big to drag into my 8' boat, and I wasn't feeling it anyway cause I'd already took an unexpected swim earlier that morning so I wasn't willing to risk that again. The fish looked to be about 2 feet long and fought like I had hooked the back end of a Peterbilt!

The fight lasted a good 5 minutes and it pulled hard enough that the bait is ruined and the hook is semi straightened out now. It seems that fish was pretty mad about having his face stuck on it. But anyway, several times during the fight I was aware that my rod was bent in a horseshoe shape, and I expected it to explode any second as I'd never seen it bent like that in the 10 years I've had it. I mean it was bending to Ugly Stik advertisement proportions, and it is an older Shimano Compre 6'6" MH/F rod. One of the gray IM8 graphite rods. As I fought the fish I would become aware that the rod was doing this and I'd let the tip down so as to reduce pressure, at which point the reel drag would begin letting line zip out. In the end I whooped the fish and won the fight and my rod seems to be just fine after the fact, but my question is, do you think this can or did damage the rod? I know I asked a question on here a couple of weeks ago about a rod degrading over time and becoming softer. This is the same rod, and in my mind's rememberance it seems it used to be stiffer. But at the least, it handled that fish like a champ!

[zippyduck]

Graphite and fiberglass both get brittle with time. They will not get softer " bendier " with time.

[The Rooster]

Graphite and fiberglass both get brittle with time. They will not get softer " bendier " with time.

Hmm......this makes sense. Ok, I'll try to stop worrying about it and just fish.

[Capt. BassinLou]

In my neck of the woods, we hook up with big mudfish from time to time. From what I read in your story, before allowing the rod to bend like a horseshoe, loosen up  the drag a little bit more. Just my humble opinion.

[coldfront]

In my neck of the woods, we hook up with big mudfish from time to time. From what I read in your story, before allowing the rod to bend like a horseshoe, loosen up  the drag a little bit more. Just my humble opinion.

rod controls surges, so does drag.  all so line doesn't break.

sometimes, fun times?, we hook up with fish we're seriously 'undergunned for'.

I set my drag to 'just slip a little' on hookset.  then clamp down with my thumb on the set.
I'm at direct odds with the 'lock 'er down with a pliers' camp.

[Pferox]

In the salt there are many times I've been under-gunned against my hooked quarry, and I've broken my share of rods in my time and must say that most were because of user error, or damaged someway before they got on the fish.  I suspect that even brand new rods that I have broken are due to previous damage that I don't know about, but that is only speculation.

Of the ones that I can't find an actual reason for the damage I have found that those were broken when I was trying to lift or net a heavy fish while forcing the tip to double over on itself creating a hook shape on the last few inches of the rod.

I have never broken a rod that was bent into an almost "U" shape while fighting a big fish, although I do try to let the rod straighten out when I see this happening as quickly as I can.

Most of my rods are fiberglass or some kind of composite, and most are pretty old now. Rods deteriorate with age, but doubt that they self destruct in two people's life times.

[The Rooster]

I do have my drag set, not just locked down, and it slips all the time when fighting just regular sized bass. I've noticed it slips less when the rod is aimed up. I also recognize that my lack of experience with a fish of this size led me to "high sticking" when I should have known better, but when you got a big one on the line who's got time to think? I backed off the drag a little and lowered the rod also, which allowed the fish to run. I also used the trolling motor to take the fight to open water so I wouldn't get wrapped around a stump. I won't say I did everything right but I did it as right as I could, and it seems to have ended well. As far as I know my rod is still fine, and so is the reel. I fished with it afterwards and caught no more fish on that rod but as I was using it I didn't notice any problems. I was mostly worried about stressing the rod because of how U shaped it was while fighting that fish, and I also worried about putting that much pull on my reel but I feel like I'd be able to tell more easily if it was hurt. It's an Abu Garcia Orra SX, the last model they made before dropping the name. Aluminum frame, brass gears, and it seems to have taken that fight with no stress at all.