Steve Rinella

Um, but yeah, that moment when that fish, when it takes the fly and then, you know, Jake's yelling at me to strip and you strip and you feel it come tight.

From there, the next three seconds, I think it's like the most like violent and exciting and chaotic three seconds of fishing that I've ever experienced.

Because like, you know that you've attached yourself to something big.

It's right there.

It's in shallow water.

You've got 50 feet of fly line that are, it's like half wrapped around your toes.

And you're just hoping that as the fish runs and jumps, that the line clears the deck and gets on the reel before it, you know, binds up.

Because then later that same morning,

Mark fed one, got him on, and we had a loop go around the reel, and I tried to do everything I could to, you know, I'm trying to pull against the 100-pound fish to make a loop to, you know, bring it around the reel, and I just couldn't do it for him, and it broke.

And it's just over.

Mine ended this way.

I fought him for an hour.

It jumped twice.

The big ones, Jake said, they don't jump too much.

He guesstimated it.

He's like, it was a solid 100.

He's like, I don't know if it was 110 or 130, but it was a really big tarpon in his mind.

I fought him for an hour, which I was a little disappointed that I didn't fight him better.

I had read all the Stu Aft articles and books.

Do you know that name?