Andre and I met up at 6:00 this morning to give it a go. He hooked up first, I thought it was a big bat. But after a 10 or 15 minute fight it broke off. When we looked, it destroyed his 135 lb wire leader. About 6" of it was completely frayed. About 15 minutes later my rod starts twitching, put the reel in gear and set the hook. Within 15 seconds it went completely airborne and landed on it's side. Then it took off for Catalina and I felt that all too familiar "ping", it broke off about 2' for my shock leader. Re tied and put another bait out, 15 minutes later I get hit again. After it ran around a little bit it surfaced and started south. We watched the dorsal and tail fins for probably 50 yards, then it submerged and put it in turbo mode. It ran over 200 yards without slowing and only made big splashes once. I gained back close to 100 yards of line before it decided to make the dash out to sea. After a 15 minute tug o war I felt that "ping" one more time. Looking at the line this time it broke the knot at the swivel, knot still intact with two tags. I know, I never should have gone out with a shock leader that has broken off twice. Called it quits in time to make my folks lunch and take my mom for blood work.
