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Besides clean fighting fish like mackerel and tuna we were also fortunate enough to trade blows with some hard running fish like cobia . My good mate Joey Barbatano found himself hooked up to a big cobe that scoffed down a large sand whiting used as a skip bait . With the Venom LBG rod fully loaded up Joey was able to apply some substantial hurt on the fish . The fish tried to power off to the depths but after a few short runs Joey had this fish disorientated on the surface and shaking its head in protest . After a 10 minute battle we were able to successfully rope gaff the cobia , which weighed in at an impressive 22kg .
The complete range of Venom LBG rods are extremely light weight as they have been manufactured with the exclusive Venom carbon fibre blanks and silicon guides . With the workload involved with targeting big pelagic species from the rocks these light weight rods will dramatically reduce any angler fatigue when hooked up to a stubborn fish in a long drawn out battle .
Having a light weight rod is also great for working your skip bait . With the Venom PE5 LBG rod we were able to work our skip baits over the strike zone by continually winding them in and letting them skip back out again . By using this technique our skip baits covered more ground and created larger splashes . This is a much more effective way to gas balloon and you will get a lot more strikes by driving your bait rather than simply leaving your rod in a wedged in a rod holder .
Heavy tackle game outfits are highly recommended for gas ballooning .
When you are fishing these deep oceanic waters you can hook just about anything and even billfish such as black marlin and the Indo-Pacific sailfish are frequently encountered using this technique . To stop these larger fish I usually run 100m of
24kg mono top shot with at least 500m of 80lb braid backing on a Tiagra 30WLRSA . With this tackle I run about 8-10kg of drag pressure and the PE5 Venom Land Based Game Rod handled this heavy drag setting fine . The power built into the Venom LBG rods is derived from the advanced resin and cloth system used in the construction of each blank .
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