I have a bit of a "fisherman always stretch the truth" story around these rod holders...but honest, mine is true! I was fortunate enough, along with a couple other friends, to be asked to test a very early and rudimentary prototype of these holders. I headed out on a local lake one summer evening with my son and a buddy in my 14 ft tinny. We were running two lines off the side of the boat with Scotty lake riggers down about 25 feet and I was dragging a full sink fly line about 50 feet straight out the back near the surface. All was working well until we had a very hard, pop the clip hit off one of the downriggers. The fish immediately started screaming line and of course ran under the fly line I had out the back and came about 3 feet out of the water. So I am trying to steer the boat to get the fish more out to the side, my buddy fighting the fish backs the drag off an older and not very high end fly reel with mono on it, while I try and get my fly rod out of the prototype rod holder and clear the line. Problem was, I didn't have any familiarity with using the new holder so I didn't react quick enough, my buddy backed the drag off too much and this fish was determined to run and jump and wrap itself around the fly line. The third jump proved to be the last as my buddy palmed the reel a little too aggressively and that was the last we saw of it! Will never know how big it was, but definitely the biggest Rainbow I have ever hooked into on any of the local lakes!
The finished product on these rod holders are great and their versatility will be appreciated by the fresh water fisherman, but I will always remember my first time using the prototype, and the "one that got away!"
Brian