On Super Bowl Sunday, Phillip “Flip” Frank of New Orleans braved the fog with Capt. Rich Waldner, who spotted this huge redfish in a bayou off Barataria Bay. Using a Sage Salt 9-weight fly rod and reel spooled with RIO Winter Redfish fly line, Frank flipped a purple Flip’s Clouser fly in front of the huge red, which sucked the fly into its crushers.
After a great battle, the fish came to the boat, and Waldner slipped his net into the red’s front half, with the other half hanging out of the net. The red weighed 45 pounds on a Boga grip, easily topping the current Louisiana and world records for fly-rod reds. The fish was 50 inches long and 27 inches in girth. Using a length/girth formula, the red weighed 45.56 pounds just before being released alive.
