44.5 inches, 36 pounds, Back Beach at Race Point a few days after fourth of July in 2001.
My buddy and I had been out on the beach all day, not really fishing as it was dead as you would expect in July during the day. We were just killing time, hoping maybe we'd have some fun with some blues if they pushed through. We left the beach in the late afternoon to grab some food, then figured we'd take a spin down the back beach around dusk. Beach is empty except for one guy I'd never seen out there before throwing plugs out into a few hundred yards of occasional swirls, not getting any hits. We hop out of the truck 40 yards down the beach from the other guy and my buddy gets a 20 lb bass on about his second cast on a yozuri crystal minnow. As he's releasing, sun goes under the water. I throw on a black mambo and hit a 36#er on my first cast with it. We each got a couple more 15-25# fish over the next 25 minutes or so before it shut down.
Best part of the story is that the other guy down the beach is a guy I've come to realize in subsequent years is a real idiot....he walks around up there like he's god's gift to surf fishing these days. (I'll grant he does catch lots of fish nowadays.) After we catch our fish he comes running down saying, "What did you guys catch those on, these fish have been here the last three nights and I haven't gotten a hit." When my buddy tells him he got his on a yozuri, the guy goes "What's a yozuri?". Now this guy walks around up there thinking he's some kind of god and five years ago he didn't know what a yozuri plug was. Every time I see people asking him what he's using and where the fish are now, I always think of that night.
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