Six years old and stand up fighting a spearfish + New Marlin Video
Most anglers think that fighting a billfish is a sport for heavy weight champions. And yes, it sometimes takes a lot of raw muscle power and strength to succeed, but the right technique is usually more important. At an age of six years young Christian Eldor had to develop his own big game fighting technique when catching a 44 lbs spearfish. Christian was visiting the small island La Gomera which is part of the Canary Islands and together with his father Thomas Eldor Petersen from Fairpoint Outdoors/Kinetic he was fishing on board a private boat Beast’n owned and sailed by Søren Jensen from Vejle in Denmark. Besides targeting blue marlin they were also using a heavy popper rod and a fixed spool reel rigged with a smaller lure to target spearfish. When a spearfish finally attacked the lure, the rod was handed to Christian. To be able to fight the fish he had to hold the rod handle between his legs and use all his strength to turn the reel and constantly put pressure on the rod and the fish. He managed to succeed in his first stand up fight against a billfish and land the impressive Atlantic spearfish that was twice as long as Christian himself and had a weight of 44 pounds (20kg). The catch could have been a new world record in the small fry category, but skipper handed Christian the rod from the rodholder placed near the flybridge. According to the record rules no one else can hold the rod during the fight.
This fish wasn’t the only one Christian caught during his visit on La Gomera. On board Beast’n he also caught a three kilo skip jack tuna and when fishing in the local harbor he had some excellent fishing for mullets. By using bread on a small hook he caught several mullets up to three kilos. Most of them were fighting like crazy in between boats, poles and piers. In addition to this he also caught several smaller colorful fish of different species.
Marlin action Video
Christian’s Father Thomas Eldor Petersen from Kinetic is an experienced blue water angler who has caught a large number of billfish and large tunas around the globe. During this trip to La Gomera he also caught and released a 550 lbs blue marlin. This marlin from La Gomera was his first from this location, but far from being his first blue marlin. On several occasions he has been visiting Cape Verde to fish with one of the World’s top marlin skippers Zak Conde onbord the boat Amelia (www.marlincapeverde.com).