well last night my team finally met a shark we couldn't match 
I woke up to my screaming 12/0 and It dumped me in 2 minutes flat- we knew we were onto a good shark so we all got ready to tie into a 9/0 reel that wasn't being fished (awesome trick we learnt of this site!- although its easier said then done 
) once the 9 was tied in, it dumped that too. it didn't stop once, I didn't even manage to get one wind in on this shark 
as my final 200m of line on the 9/0 came around (this only like 3-4mins into the fight btw!) I sat my ass down in the sand, wrapped my shirt around my hand and fingers and jammed them into the reel for extra drag. slowed him dwn but not by much, and I lost all my line on both the 12 and 9.
I sat there bewildered for ages and it lead me to thinking- if your onto an unstoppable shark- what the heck can u do, really? like if your holding on for dear life, full drag and then some, tie into another reel and he still SMOKES you, what would you do? what CAN you do?
BTW ive sworn to that shark he hasn't heard the last of me
You brought a knife to a gun fight. I'm sure you will be chasing this beast for the rest of your life. What are of FL were you fishing?
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TEAM GETCHA GETCHA SHARKON
If you're seriously not wanting to lose the fish hop in the yak and go for a ride 
jkjk don't think that would end well in the dead of night. Some fish are just not ment to be caught.
we fish gold coast Australia, we only brought a 12 a few 9s as we were only aiming for 8 footers tops, just goes to show u gotta be ready for everything I guess definitely going back there within the next couple of days with a bigger arsenal....
I only have one thing to say, get a Santiago 130. I promise you that you will never lose a shark again. I have a perfectly good example of a Santiago matched up to a Senator with the same size fish same location and same conditions. I was fishing with a buddy of mine last year during the BHC and he hooked a shark on his 14/0. It ripped line off like it was nothing for a good 10 minutes. Long story short it took 40 minutes to muscle in the shark and it ended up only being an 8'2" bull.
This year during the BTC I was fishing with Shannon and he was fishing with his Santiago I recommended. We sat waiting for the bight and it finally came we got the hookup and he was on. The shark pulled line but only for a few seconds and the reel wasnt even at strike. After ten minutes of reeling in the line from the 300 yard drop we learned that it was an 8"2" bull. He traditionally fished senators but has finally come to the realization that senators may not be the best in the market. Yes they have landed true beasts but its very common to go up to any land based sharker whos fished senators who have said they have got dumped or man handled. I have yet to hear of a 130 being spooled, I fished with Peter Buban the night he hooked the 14 foot hammer on the jetty last November, yes the shark nearly spooled him but when he realized it was time to give it to him he pushed the drag to almost full. He stopped the shark and turned him and after two hours of muscling the shark he finally landed the big lady hammer. He did it again to a 13'9" hammer during the BTC. This shows that it wasnt just a fluke, 130s are the latest and greatest and in my opinion are here for good until the next greatest reel invention. I have 1 Santiago 130 in my arsenal due to lack of funds otherwise Id have 10 but I will say Ill never get rid of it.
YOU'RE TYING A 9/0 ONTO A 12/0 THAT' GETTING DUMPED,,,,Not Good!!! I understand that's all you had at the time but try and tie into something bigger or equivalent ,reel in a line thats out if you have time or tie two of those 9/0's on one snap swivel and try and apply more pressure on the fish that way.Did it all happen extremely quick like a hammer or was it a slow powerful roll like a big tiger or great white .With the hammer you have very little time to dedcide what you will do on the other two it happen much slower but you still say<<<<<<WTF IS THIS?????????
ps........big shiny gold looking like a good bet right about now
SOUTH FLORIDA SHARK CLUB -President SFSC-Founding Member est 1983 SFSC-Website Administrator BIG HAMMER SHARK TOURNAMENT -Founder Rene Memorial Sharkathon -Founder NMFS Shark Tagger
we definitely weren't expecting it and didn't really have too much time to react as I would hazard a guess at a large hammer as it was all said and done in less than a few minutes minutes 
having to tie in while the line was flying out was really challenging for our team, is there anyway to make this job easier? just keep practicing under stress I guess?
I'm definitely thinking 130's from here on in.... plus 1 spare just in case... 
who knows it mite have been a white shark