iStockphoto / Talaj / michaldziki
jumbo Smallmouth Bass fish next to a measuring tape and bobber
Montana angler Daniel Caricaburu-Lundin is a self-described ‘swimbait nerd’ who makes his own custom fishing lures and sells them through his business ‘Click Bait Customs.’ He caught a potential world record Smallmouth Bass last month while fishing with one of his custom-made baits but he lost out on the record books due to a technicality.
Once he got it into the boat and measured the fish it showed just shy of 23-inches. The IGFA fishing world record for Smallmouth Bass is 53cm and his fish was just shy of 58cm. A fishing world record?! Well, not today.
Smallmouth Bass Falls Short Of Fishing World Record On A Technicality
IGFA certifies all fishing world records and in order to qualify certain criteria must be met. For catch-and-release records, anglers must release the fish alive (he did), all standard local fishing rules apply (they did), and an official IGFA-certified measuring device must be used (it wasn’t).
He measured the world record-sized Smallie using the ‘Working Class Zero’ measuring board he had onboard his boat, but it was not an IGFA-certified measuring device and thus he was not able to apply for the new Smallmouth Bass fishing world record despite the fish being large enough.
Daniel spoke with Travis Hall of Field and Stream, saying “I did all the measurements with a non-IGFA board, even though I had an IGFA-certified measuring board in the boat, because I had no idea the fish was even approaching world-record length. Then I got home and found out the standing record is over an inch smaller.”
That stings. That stings a lot. Having the certified equipment on board but not recognizing it was a potential world record fish and using the IGFA-certified board and releasing the fish only to find out later it was a record, that hurts. I had a similar situation two years ago in Venice, Louisiana where we caught a state record Rainbow Runner but filleted it and ate it before looking up the record which it easily would have cleared. I still think about it a lot.
Catching A World Record On A Homemade Lure
Daniel Caricaburu-Lundin broke down the incredible catch for F&S. He was fishing a ledge where 5-10′ of water drops off to 100′ and large schools of fish sit on the edge of the Idaho lake.
Daniel had recently swapped the hooks on his custom lures for size-4 treble hooks and a fish this size could have easily flattened out the hook with its strength. Smallmouth Bass are amongst the strongest fish around, pound for pound. They also regularly put on an acrobatic show when hooked and jump around trying to toss the hook from its mouth.
He said the fish “jumped out of the water completely, and my rod was just buried. There’s no controlling a smallmouth like that. I backed the drag way down and played it really slow until I could see that it wasn’t fowl hooked. It was just ridiculously big.”
It took some maneuvering to get it to the boat but once he did the hook slipped right out of the fish’s mouth with ease.
Interestingly, there are currently four anglers tied for the IGFA Smallmouth Bass fishing world record at 53cm, with the first set in 2014, another tied in 2020, then 2023 and finally earlier this year in June 2026. The most recent world record-tying fish was caught in Japan.
His Smallmouth Bass would have blown them all away and set a new IGFA fishing world record had he just used the IGFA-certified measuring device in his boat… Brutal.
He does sell his custom-made baits though! You can find him on his website here if you’re interested (I don’t earn any commission from this, just sharing the love).