Fiberglass Fishing Rods for Fighting Big Fish on Your Feet

Every Model in the Current Line Is 100% Fiberglass

The GACHINKO BATTLE series and the SPEED CHASE series make up the range on sale today, and the glass content of every model in it is 100%. That is not a claim you have to take our word for: the figure sits in the specifications on each model's product page in our store, alongside the length, the weight and the rated load.

So if you came here looking for a fiberglass fishing rod, the answer is the whole current range rather than one model in a corner of it.

We do not hold that as a house rule, though. What a blank is made of follows what the model has to do, and hybrid constructions are in development. That work is not part of the published lineup, so nothing on it appears here or in the store yet.

What Standing Up Changes

With no fighting chair under the angler, the load of the fish runs through the body rather than through the boat. A blank for that has to be sized to a person, not to a piece of furniture bolted to the deck.

That is why the taper of the blank and the length of the butt section are drawn specifically for stand-up fighting, instead of being carried over from a rod meant to sit in a holder. Those two decisions are settled before the material question is, and they are what the material then has to serve.

The Fishing These Rods Are Drawn For

• Live bait fishing for large predators
• Bottom fishing for grouper
• Lure fishing for tuna and marlin, on spinning tackle

Which of those a model is drawn for tells you more about it than a material name does, which is why the rods are split into two series. GACHINKO BATTLE (baitcasting) is built around live bait: a rod for that fishing has to report what the bait is doing long before a fish touches it, and then hold up when one does. It does not stop at the bottom, either. GACHINKO BATTLE SOUL 160 is the broadest model in the series, taking in kingfish and grouper as well as tuna and trolling for marlin.

Two models in that series answer the same fish in opposite ways. GACHINKO BATTLE SOUL 165H was developed for taking on a large fish bare-handed, in a stand-up fight with no gimbal and no harness. GACHINKO BATTLE SOUL 155BF is built on the 165H and goes the other way, set up for power fighting with a gimbal and the rest of the supports.

SPEED CHASE is drawn for the other half of it: lure fishing for bluefin tuna and for large marlin. The series is mainly spinning, and it also carries a baitcasting model developed for large bluefin tuna. SPEED CHASE ASSAULT FISHER 1530-50S carries a parabolic action with its pivot down at the angler's hands, and SPEED CHASE FINAL ROUND 1530-50S is the highest-power model of the series.

What the Blanks Have Held

A kingfish over 50 kg (110 lb) and a grouper in the 70 kg (154 lb) class have both been brought to the boat on STANDING SOUL® rods. Fish at that weight answer the question of whether a blank holds its shape under sustained load better than any bench figure we could quote for it.

For that fishing — heavy fish on live bait or off the bottom — the models we would put in your hands are the GACHINKO BATTLE baitcasting series.

Designed and Built in Japan

Development and manufacturing both happen in Japan, run by Soul Shop Co., Ltd. in Mishima, Shizuoka Prefecture. Who does the fishing that these decisions come out of is a longer story, and it is on our About page.

Which Model Fits Your Fishing

Since the material question has the same answer across the range, the one worth asking instead is about the fishing. Tell us the species you are after, the way you fish for them, and the reel and line you run, and we will tell you which model we would put in your hands and why that one.

Our online store takes orders for delivery inside Japan only at the moment. If you are buying from another country, start with International Orders.