This is the KENTAUROS—or centaur—rod: the upper and lower parts come from two different rods.
It has an unexpectedly long casting range. And, remarkably, it can even be used for ajing.
A centaur rod that challenges what an ajing rod is supposed to be… so what exactly have I joined together?
Two rods, one combination
The starting point was a 9.6 ft Daiko jigging rod. It is an old rod, but still in good condition. I cut off the tip, removing roughly the part carrying the top three guides.
Then, more surprisingly still, I joined on the upper section of a 34 HSR-610.
That HSR-610 had suffered a broken tip when I was drawing the line towards me after lifting a 38 cm aji. Only the tip had broken, and I had repaired it.
The join worked. Standing the assembled rod upright towards our high, open ceiling, I thought it looked very good.
3.23 metres, with room to bend
The total length came to 3 m 23 cm. I hung a weight of about 250 g from it. It bent responsively, while the rod as a whole still seemed to have plenty in reserve.
My impression was that it might lift fish of around 45 cm out of the water quite easily. After lifting a large fish, though, I would need to put it down at my feet: the tip is fine, and that is the part I need to take care of.
On the water
I fished with it, and the sensitivity was excellent.
Strangely, the feel at the tip seemed to travel straight through to my hand. How does that happen? It felt like a kind of amplification. Even with the thick butt section, I would say that more than 80 per cent of those fine sensations reached my hand.
It is curious, but that really is how it felt. Quite something. I was impressed.
The world is still wide open—or perhaps the better way to put it is that there are so many things I have yet to try.
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