I can't really recall a good rod breaking story, other than watching Saukit2em bust is GL3 in half last year on a snag

Back in the 80's when I first began running clients on the Columbia for the upriver brights, I lost 2 Berkley "Ugly Stick" rods and ABU 6500's in on week.

The first lost rod award wen to the client that just outright let go of the rod during a morning of jigging. It happened so fast, that the client had no idea what had just happened. The fish grabbed the jig on the downward trend and I could see their line spooling on the surface. As I was just about to mention to them to set the hook, they put just enough pressure on the jig to piss the fish off. The fish took off at about the same time the person was going to start raising the rod. I guess the fish won. Next thing I saw was the rod flipping over the boat and in to the Columbia. D'oh.

Later that week, I was backtrolling some magnum wiggle warts for the brights. Back than, I wasn't that insistent that the rods must be kept in the rod holder. This client insisted on holding the rod. Late in the afternoon, on a nice sunny day, his rod was hammered by a big king. To this day, I remember watching the rod fly out of his hand, hit the water on a run and scream past the boat downstream. All I could do was chuckle.

Parker