THE NEXT RECORDS

Which hotspots have the potential to produce giant marlin and swordfish?

- SAM WHITE

It's a question Capt. Skip Smith posed in one of his back-page departments in Marlin: Where will the next world records come from? It's a question that gets batted around among fishermen on the docks and in the bars from time to time, and one we felt was worthy of a deeper dive. One invaluable resource is the IGFA's annual publication, World Record Game Fishes.

Because history is most likely to repeat itself, a check of the existing records is a good starting point. There are also those up-and-coming fisheries that have potential but might not be ready for prime time just yet and others that have sadly seen their glory days come and go.

ATLANTIC BLUE MARLIN

Except for a handful of fish-including the current all-tackle record from Brazil-nearly every line-class world record for Atlantic blue marlin has come from the same region in the northeastern Atlantic Ocean: the Canary Islands, the Azores and Madeira. The anglers who caught these fish read like a who's who of the IGFA: Stewart and Nikki Campbell, Leo Cloostermans, Gary and Sherrell Carter, and Jada Van Mols Holt, among others. All are seasoned record chasers and not casual fishermen out for a day on the water, but this lends even more credibility to their choices in terms of destinations. And there are a few bigfish destinations outside this particular area, namely Brazil, Cape Verde, Ascension Island and the Ivory Coast. Western Africa is generally out of the picture due to a lack of charter boats and facilities for visitors, and there is no way to fish off Ascension without a fully self-contained mothership/gameboat operation. However, Brazil and Cape Verde both have excellent blue marlin fishing, with some giants caught every year. Cape Verde in particular also has a plethora of top-shelf charter operations, nearly any of which would be suitable for chasing a world record.

PACIFIC BLUE MARLIN