Not so slippery customer! The 5ft2in girl who took on a 7ft catfish - and won



A woman left her boyfriend reeling after catching a monster record-breaking fish.

Kirstin Hole, 20, landed the enormous catfish that weighed more than her at a staggering 120lbs in front of stunned Lee Pollard, an expert angler himself.

The catch annihilated the previous record for the biggest freshwater fish ever caught in the UK by a woman, which stood at 69lbs 8ozs.

The fish also easily beat boyfriend Lee's biggest catch of the couple's fishing trip at 40lbs.

Hold on! It took Kirstin over an hour to land the 7ft catfish at Oakwood Park lakes in Norfolk last week and it took three people to record the 120lb weight

Kirstin, who is 5ft 2ins tall, said the 7ft long mighty specimen felt more like a bus as he struggled to reel it during an hour long battle.

Kirstin, Lee, 29, and another angler heaved the fish into a weighing sling and they were stunned when it measured 8st 6lbs - about the same as her.

She posed for an obligitatory photo with the catfish before returning it back to the lake alive and well.

Kirstin, a child minder from Lechlade, Glos, and Lee were on a three day trip to the Oakwood Park fishery in Thetford, Norfolk, when she landed the monster from the deep.

She said: 'I have only been fishing for a couple of years since I met Lee and do it for the fun of it.

'Lee is a bit of an expert and runs catfish trips to the River Ebro in Spain, so he knows what he is doing.

'We thought we would spend a couple of days together over here and at 5.15am we were sleeping in our tent when my rod alarm went off, so I got up and grabbed my rod.

Slippery customer: Kirstin Hole struggles to hold on to the largest freshwater fish ever caught by a woman in the UK

'Lee came out to help but I did it all myself. I reeled it in really slowly, but it felt like I was battling with a bus it was so heavy.

'I kept on pulling and it took me an hour to pull it out of the water, it was just a huge, dead weight.

'When I got it out I couldn't believe the size of it, it wouldn't fit on our 6ft long weighing mat.

'Another two fishermen from around the lake came over to help me get it on the scales, and then Lee, myself, and one of them pulled it on.

'It came up at 120lbs and I was shocked, it's the biggest thing I have ever caught.

Pint-sized schoolboy Conor Smith battled for almost half-an-hour to bag the fish

'It was so big I couldn't even hold it longways like you normally would for a picture so I just had to hug it.

'Then it took a couple of us to gently roll it back in the water.

'I was just so happy that I had caught such a big fish.'.

Proud boyfriend Lee said: 'I was over-the-moon for Kirstin. She battled with it for an hour and managed to pull it in all by herself, it was great.

'My best ever catfish in the UK is about 50lbs and on that trip I caught one that was about 40lbs, but no where near the size of Kirstin's.'

in 2007 angler Bev Street broke a legendary record when she reeled in a 66lb catfish, the biggest UK freshwater fish since Georgina Ballantine caught a 64lbs salmon in 1922.

Mrs Ballantine, part of the Ballantine Whisky family, was famously pictured afterwards dressed in her tweed hat and coat standing next to the giant salmon.

Mrs Street broke her own record again in 2008 with the 69lbs specimen which has now been shattered by Kirstin.

A boy of 12 is hoping he's broken a record too, this time with a 187lb tuna caught in the Atlantic off Madeira.



Conor Smith, of Halesowen, West Midlands, has submitted his catch to the International Game Fishing Association.



Conor is confident they will confirm it’s a junior world record for a tuna.

His father Frank said: 'Conor only weighs 47kg and this tuna, at 85kg, was almost double that!



'It was a real battle – about 25 minutes before he finally reeled him in.'



The bigeye tuna, caught off Cape Girao, was weighed on official harbour scales and documents, photographs and witness reports have now been sent off for formal approval by the IGFA.

