The new Vanquish’s showed up today.

Got them out, drooled all over them and spooled them up with some Varivas braid to get to test them out in the next couple days before going back to work next week.

First Impressions: WOW! These reels are light weight, and smooth. Just from playing with them in the galley I can tell some real positives already:

1. The out of sync rotor to spool oscillation is brilliant engineering, the line laid nearly perfectly parallel all the way through the spooling of both the 2000 and 3000.

2. The little “fin” that helps keep the line in place on the rotor is nifty, how much it helps in reality will take time to tell.

3. Drag is super smooth and slips without hesitation.

4. Personal opinion here, but the black/chrome colorway is stunning.

I was slightly hesitant about trying another JDM reel after a disaster I had a few years ago with a couple Cardiff 2000s I got really soured my on JDM shimano, hopefully these won’t be a recurrence, but the Vanquish is their flagship model of the MGL line and made in Japan.

Couple other notes of interest on sizes: I picked the 2000 and 3000 for a specific reason, I knew based on weight they would both be useful for me on multiple of my JDM rods but also lets me get a feel for the model lineup size wise. I will be keeping my 2015 Daiwa Luvias 2004 reels, and they will stay with my two Abu Garcia Eradicator rods spooled with Ester line with a spare spool each of 3lb Varivas Twitch Master for my true UL fishing needs.

All that to say, I’m glad I didn’t pick up a 1000 size Vanquish on first go round, I think with the shimano a it’s more than just spool size difference because of the weight difference I see, but either way, for the primary rods I wanted these for, the 1000 might actually be TOO light/small. If I ever decide to pick up Vanquish models for the 5’10” UL or 6’7” SUL Abus, it would no question be a 1000 size. For my 610 Lunakia and 610 Finezza Prototype, the 2000 is perfect.

As far as the 3000, well the idea was it’s going to befor one or both of the larger Lunakia in my stable, the 7-5 or 8-2, I knew the 3000 would work on at least one of them, if it’s too big for the 7-5 it will be fine on the 8-2 and vis-versa. Right now, without fishing them, I’ll say the ‘23 Vanquish 3000 might be a bit too light for good balance on the big boy 8-2, I might be looking to get the 4000 next go round. But it’s obvious as soon as I held the rig, it’s perfect on the 7-5 Lunakia, better than the 2000, 2500 or 3000 Luvias 2020 models felt, so I got that going for me at least…

I’ll be looking at picking up another pair of these sometime after first of the year, most likely will be another 2000 and a 4000/3000 depending on how I like the 3000 on the big boy Luna.

Rest assured folks, I will fish the 2000 size Vanquish in the coming weeks/months on ALL my JDM rods so those of you with similar rods considering a Vanquish may have another opinion to base a purchase on, I understand the hesitancy in making a purchase for something new that has to be Imported and you can’t hold it first, so I will try to give these pretty babies a workout on all my rods I have and let yall know my thoughts for whatever they’re worth.

Oh, for those that look for this in a reel, the “low inertia” claims on startup of reeling is very real, I couldn’t ever tell a difference between my 19 Ballistic and 20 Luvias like some have said they can, I guess my meat shank mechanic hands just aren’t in tune enough anymore to tell. BUT, great big ole BUT, it’s blatantly, strikingly, noticeable when trying to feel the startup force required of the Vanquish compared to the 20 Luvias. With no line out I can literally blow on the face of the rotor and it will turn.

Cheers.

Stay tuned for field trial notes.