$30,000 top prize for the heaviest snapper<\/a>.<\/p>\nHe also took home $2500 for heaviest fish of the day.<\/p>\n
Ra’s last-minute catch dashed the hopes of Darin Maxwell from \u014cp\u014dtiki of becoming the first person to win the competition twice.<\/p>\n
In the end, Maxwell had to content himself with second place and cash prizes totalling $4500 for a fish weighing in at 7.25kg.<\/p>\n
Maxwell’s monster 12.03kg catch in 2012 remains the heaviest snapper caught in the competition’s 15-year history.<\/p>\n
A total of 1200 fishers registered for this year’s bonanza, which has been held every March on Ninety Mile Beach, or Te Oneroa-a-T\u014dhe, since 2011.<\/p>\n
![\"Anglers](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/4KB0UH4_PD050325SNAPPER05_JPG.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
\nThe Ninety Mile Beach Snapper Bonanza is said to be the world’s biggest surfcasting contest.
\nPhoto: RNZ\/Peter de Graaf\n<\/p>\n
Organised by Kait\u0101ia publican Dave Collard and printer John Stewart, the event, based at Waipapakauri Ramp near the southern end of the beach, is said to be the world’s biggest surfcasting contest.<\/p>\n
The pair stepped in to rescue the contest after its predecessor, the Snapper Classic, folded amid financial difficulties in 2009.<\/p>\n
The annual prize pool, which includes a lucky draw for a ute, totals more than $200,000.<\/p>\n
About 120 fish caught during the contest were auctioned off at Saturday’s Kait\u0101ia Market, raising more than $14,000 for the Kait\u0101ia Volunteer Fire Brigade.<\/p>\n
Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Far North man Harley Ra with the snapper that earned him a whopping $30,000. Photo: Supplied \/ Snapper…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":330148,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[48,47,42,43,49,46,44,45,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-330147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-audio","tag-current-affairs","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330147\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/330148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Far](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/4JRQFQP_Harley_Ra_jpg.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n