THE 46-INCH, 41-pound rockfish flexed as I tried to steady it for photos. It was easily my biggest rockfish ever and would be returned to the water, earning a trophy release citation from the Virginia Saltwater Fishing Tournament.

The fish didn't know that, however, and strained to slip my grasp as Ken Neill focused the lens.

As Neill snapped the shots, a rod tip to his left popped sharply downward. He grabbed the rod and quickly handed it to Charles Southall, then promptly told him to back away from the starboard gunwale so that we might record my fish being returned to the water.

The amiable Southall took a couple of steps back and resumed his winding of the reel whenever the obviously big fish at the terminal end of the tackle yielded.

Adrenaline can warm you on even the coldest days and it became abundantly clear our celebration might be prolonged when the first swirl of Southall's fish appeared 10 yards from the boat. A second look confirmed this was one monster rock.

Neill stowed his camera and stretched forward with the net. Southall coaxed the fish in and the duo lifted the prize into the boat. And what a prize it was: 52.5 inches long, 57 pounds by the boat's scale. This wasn't a fish; this was a sea monster!

My tagging along on this expedition last Saturday was an afterthought. Neill and I had talked about making a winter offshore trip, deep-dropping for lunker black sea bass. Extreme fishing for sure, but the tasty rewards pulled from hundreds of feet deep in frigid waters makes it worthwhile.

Neill, a Yorktown dentist by profession and fisherman by passion, advised weather would be marginal and suggested postponing, adding he might go rockfishing instead.

Winter Rocks

Trophy rockfish get big in the spring as they travel up the Chesapeake Bay to spawn in its many tributaries. Winter fish, though, are the real hogs, bulked up for cold weather. Most 50-pound fish come during winter seasons, either in the Lower Chesapeake Bay or along the ocean coast, where fishing is legal inside a three-mile limit.

Winter fishing can test both your resolve and your gear's capabilities. Braving near-freezing temperatures, cold precipitation and harsh winds is part of the game.