Rapala Report

Rapala Jigging Shadow Rap

How do you follow a legend? Be you an actor re-booting a iconic character, or a new bait launching in a classic lure line, the answer is the same – innovate, don't imitate. Make the part your own. Starring now in such a role is Rapala's new Jigging Shadow Rap.

Stepping onstage after the famed original Jigging Rap became a household name, Rapala's new Jigging Shadow Rap weighs less than its legendary predecessor and glides more slowly on the fall. And the impressive newcomer’s subtle, nuanced performance as a distressed baitfish earns rave reviews from wary and pressured gamefish, inspiring them to bite.

“This is one of the craziest walleye bites I have ever been on in my life!” Minnesota angler Brett McComas exclaims in a video featured in the popular Target Walleye eNewsletter. “They are just going bonkers over it,” he said. “It's just been a feeding frenzy.”

Designed to vertically target multiple freshwater gamefish species – whether they’re suspending high in the water column, or holding tight to bottom – Rapala’s new Jigging Shadow Rap boasts a broader silhouette than its original Jigging Rap. Enhanced with belly-flashing action and modern, realistic baitfish finishes, the Jigging Shadow Rap falls seductively slowly, triggering even the most-finicky of gamefish to bite.

At 3-½ inches, the new Jigging Shadow Rap equals the length of a No. 9 original Jigging Rap but weighs only as much as a No. 7 original – 5/8ths of an ounce. A 3-½ inch-long No. 9 original Jigging Rap, in comparison, weighs 7/8ths of an ounce – a full ¼ oz. more than a Jigging Shadow Rap.

“It's a lot lighter and fishes slower,” McComas explained. “On the drop, it falls with a really nice, slow, wide glide.”

McComas fishes a Jigging Shadow Rap in much the same way he fishes an original Jigging Rap – casting it horizontally about 40 to 50 feet out from his boat, waiting for it to fall to the bottom, then snapping it off the bottom with vertical rips of his rod tip. Each rip moves his bait about four to five feet, horizontally, back towards his boat. But you’ll catch more fish with a Jigging Shadow Rap if you throttle back a bit from the speed at which you would rip up an original Jigging Rap, McComas advised. Rip it “a little bit slower,” he said, but still with “decent” force.

“As far as cadence and how hard you snap,” McComas said, “it's just like” snap-jigging a plastic boot-tail or paddle-tail bait. “It's just a nice sweep,” he said. “And then let that thing just glide back down.”

Walleyes and other gamefish will strike a Jigging Shadow Rap on the fall “almost every time,” McComas said, citing his own exhilarating experiences. “I’m feeling a ‘Donk!’ and they're getting it.”

If he doesn’t get bit in the glide down, McComas said, he’ll wait 4 to 5 seconds after his bait hits bottom before making another vertical rip with his rod tip. A follow-up rip often turns into a hook-set as he sticks a hungry walleye that pinned the bait to bottom after the preceding drop.

Weighted with lead-free zinc, the Jigging Shadow Rap enables conservation-minded anglers to find bottom and get bites in a more environmentally friendly and sustainable way. Its durable, hard-plastic body comes armed with two super sharp VMC hooks – a single hook protruding from its nose, and a No. 6 black-nickel, round-bend treble hanging from its belly.

It has a suggested retail price of $11.49.