Record Largemouth Caught in Downtown Austin Is the Biggest Bass (So Far) of the 2025 Texas ShareLunker Season
Willie Pipkin is a lifelong resident of Austin, Texas, where he plays guitar for a living. But his real passion is bass fishing, and on Wednesday, he caught the fish of his dreams in the heart of downtown Austin. Pipkin’s largemouth bass weighed 14.05 pounds and it came from Lady Bird Lake.
In addition to setting a new waterbody record for Lady Bird, Pipkin’s 14-pounder is the third Legacy ShareLunker (and the heaviest so far) of the 2025 season, according to Texas Parks and Wildlife. TPWD’s ShareLunker Program takes the biggest largemouth bass caught in the state each year to a hatchery, where they’re used to grow more trophy-sized bass to be stocked in lakes across the state. The Legacy ShareLunkers (the female bass weighing 13 pounds or more) are the cornerstone of the program, since their eggs contain the next generation of lunkers.
“After they spawn my bass in their Athens fish hatchery, they’ll get back in touch with me, and I’ll meet them back at the spot where I caught the bass and I get to release the fish there,” Pipkin tells Outdoor Life.
He says he’d gone out Tuesday and was sight-fishing along the shore of Barton Creek, a crystal-clear stream that flows into Lady Bird Lake near Zilker Park in the middle of the city. He spotted a bass just 20 yards from shore and cast a Texas-rigged Zoom fluke to it. But the fish just moved away from his lure.
After multiple casts, the fish still wouldn’t eat, and Pipkin realized the bass was on its bed. So, he came back the following day and headed straight for the same shoreline. The bass was still there, and he spent most of his afternoon sight-casting to it.
“I cast to that bass for about three hours, watching it chase bream away from her nest,” says Pipkin, who was throwing a watermelon-red fluke on a spinning rod. “Finally, on one cast I saw the bass open its mouth and close it.”
Pipkin says he never would have known to set the hook if he didn’t see the eat. As he reeled down, he felt the 20-pound braid come tight.
“I felt the fish, and I thought Oh my Lord, it’s a dinosaur!”
The bass fought long and hard, and Pipkin says it jumped twice, its head and shoulders coming completely out of the water. After landing the bass from the bank, he quickly carried it to his vehicle, where he pulled out a hand scale and weighed the fish at 14 pounds.
“I knew immediately it was a bass that would qualify for the Texas ShareLunker program,” Pipkin says. “And if it really was 14 pounds, it would be a Lady Bird Lake record largemouth, too.”
In order for the fish to contribute as a ShareLunker, however, Pipkin had to keep it alive until TPWD officials could get there. He called his friend Tim Fading, who showed up 20 minutes later with a large mesh bag, which they used to cradle the giant bass and keep its head in the water.
“About 90 minutes later, eight people from ShareLunker showed up. When they saw my bass, they were stunned.”
Using a certified scale, officials weighed Pipkin’s bass at 14.05 pounds. The largemouth measured 27.75 inches long with a 20.75-inch girth. It should easily replace the previous Lady Bird Lake largemouth bass record, which weighed 13.5 pounds and was caught in 2015. TPWD officials then put the lunker bass in their mobile fish tank and transported the live fish to the Lunker Bunker in Athens.
“This whole thing is incredible,” Pipkin says. “I’ve spent my whole life fishing here in Austin, and to catch a Legacy bass that is now the lake record means the world to me.”
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