Tackle Primer: The Twitch’n Glider

How Braxton Setzer applies one of the more affordable glide baits

Glide baits have gained a lot of popularity in recent years, but they're still not very accessible compared to the average soft-plastic swimbait due to price and, in some cases, supply. The River2Sea S-Waver and the Duel Hardcore Ninja Twitch’n Glider are two baits that mimic the high-end options at a much more affordable price. In particular, the Twitch’n Glider is one of the better copies of the $100-plus Roman Made Negotiator, which has more or less set the standard for the lure category, and it’s a pretty solid option for someone who wants to fish a glide bait for the first time.

Fishing the Twitch’n Glider

A glide bait isn’t perfect for every situation, but it has gained a place as a big-fish bait and as a great tool for drawing less aggressive bass out into view. FLW Tour pro Braxton Setzer particularly likes one for catching aggressive fish.

Setzer says that dock fishing is probably his most common application, but certainly not the only one.

“I throw it pretty much anywhere there’s an ambush point,” says Setzer. “Around docks, down grass lines, or around stumps – anywhere there is an ambush point where fish are keying in on bigger bait like gizzard shad.”

Setzer will fish it in a wide variety of situations, but he usually sticks to using it in the warmer months.

“It’s a bait that I go to when the fish are more aggressive and up shallow,” he says. “It’s not really a bait I throw a lot in the cold of winter. You’d be hard-pressed to talk a really lethargic fish into coming to get a bait that big.”

The glide bait gets its name because the single joint allows for a wide and slow “S” glide on a steady retrieve, but that’s not the only retrieve possible. Both Brad Knight and Cody Meyer like to vary the retrieve, and Setzer is no different.

“My personal favorite is a twitch-and-pause retrieve, where you’re actually walking the bait subsurface,” says Setzer. “It walks similar to a topwater bait. You can walk it and let it glide back and forth underwater. Then you can stop it around a piece of cover or the end of a laydown and let it sit there, and sometimes it will pull those fish up.”

Though swimbaits are known for producing a lot of follows from fish that don’t actually bite, Setzer says that isn’t a huge problem when the bite is on.

“I think it’s the bigger profile of the bait. Fish tend to be really aggressive when they commit to come and get it,” he says. “They’re coming out there to kill it. It’s a pretty visual bait because it’s right under the surface, and it can get some big fish, so it’s a lot of fun to fish.”

The right stuff

Though the Twitch’n Glider comes in myriad colors, Setzer tends to prefer more muted and natural shades. Even so, there might well be a place for some of the brighter models in your tackle box. Pink swimbaits have certainly been known to produce, and foil-wrapped swimbaits have a solid following as well.

For tackle, Setzer goes pretty heavy.

“I like the Phenix Recon 796 [7-foot, 9-inch, heavy, fast]. It’s a rod that’s got enough backbone to be able to handle that bait,” says Setzer. “It [the Twitch’n Glider] is pretty substantial. It weighs 2 5/8 ounces, so it takes a pretty substantial rod to throw it. But that rod still has a soft enough tip that you can walk the bait properly.”

In dirtier water, Setzer will sometimes go with straight braid, but he says he’s also thrown the Twitch’n Glider on heavy fluorocarbon or braid with a fluoro leader (tied with an Alberto Knot).

However you decide to fish it, the Twitch’n Glider is a good place to start with glide baits. There probably is no technique more addictive than swimbaiting, and a medium-sized glide bait is as good a place as any to get sucked in.