Thanks to Bai Yu and his friends' antics, the official live stream was incredibly popular throughout the noon period, with the number of viewers never falling below 300,000.
With such high popularity, it is naturally very beneficial for Bai Yu and others.
For example, Bai Yu's own account gained tens of thousands of followers as a result. Although it is not worth mentioning in terms of his total number of followers, it is still a good thing.
This is especially beneficial for his image among ordinary netizens.
After all, given Bai Yu's past image and the labels attached to him—national team member, world long-distance running champion, only one Olympic gold medal away from becoming a Grand Slam athlete—he was already a top contender.
In addition, with his huge following on Douyin and Kuaishou, and the lack of exposure of his daily life online, his subconscious image has always been that of someone aloof and somewhat different from ordinary people.
Even the previous mukbang videos on camera were normal live streams. Apart from eating a bit too much, there was nothing else wrong with them.
But this time, Bai Yu and his friends did something funny while eating. Although it was just eating a chicken leg one bite at a time, something most people could do, it changed his image quite a bit, making him seem much more down-to-earth.
Then his public image improved, and he gained a small number of fans.
After they finished lunch, the organizers were very perceptive and left with their equipment, without lingering there.
It's not that the organizers used Bai Yu and the others' mukbang videos and then dumped them; it's just that during the competition, there was only one hour of rest time at noon. They couldn't keep streaming Bai Yu and the others without letting them rest.
After the staff left, Bai Yu and the other three rested briefly at the table, but this didn't last long before their phone alarms went off.
This was set before their break; once the alarm went off, it meant there were only five minutes left before the afternoon match started.
After the alarm clock rang, Bai Yu and the others stood up from their chairs, stretched briefly, and then walked to their respective fishing spots.
Bai Yu and Lu Sheng's fishing spots were next to each other. The fishing spots for the final round were arranged in order, unlike those for the elimination rounds.
Before long, the two brothers arrived at their respective fishing spots, picked up their fishing rods, and prepared to fish.
And just at that moment, it was 1 p.m., the time when the afternoon fishing session would begin.
To address this, Bai Yu simply baited his hook with corn kernels, cast it out, and waited for the first fish of the afternoon to arrive.
Bai Yu was still full of anticipation for the afternoon's fishing trip.
After all, his fishing was excellent this morning. If he can maintain that momentum this afternoon, he has a very good chance of taking first place and taking the lead on the first day of the competition.
For any athlete with a competitive spirit, once they choose to participate, they must be extremely eager to win the championship.
Moreover, Bai Yu is an athlete himself, so he certainly doesn't lack competitive spirit, and he is also full of desire for first place.
Unlike other contestants, he wasn't aiming for the prize money; he was aiming for the honor of first place.
After Bai Yu cast his fishing line, he also threw a handful of corn kernels into the pond. In the afternoon, while fishing, he also took two bags of bait from the organizer.
There was no way around it; he was going through corn bait too quickly. He used more than a bag of bait in just one morning, and the remaining half bag definitely wouldn't be enough for the afternoon.
Of course, Bai Yu's bait is not used for groundbaiting. Although he does throw bait into the pond to groundbait, the frequency of his groundbaiting meets the requirements of the competition and does not constitute heavy groundbaiting.
His bait consumption is simply because he catches a large number of fish, and then he needs to replenish it.
After waiting for five or six minutes, just as Bai Yu was hesitating whether to scatter some more corn into the pond to attract the fish, the float, which had been motionless on the surface of the water, suddenly sank and disappeared.
Bai Yu was all too familiar with this scene; it was exactly the reaction of the float sinking after a fish bites the hook.
In response, Bai Yu immediately grabbed his fishing rod and lifted it up to hook the fish, deeply embedding the hook into its mouth!
However, Bai Yu's lifting of the rod seemed to have stung the creature, causing it to enter a berserk mode.
Then Bai Yu felt a tremendous force coming from the fishing rod. The force was so great that if Bai Yu hadn't reacted exceptionally quickly, he would have gotten off the chair the moment he sensed something was wrong and changed from sitting to squatting to lower his center of gravity.
Otherwise, he would have been pulled off balance by that immense force, and if things went wrong, he might have been dragged into the fishpond.
Fortunately, Bai Yu reacted quickly enough, and he braced the rod handle against his thigh to deflect the force.
"Holy crap, what the hell is going on? Wasn't the biggest fish in this pond supposed to weigh only 70 or 80 pounds? This force is weird. Could a fish weighing 70 or 80 pounds really be generating this force?"
Bai Yu held firm against the pulling force, not daring to relax for a moment, afraid that the fishing rod would be pulled away by this guy in the next second.
However, despite not letting his guard down, he still had to complain. The pressure he felt from the fish that took the bait this time was unlike anything he would expect from a fish weighing less than 100 pounds.
Before Bai Yu could finish complaining, he heard a 'creaking' sound, followed by two 'snap' sounds. He felt the weight in his hands suddenly lighten, and he uncontrollably fell backward.
To counter this immense force, Bai Yu had already lowered his center of gravity and used his own weight to lean back slightly, conserving his energy.
The white fisherman's movements were not problematic. It was normal for him to rely on his own weight to wrestle with the big fish, as this would save his energy.
But to Bai Yu's surprise, the fishing rod in his hand suddenly lost its tension, and he was the one who was unlucky. He involuntarily fell backward and almost did a backflip on the spot.
Once Bai Yu had regained his balance, he picked up his fishing rod and saw that the original 8.1-meter rod had shortened considerably, and the remaining rod was less than 4 meters long.
Right next to Bai Yu's fishing spot, there was a slightly thinner fishing rod, probably only two or three sections long. Judging from its appearance, it was obvious that it had been broken off from the fishing rod in Bai Yu's hand.
The remaining section of the fishing rod with the fishing line attached had disappeared; even when he looked at the fishpond in front of him, he couldn't see the fishing rod anywhere.
"Brother Yu, are you alright? How did you manage to slip and fall on your bottom?"
Just as Bai Yu was still immersed in the result of her fishing rod breaking, Lu Sheng's shout rang out from the side. Lu Sheng had already noticed the commotion that Bai Yu had caused.
However, Lu Sheng did not see the whole process of what happened. When he looked at Bai Yu's fishing spot, the latter had already fallen.
"It's okay. A big fish took the bait and broke my fishing rod. It's not a big problem. I'll just get a new one."
Bai Yu replied to Lu Sheng, and then he prepared to take out another fishing rod from his fishing tackle bag.
Broken fishing rods are a common occurrence in fishing competitions, especially when there are large fish in the pond.
Therefore, the competition rules do not state that breaking a rod is not allowed, or that breaking a rod will result in disqualification.
As long as the players have a spare fishing rod, they can switch to another rod and continue fishing.
Bai Yu looked at the fishing rods in the tackle bag, took out the 7.2-meter fishing rod which was the second longest after the 8.1-meter rod, and then started tying the line to continue fishing.
It's not that Bai Yu doesn't want to use bigger and more powerful fishing rods; he does have nine-meter and ten-meter rods in his tackle box. However, the competition rules state that the longest fishing rod a competitor can use is 8.1 meters.
Therefore, the only fishing rod that Bai Yu can use now is a 7.2-meter rod, which is the optimal solution.
However, just as Bai Yu was re-tying the fishing rod and installing the equipment, he became popular again in a live broadcast room that he was unaware of.
Because the entire process of Bai Yu fishing was broadcast live in the live stream room, there were two to three hundred thousand viewers online at the time, who witnessed the whole thing.
Then these netizens started discussing the main reason why Bai Yu's fishing rod broke: was it because the rod wasn't strong enough, or was it due to his own handling?
After netizens dug deep, they discovered the brand of Bai Yu's fishing rod, the strength of the rod he used, and the largest fish in the pond.
After a series of analyses, the conclusion was reached that Bai Yu's operation was flawed, and the fishing rod broke because of his improper operation.
The fishing rod used by Bai Yu is from a well-known domestic brand. According to the data provided by the fishing rod brand, the 8.1-meter rod can withstand the pull of a fish weighing over 100 kilograms.
The fishpond where Bai Yu and his team competed did not have any fish weighing over 100 pounds. With both sides providing evidence, it would be quite difficult to break the fishing rod by the strength of the fish alone.
Combined with Bai Yu's previous actions, after the fish took the bait, his only move was to fight head-on, without any skill whatsoever.
It was because of Bai Yu's stubborn behavior that his fishing rod broke.
This is why viewers in the live stream noticed that Bai Yu's fishing experience wasn't very good; strictly speaking, he was just a lucky brute.
Through their previous experience, they discovered that when Bai Yu was reeling in his line, he would simply brute force the attack without any skill involved.
However, it is precisely this tough stance that has made Bai Yu a relatively popular contestant among all the participants in this competition, and he is already considered a hot contestant.
This popularity isn't solely due to Bai Yu's fans, but also to his fishing skills, which are comparable to those of an average person.
After all, for many anglers, Bai Yu's fishing method is the same as theirs. As for the so-called fishing techniques of those fishing masters, they are not commonly used by the general public. Ordinary people fish in a way that is just like Bai Yu, choosing to fish in a tough and straightforward manner.
Regardless of what the viewers in the live stream discussed, Bai Yu had already tied up the fishing line and baited the hook, ready to start fishing.
This time, Bai Yu used the same equipment as before, except for the fishing rod. The fishing line and hook were the same.
The broken rod had nothing to do with anything else, so Bai Yu used the same equipment again.
............
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com