Ronix 51

Not necessarily - the tip and its action (or how soft the top end of the rod feels) varies between rod manufacturers. To get an idea on how a muskie rod might feel, compare both its action (medium, MH, H, XH, etc) to its taper (moderate, moderate fast, fast, etc.). A rod with a fast taper will bend more towards the tip of the blank thus giving it that stiffer feeling. St. Croix rods tend to have faster tapers paired with their actions vs. chaos tackle rods which have more of a parabolic bend and load more further down the blank. Both are great rods and have different tip actions. A lot of it comes down to A. what you're throwing with it and B. personal preference. To the original poster's question: what is the size baits are you going to be throwing with this rod? Boat-side maneuvers are a big part of musky fishing now so longer rods have definitely become the norm. If you're going to stay under 8' or go with a longer (8'0+) telescopic rod, you can probably find some used ones in facebook groups that are relatively cheap to ship and discounted. Otherwise, your retail options are pretty limited around NY minus cabelas in Buffalo and Chautauqua Reel Outdoors in Lakewood down by Chautauqua.

Awesome catch and nice fish especially from where he caught it but I would wager the farm that its not even close to approaching 60"...I would put it at maybe 52-53" given the additional photo angles I've seen. That and, the fact that it went from 60" to 57" in less than 2 days (from the same guy) leads me to strongly believe that it was not accurately measured at all and that it was more of an estimate to begin with.