thornback speciman weight

was just flicking through the speciman book and noticed that for the umpteenth time there isnt a speciman thornback caught, do people think that the speciman weight for these is pretty high, or justified.also does anyone remember one of speciman size been caught, think i may be a little young to remember

Had to go back to 2003 to find the last one 21.45lbs Martin Rayner (aka screaming reels) on sept 23rd kilmore quay
Also on the same page is a photo of cooke with his spec tope
went back as far as 1998 and non showed up.
older books 1985 (3); 1989 (4); 1990 none and 1993 (1)

thats what i thought alrite.it appears that record was significantly larger than the nearest speciman, i knew a longliner from kinsale and he always maintained there was "mittigating" factors about that record. the speciman weight still seems unjustafiably high in my opinion