Ep. 67: Long Range Hunting with Jon Pynch

Welcome back to Cutting the Distance.

I met today's guest in my booth at the Pacific Northwest Sportsman Show probably eight nine years ago. He was a quiet guy. He didn't say a whole lot. He was kind of sitting in the corner, and I knew he was good at long range hunting and I was kind of getting into it, so I kind of forced him to talk to men.

That's not exactly how it goes.

He's a great guy, just very very quiet, and I was getting more into my rifles, you know, my loads, figuring out how to get all my equipment dialed, and he was a great resource. So John Pinch is my guest today. I don't know, he's too humble to probably tell you how many, but I know he's won hundreds of shooting events between the nrl PRS and other shooting events. When he's not shooting, it seems to be traveling on some pretty pretty kick ass big game hunts across the country.

And so welcome to the show.

John, thanks for having me.

Jason, good talking me. I don't know if I spend a lot of time at home because I've gone so much, but yeah, my wife and kids are awesome.

Yeah, how's everything going.

Yeah, No, it's been going good.

Been pretty busy, traveling a lot the last like November December was real busy.

So it's actually been really laid back.

Just past New Year's here, had a pretty fun Christmas, been hanging out with the boys and just landlow working on some stuff at the house.

It feels pretty good.

So kind of revamp and getting ready for this next year, making some plans for business and shooting. And I've done landscaping for a long time, kind of phasing out of that slowly, but I think this year is looking pretty good to hopefully wrap that up and focus continue to focus more on the shooting side of things.

So it's going good.

So that's a great segue, John, like, what does a typical year for you look like as far as hunting versus shooting? Like, what's what's a year in your life look like?

Yeah? I fly by the.

Seat of my pants a little bit more than some of my buddies where they playing out their whole year starting in.

Probably let's see into this month.

January, the shoots start kicking off Interill Hunter and PRS, which is the Precision Rifle League for Precision Rifle.

Series, and.

There's shoots all over US, Canada, you know, went to South Africa this year to shoot one, There's something Norway. They're all over so pretty much you could shoot almost every weekend, especially through the spring and early summer. The heat of the summer kind of moved some of the matches around, Like generally there's not a lot of Arizona matches in the middle of the summer and stuff like that.

Try to get to the kids baseball.

Tournaments and stuff as much as possible. But as long as I got an open weekend, I'm usually booking a flight somewhere and hitting the shoot somewhere. So I try to shoot as much as I can. Hunting Trump's competent. So the last couple of years we had hunts booked over the Precision Rifle Series finale, I took a little wind out of my sales for really hitting the season hard.

Knowing I couldn't shoot the championship, so I shot.

Three four matches instead of you know, eight to twelve or some guys are shooting fifteen eighteen.

Matches a year, which which is a lot.

That's a lot of flights, a lot of travel, getting guns ready and everything. So I try to shoot as mini shoots as I can, schedule permitting, and hopefully I'm doing more in the next few years the way some of my schedules changing.

But then hunting trump's all that.

So some of our hunts we've got dates booked and planning for next year. Other ones we try to keep a pretty loose schedule, and we've hit multiple cancelation hunts the last few years. Just went up to Kodiak last minute, just on a DII thing a few weeks ago. That's when you, I think you initially texted me view podcasts is like I'm heading out on a planing tomorrow to a little drop camp. So I was trying to kill

Too, so gotcha so so real busy. You could shoot as much as you want, Then do you do you tend to focus on PRS more so or NRL or do you have to hit like a certain amount of events to qualify? Like how how do you juggle that as well? Like there's all these different events or maybe just like you know, single events, like how do you how do you how do you play the game?

I mean it's kind of kind of personal preference. I've done Interall Hunter, probably a little more I wanted to.

There's a an interal Hunter. There's there's an open class, which you're done. Can weigh sixteen pounds or less, so you can run whatever you want up to sixteen pounds.

There's Light class, which is twelve pounds or less.

There's factory which they have a list of factory rifles you can't modem at all. You take it out of the box at Tica Brigar or whatever their list is. And then there's teams when two guys can sign up and shoot teams. And I wanted to be the first one that won every class. So take an open gun and when the overall shoot not just first in that class take a light gun and when the entire shoot, and then take a factory gun and beat all the custom rifle guys for the entire shoot, and then do

I was able to shoot the finale this year.

Dude, I got six of the finale, so it was good. It's the top two hundred and fifty guys and so I shot. I had a good match, but I had one bad stage that you know, he takes nothing to drop to drop a few spots.

So it's, uh, there's some killers there.

There's a bunch of really good I have a really good friends in that in that in that group, and some guys that are super dedicated to it. So it's yeah, just kind of I kind of ebb and flow, like this year I want to hit perrs a little bit more.

It's it's uh, it's heavy, more purpose.

Built guns, where in or all Hunter is more hunting type of guns where the PRS is you know, it's a you're shooting a twenty pounds you know, six sixty five twenty five cal gun, not much recoil, lots of movement, real fast shooting, which I'm I'm real good at. But it's the pinnacle shooting, like it is the best shooters in the world. Yeah, and I want to shoot that more just because it makes me better.

Yeah.

Interial Hunter is a different It combines glassing, u position building, it combines a lot of different elements that I love.

But just purely shooting PRS.

Is Yeah, is difficult because there's target acquisition in NRAL, Like you have to spot your target, get your own, you know, all of that, which adds into the game.

The game.

So I want to I want to rewind this a little bit. You would never say this, but it was internally in your head. You basically took a gun that you could buy off of a shelf and then went and beat the some shooters shooting the best, most fancy guns that you could build.

Yeah, so I did barely by idea.

So I mean you would, like I said, you're you're very you know, modest, humble, But but that just kind of for all the listeners. Lets you in the kind of how good John is and he'll never say it, but I mean to take a gun that's that's literally a stock gun and beating you know, custom rifles. It kind of just hints to to how good you are behind a gun and you know, your your dedication, your time.

Yeah, So, I mean, so there's there's the art and the science of long range shooting, and wind is the art. Right, there's it's never fixed, it's you're never on a flat plane. There's ups, there's downs, there's left, there's rights, there's eddies, there's box canyons that swirl. So so there's the science.

You know, there's a lot of data, there's a lot of blissed calculators, there's a lot of things that do a really good job with cross wind, jump and every variable you can imagine. And then there's the art of it. And so there isn't a hard and fast answer. You pretty much you look at anything you can get. You if there's grass, if there's trees, if there's anything in the air, if there's rain, if there's fog, anything that you can see you take into account obviously. I mean

And so if there's a big.

Updraft, like I don't know, Like so I've had some big up drafts.

If I'm say I'm on.

A valley, I'm up here, I'm shooting over here more it's actually more if I'm up here and this is a long valley running out and there's like kind of hills on this you know, here and here, and there's a valley coming at you, and the wind's coming at you. If I'm shooting across to those with a strong wind in your face, you'll get a bit. I'll get a big updraft.

On this hill.

That wind's ripping up this hill, and it'll hold my bullet up. And so those are all things that are so hard to take into account. It kind of leads into another I think the most important thing that you can do as a shooter, and it's it changed a lot of my I don't know philosophy is the right.

Word, but.

Gun build choice weights calibers, so I can spot my own shot. You have to see where your bullet lands. And a lot of guys don't. A lot of guys shoot the recoils gone. They rely on their buddy, and if they're solo, they're out of lock. They shoot and they hope they hit it. And if you can spot your shots, stuff happens. You can make a bad wind call, you can do anything. But if you can spot your shot, generally you can measure that and make a quick correction and get a second round impact.

That's not ideal.

I'm just saying there's stuff happens, and no one's ever right one hundred percent of time on wind. And so if I'm on the canyon and it's calm where I'm at, generally you can hear wind, or you can see wind, you know something's going on. If it's that far, if it's if you're two canyons away, generally you're talking like thousand plus yards depending on the train. I'm gonna recommend

I'm never gonna people ask how far. I just don't say I don't.

There's elements of long range shooting that I love it, but I also I hate the social media. I killed this at fourteen hundred yards of one shot. I was like, well, you couldn't do that. If we went out and on steel, you'd missed that steel a lot. I know you would because I've shot more than you.

Not to sound arrogant, but yeah, it's hard, and so you take anything. I mean, generally, you can hear wind.

You can see it, especially evergreen trees are real easy to read, big fir trees. You can see the directs and the winds hitting the backside of the trees relatively calm the front the branches are kind of peeling around, and then it's just experience. Hey, is that a seven over?

There? Is that a fifteen mile an hour?

And then if it's dead for three hundred yards, you don't have wind until you hit four and five hundred yards, so you can We're getting a little deep here for a podcast, but you can you can run your brackets out.

Like when you shoot. When you shoot a.

Bullet, the biggest deflections right out of your gun. If you take a bullet off course out of the muzzle, it's going to be way off course down range.

If it doesn't go off course till.

Three or four hundred yards, if you're protected along a clear cut tree line, or it's just you're in this some sort of you're in the bottom and it doesn't get into the wind until you shoot out the top.

Then you're cutting your wind drift down.

The first four hundred yards don't see wind and maybe the last three hundred yards see a fifteen mile an hour.

So you can kind of break that down into brackets of what it's going to do.

All that comes from experience. I wish I had like this really good answer. You do this, this, and this. It doesn't exist. It's an art. It comes from a lot of practice and taking everything into account. What I see a lot of guys do is the moment happens. It's quick. Half the times they forget to dial something or what just they don't level their gun. Go through your checklist, make sure your range is perfect. These are

To hold down much hold that far.

So yeah, I mean there's a lot of things we could go.

You know, we could talk about this forever, but I think just slow down and be very aware if you're not comfortable.

Cut distance.

Generally, if you're looking over a couple of canyons, you can get to the next ridge. Yeah, just cut the distance, get to six hundred seven hundrey yards.

Yeah.

And one of the things you know, especially on wind, that I like to do is in my ballistic calculator, if I if I think it could be a five, but then it could be a ten, I want to go look at the difference like how much error is in my my calculation? And if it's more than what's acceptable at that range, then I need to get closer,

You guys, is this banter online?

As always gone, oh yeah, and this this this banner kind of comes into this question where it's stuff that we all talk about behind the scenes, but when you you don't want to necessarily knock long range hunting. But so Charlie Smith's question is do you think long range rifles are ruining hunting? Which is is a fair question. And when you say ruining hunting, is it ruining our season? Shortening them? Is it taking too many animals? But like,

Is this whole long range movement? Is it? Is it affecting hunting? And to what degree?

Yeah?

I mean I don't I don't understand how you you could say it's not. How is technology not? I mean when I started archery, I mean I shot archer for years, years ago, a forty fifty yard shot was a tough shot. Now now my bow's got a slider and I can you can stackers at a hundred yards like it's it's and you look at muzzleloaders, right, you look at these crazy muzzleloaders that are shooting smoke powder some of the states.

More animals are dying. People are getting better at hunting.

There's so much information like this podcast and many others and internet forums.

So yeah, I think it is. I think states.

I think I worry about a lot hunting. I've had the opportunity to go on some high end hunts that are out of my budget that because of the buddy I have and experienced both sides the thing. I mean, I grew up over the counter hunting and I live in western Oregon, grew up in western Washington. So we're hunting roses and blacktails parked in the trailhead which used to be three or four trucks now it's ten or twenty, and so we all see the same thing. I see

Some guys like to go into to fkinhorn. I want to, like.

I love the idea of finding a big buck, so I wish there were you know, I wish there needs to be less tags in some areas.

I mean, it's a sticky people are going to get fired up. But yeah, I think it does. It makes it easier in some ways. I don't like the guys.

Already mentioned this that are like puffing their chest up because they shot so far.

The brag adocious of that kind.

Of stuff bugs me, but it happens in every everything I shot. This at fifty five yards with my trad and ball. I shot this at one twenty with my compound. I shot this at five hundred with a muzzleoader, and I show this at fifteen hundred with the center fire. It's the same thing across the board. Everyone's getting better, everyone's getting dead deadler in technologies.

Yeah, incredible.

We we're Oh, I mean, I don't I don't know what the answer is.

Yeah, yeah, No, I think I think we both know. And and I'm I'm on the side where yeah, we've got and I would I say we, I I should be careful to put myself on the same boat as you, but like we have the ability to shoot to shoot like long range, but I take more pride. And then I snuck into that bucket one hundred and fifty, you know, or one hundred. Yeah, I had a long range rifle,

But to me, that's the challenge one percent.

I mean, we all want to be ethical and competent. I loved archery hunting. I shot more balls and deer with my deer. I shot more elk with both than I have with a gun, and shot quite a few deer. And I liked it because it was challenging. When I back in the day, I had sided my whatever I was shooting with my thirty six or three hundred wind bag or whatever, and.

Then I was done. I was like, it's not fun to shoot that gun at two hundred yards.

And so I was geeking out on the archery side, and then found out about long range a long time ago, and it just was interesting.

It was fun.

It was challenging again. It was fun to make wind calls. It was fun to learn that art of it, and so and then I started hunting that way, and.

It is fun. I mean, this year, pretty short kills. I got shot.

I killed the big white, my biggest white tail at sixty five yards.

I was working it was working these doughs and it was in this thick stuff.

I just worked in on it and then you know, shot my sidkat a couple hundred, I don't two fifty.

Just a lot of closer arrange stuff this year. It's is it easy? I think it's easier to shoot an animal four to six hundred yards than it is at fifty to one hundred most of the time because it's calm. I'm prone, like I'm not going to miss that shot, yeap, And so yeah, I don't know.

I mean, it's a it is a debate, and I totally get it.

I'm not one that's going to defend it.

I don't like when guys pick sides like compound guys or muzzle or guys.

We're all We're all doing the same thing. The game is. It's the sports change. And it's been weird the last three years watching watching the money and everything change. And it's a lot of it's all of it, it's all over, it's social media, it's everything. But it's it is changing quick. I don't know. It will be interesting to see where it goes.

I think that if if we're going to be willing to do it, we just have to accept or like you said, make change like Arizona, that our seasons may shorten because our take's going to be higher. We're going to, you know, because of some of these things and technology advancements. But then I don't want to be a hypocrite and say that we shouldn't have them because I'm also using them, because otherwise, if you're not, if you don't have the ability year behind everybody. And so I I think it's

Oh, just aim at the post.

You know, that's all you ever heard on those duplexes like fire no matter what, gun, no matter what.

And then put on the back, put on the back to one thousand yards.

And then the one thing that really drives me nuts, and I'm gonna throw some of my own family under the bus, you know, because they had custom guns built because we were out doing it and maybe taking longer shots. And you know, I can like my Dad, you get like ten bolts down the barrel and be like all right, build my dope chart and showed me how to dial this thing, you know, And I'm like, well, I don't know if like you don't have a coach there or

He's He's like I should be good like eight hundred right with this.

I'm like, no, you don't, like you haven't confirmed anything besides a starting point, you know.

And it's the same.

It's the same guys that get their gun boar sided Sportsman the night before season and think they're ready to go hunt. It's the same guys that buy a bow the week before season.

So it's the same. It's the same mentality.

There's uh yeah, it's yeah, I know.

What it is. There were guys outside care we don't geek out like we do.

Yeah, and they think that just buying the equipment gets him there, you know, and it's like, no, there's a lot more to this, and so all diverge I know Charlie brought that up more as a joke, but it's something that we talk about. When when I said, when we say ruining hunting, I wouldn't say it's ruining it, but it's definitely affecting it in.

A change way.

Yep.

I mean, but what isn't like how has ONYX not changed it?

How is everything we do like the application served us and mapping and everything.

I mean, yeah, I mean you could throw you could throw us under the bus, like easier to use calls now you have more people that can use and so yeah, I mean I'd be hypocritical to say this, but it's just something I think is as a as a general group of people, you know, hunters, we just have to think about and make good decisions moving forward.

I think.

I think just being aware of it, having a discussion. Everyone's using technology. The better trucks are farther, cutting gears lighter, you can go in deeper, you stay drier, you stay warmer.

Everything we do.

Nutrition is lighter, peak put forty grams of protein instead of ten like Mountain.

Everything's better, right, so you can you can do I think the discussion and just to beware you can't get mad.

About it, but I think you've got to be open to potential tag cut numbers and being not drawn as much.

I think that's ultimately where we need to go. I don't know that when we do that.

Because fishing games were lying on the sales, we'll see it's and then now we got wolves.

Yeah, yeah, we won't get into that one range. There's no ethical distance for a wolf, so take that.

So this is this one may just pertain the long range, and I'll let you put the parameters on it. So when do you take and this comes from my buddy Cody Wilson, not a whoming when do you look at things like asthmuth and and bullets like spin drift, Like when do those things come into play? Is that only when you're looking at like really long range and maybe explain asthmuth for people that you know don't understand.

For coriolis, yeah, you take a heading that generally referring to coriols a fact the rotation of the earth. I mean, that's I would say, I don't want to say never, but pretty much never.

That's not going to affect anything.

Spin drift absolutely, I mean, you'll get for sure, have your spind drift on in your calculators.

If you're zeroed almost all barrels or right twist, which means if you're your zero is.

Dead on left right, you're gonna hit right at distance because your bullet's rolling to the right. So yes, absolutely use that spin drift is going to be.

It's going to be. It depends on the caliber and the twist.

You know, it can be four or five six inches of a thousand plus or minus, and it's definitely moving your bullets.

So yes, do spin drift Coreyolis.

Or your asthmuth not near as important, I'd say in hunting distances, it's nearly it's irrelevant relevant.

That would be my opinion. Some people may argue that, but I don't really know anybody that would argue that.

A whole lot, and I might misquote you. I know at one time you had actually told me to cite my gun into one hundred a little bit to the left to kind of account for that out to what I would consider my hunting distance is right, and it kind of just now you just said keep it on your calculator, which I don't want to discredit that at all, but for a guy like me, that's not going to shoot it an animal unless it's a follow up shot.

I wouldn't. I wouldn't.

I would never say that much. I'm usually if I'm left, I'm shooting Mills now. I shot in the way forever bolt grade. I'm not going to go into it in Mills. M a discussion, but I shoot Mills now because it's in the comp world, and I do like a lot of aspects of it.

For I think there's some benefits to it in the hunting world as well.

But uh so, each click in a mill is roughly point three to three four three six whatever. If if I can't land on my zero if I if I'm going to be either left or right on my zero point, I'm gonna I'm gonna choose the left to little left. Yeah, it's I'm not. I'm never going to go on an inch left. That's a lot.

I wouldn't. I wouldn't. I wouldn't say that.

But if I'm gonna choose either left or right, I'm gonna choose left and just kind of have a mental note of that when I'm calculating spin drift and we're talking in the hunting world, You're right, it's not near as important. I mean, five six inches of a thousand, that's a chunk of But you know, in your three four, five, six seven hundred yard range, you're talking a few inches, you're still in the vitals. It's going to be more

You're going to mis right. So you have to take that into account on tiny, little skinny targets.

Yeah, and then I actually ended up avoiding that going left at all plans, which has probably saved me. It sounds like, because that would have been too much, I just went back to zero and then like, you have my spin drift calculator on.

Yeah, I think that's the smartest.

Yeah.

Yeah, back in the day, I mean, when I started, I'm kind of getting old now, I guess, But there wasn't spin drifting calculators.

There's everybody just new, like all these bolts kind of go right, so I'm going to zero a little left, I mean, and then you just kind of have that mental note. So it's progressing, like you get the new like the Kestrel fifty seven hundred with appliaballistics, like they've got cross wind jump and spin drip, you got every.

Calculation at Coriolis, they got everything in there.

I mean, it's a you know, and those apps are on on your.

Phone as well and different things like that.

So okay, well, well that was that's going to kind of wrap it up for the listener questions. Once again, you have questions for us here at Cutting the Distance, please email them to us at CTD at Phelpsgamecalls dot com or send us a message and we'll do our best to Again. So now we're gonna kind of jump into my discussion, you know, on on the guns and

Yeah, I mean, I obviously the list is super long. I think I think you need to be interested in it. It's got to be kind, it's got to be somewhat of a hobby. I think you could make the argument. And we and I do do this. We train people

So you can make the argument that.

In that generally what was what was rapid shooting three hundred yards and end type of a thing four hundred was a long shot. You could make the argument that three to six hundred yards with a good set up gun and limited knowledge is nearly automatic. And so I talk with a lot of guys as like, man, I'd really like your limit to be in that six six fifty range, unless the wind is howling and maybe less.

You got to be interested. You got to shoot.

You can't go out and shoot four or five rounds a year. Your form, your follow through, your trigger pull, everything is.

Not is not going to be adequate to do in my opinion.

To be ethical, you know, to make a seven hundred yard shot, even have the wherewithal to think about, Okay, the thermals are coming down this hill a little bit left to right. I'm going to you know, just all the basics to stay calm in a situation. I see guys get so keyed up when they get in and they're getting ready to take a shot that all the thought process of the small things go away. And I think you can get that by shooting more. You go up,

Don't just shoot shoot shoot, Oh I hit it. See if you can hit.

On a first round, or see if you can get real, real close, because that's all that matters. If you hit on your fifth round, it's relevant. Like the guys that shoot new world record at forty two hundred yards and you shot seventeen rounds. To me, it's it's I guess the equipment's interesting to get a you know whatever. I don't want to it seems dumb to me. Yeah, and I don't have close first round impacts.

I don't want to throw the L word around on that. You know, like you said one shot finally hit at seventeen, but like I don't want to say, and this is gonna. I don't know if we have any extra you know, extreme long range people here, but like at some point I already hit it one out of seventeen. Yeah, it's still a feat and you still accomplish something. But was there a little bit of luck involved finally that you did hit at the last sixteen you know, And so I just like.

You, Yeah, as a disclaimer, uh, there are they're doing the world records are now they're doing like three consecutive shots Cold War plus two at twenty five hundred and thirty two. Like that's impressive. Like I'm not going to discredit that, we you know, so anyway, disclaimer, Yeah, the whole world record thing is to me is stupid, but whatever.

Yeah, and then like growing up around here what we considered long range growing up, you know, we have a pretty good range here where I grew up. You know a lot of guys that were bench tress shooters here at the at the PO range.

They would always do.

They would shoot at a at a target maybe a hundred yards off the deer or the elk that they wanted to shoot in a clear cut, get the wind right, and then they would bring their gun back over, which just like you said, like you want to make that

But yeah, I go.

It's that's not a bad as funny as that may sound to some people, that's not If you're shooting a long range and you can't cut the distance and you trust your deer and stuff, it's not bad idea to take a shot like that. If you can swing over, you've got a rock face or something, you can shoot one hundred two hundred yards of left right, that's I

Sporty yeap, yep.

That's how we know what you're saying.

Yeah, yeah, there's an art to it where you want to like you don't want to. It's almost like you're using a cheat code like on an old video game, right, Like I don't want I don't want that information. I

So the only the only time any of the top guys will do anything is if and this is rare, I.

Can I don't.

I might have done it once ever, but I'm always trying to hit the target. The idea is to hit the target, read where you hit the target, move your impact of the center so you can stay in there as the wind changes. But every once in a while there's a couple stages I wish I would have done this. You'll get maybe a skyline target at eight hundred nine hundred yards where if you miss, you see nothing, nothing, and so you'll see guys go up there. They think

Think I've done it once.

I gotcha.

Yeah, misunderstanding there, but yeah, that makes sense. Just you know, try to spot your shot on the target and then make your adjustments if you you know, micro adjustments at that point to stay on or be center. Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So let's get into the equipment because it's it's what everybody wants to talk about.

Yeah, so like.

Gun selection, where for me, I made the decision to hunt with multiple guns. So I've got a big long range gun that I don't like to pack around. I went with a kind of a do it all mountain rifle and seven short action ultramag and then just recently got a six and a half PRC. As it seems like some of these you know, So so that's kind

So I've always been, uh, component first, I usually picked my bullet and build the gun around that.

And I've been a big burger bullet fan for a long long time.

I've recently actually shot some solids. I'm life and we'll see playing with some different things. But been a Burger bullet fan for a long long time. So I'm the same as you. I have a six five PRC. I like a thirty cow and a Big three thirty eight. I haven't shot by Big three thirty eight years as much as I used to. Mostly I'm six five and thirty. But I kind of like the idea of, you know, a few different golf clubs in your bag, so for different different hunts, different weights.

Like, so I'm going to pick my bullet.

If I want to shoot a two fifteen hybrid Burger, I'm going to kind of see it's a thirty cow. I'm going to see, do I what do I want to shoot? Well, I want to shoot good brass. Generally that's been Lapua the last handful of years. Now we have a DG, we've got Peterson, we've got Alpha, We've got some pretty good brass selections that aren't your typical Norman was consistent, but it was soft.

You know.

Then you've got all your hornerity and federal stuff that's not not to the quality of some of the premium brass brands, So I'm gonna pick my brass.

So I'm going to go.

Lately, it's been Lapua makes three hundred Norma. Three hundred Norma has been really easy for me. It's about my shots. Good speeds are decent. I'm not a speed demon like a lot of guys. Gosh, a lot of guys are into horsepower. They're into fast cars. I get it, it's fun. But I am a slow and steady wins the race in the gun world, and it took a lot of shooting to get to that.

And every guy that gets into.

Camp shooting doesn't understand it until you shoot a while and you realize that the faster, crazier guns tend to be a little bit more finicky. So if I can run a two point fifteen at twenty nine to fifty to three thousand, thirty twenty, like, I don't, really, I don't want to run at thirty one fifty if it shoots, I mean you can. I'm not saying don't, But man, the consistency that I get out of twenty nine to fifty three.

Thousand, it's just day in and day out.

It's not finicky, And so I use That's how I picked my gun, So then I picked my barrel.

Twist around that.

If I want to have a midweight gun, I like thirty cows and at ten to eleven pound range, just because I want to spot my shots. Like I talked about earlier, a good muzzle break six five PRC. I like the one fifty six Burger a lot, And then you know, eighty g makes good brass. Lapooa makes brass for it. And I'm going to run that gun and probably between an eight to ten pound gun, probably with a bipod with everything on it, and I run a big scope. I don't not going to skimp on scope.

Good, just as a kid.

Yeah.

And so at the point, at the point you're selecting your round and your caliber, are you already you've already decided whether you want to reload or whether you want to shoot box ammo? Right, you you have to make that decision reloading.

I'm reloading.

And just just because I mean I'm saying I got I reload a lot, I mean I've reloaded. I don't even want to figure how many rounds I've reloaded. So I've got a bigger room full of a billion presses and just anyway.

I do all that. So yes, in it's been awesome the last few years.

And I think the reason the six by PRC, the seven PRC, the three hundred PRC has done well is because Hornerty is doing a pretty good job.

We've we've shot up set up a bunch.

Of guns with guys like, hey, I want you to factor amazal, so we'll get a few different lots of six by PRC or seven PRC and they shoot pretty good. So that's a good thing to bring up. I don't even it doesn't really enter my head because I.

Just know I'm going to reload.

But yeah, if you're gonna reload, or if you're if you're gonna buy factory, I would probably lean towards those rounds right now because Hornet is doing a pretty good job, pretty affordable, pretty good bullet choice, high BC longer range bullets, and.

They've been good. I mean six five PRC has been been real accurate.

Yeah, yeah, so yeah, that's that's kind of like I say, you know, and then you also, I mean we've had some discussions about three hundred PRC Ver seven and what your target animal or like what the gun is primarily going to be used for, So if you know, for an elk guy or or a moose or elk guy primarily versus if you're just gonna be a meal deer hunter, Like, how do you like, is there an energy ideas or just like your experience on on terminal performance on game, Like,

Yeah, So there's one thousand pounds of energy on impact. There's all kinds of different theories out there.

I am a big fan of less so now, but I think overkill is always better. Some of them. My stuff is antidotal. I don't want to talk bad about seven mills, but I back in the day, I had a to eighty actlete and I won't say what bullet. It wasn't a burger, but I was using some bullets and had some real bad experience on how it's an accurate round.

Seven mills are awesome. I mean, there's there's a lot of good seven mills out there. I just had We had three different rosies, no two rosies in one rocky that we shot with that gun in one year, and it was really really bad performance.

So that's pretty anecdotal. There's a lot of different bullets. Some of the bullet placement was most of those all bullet placement was good.

It should have been adequate, you could say, not perfect. It wasn't a double one heart shot, but it was in the vitals.

It broke ball and so since then, like I shied away from it.

So I if I'm going to go elkermose, I'm gonna default to the thirty almost always. I've had really good luck with the two fifteen, a two thirty Burger, and even the two forty five. You know, the two twelve ELDX. Like, there's a lot of bullets that guys have had really good luck with. So I want a little bit more impact. That being said, I shot at Shyris this year with the six five PRC dropped it. It was quick, it was a three yard shot and it dropped it fast. So yeah, I think more energy is better.

I like a bigger hole. I think it's not just energy.

I feel like then three thirty eights and thirty seem like they kill really good. And I don't maybe it's subjective, but it seems like diameter and a lot of guys I talked to the shoot a lot of Elk always seemed to like thirties more than sevens, So personal preference, but I like, I like thirties.

Yeah, and then like my three thirty eight, and I don't want to get into the like the again nerd out on it really like those big three hundred grain pills and like just a sexual just a sexual density of those they don't And it's my family growing up, like, oh,

I shot coups deer with my three thirty eight three hundred gad bullets. Say it's three thirty eight in and it's a quarter out and you're done. Where I've shot them with some smaller guns and it's a little hole in and six softball out the other side.

So I mean, again, hitting bone, things change you guys know that. But yeah, I mean, yeah, three thirty eighths are awesome. I just I can't spot the shot generally in the way I want to carry.

On all these backpack counts we do, Like, I'm just not willing to do that right now.

Wait wise, because I'm not good jat packing camera. You're all my jeered ways to stinking Yeah. I was trying to cut some ways somewhere and she seems like I go down to that six five PRC or a thirty cow.

Yeah, gotcha, We've got I mean, you build your rifles. You've had lots of rifles built for you over the years. Like how important with with all the technology out there and everybody building pretty good stuff? Like how important are the triggers and barrels and betting and stocks like all these things were you know, when you go to build a gun, you pick the barrel, you pick the stock you picked, you know, and then the betting.

The betting is a little.

Bit of of the the art and the gun builder and making sure it's done right. But in your opinion, like, how important is that stuff when you go to build a gun or should you just go with what your builder recommends? Or what you know, if I'm coming to mountain.

For yeah, you have a good builder. Trust what they say. You know, we've done everything from you know a lot of it.

Like a lot of the chassis say they're dropping ready Bolton go, and I've had great luck with that.

I also like betting. I've also epoxied them together like I I'll do that too. I love that.

Now I know there's no variables, and so yeah, triggers are important. Use the best trigger Like I think the top triggers right now are Trigger Tech, which is what I run, and Vix and Andy's making some real good triggers.

Barrels I've had.

I've seen every company there is make bad barrels.

And but there's the top.

There's you know, you've got Benchmark, Kreeger, Bartlin Proof.

There's a whole bunch of good barrel makers. I don't I'm leaving a bunch out. But if there's an if they're a name in barrels, they're generally going to be fine. And everyone has made a bad barrel. It's the way it goes. There's all there's been. I've seen every scope break there is.

I've never seen a single brand not break you just want to pick stuff that's got a pretty good reputation and it's tough, and so yeah, I think all those components play together. They're important to me. I think there's probably there's a lot of customer rifles out there. In my opinion, I'll bet eighty to ninety percent of them aren't being utilized. The load development's not done. People don't.

So stuff changes.

You got to check my guns all the time before every single hunt, I chrono and shoot it.

I shoot at least to six hundred. But stuff changes.

But yeah, get the best components you can get, but the setup. There's a lot of good guns out there that aren't being utilized correctly. So that comes from guys geeking out on it, being a hobby, learning and getting their guns set up correctly.

Gotcha.

Now, now we'll go into the optics, and we talked about all the gun components. Now maybe just as important, if not more important, or what you're gonna you know, glue to the top of the gun or stick to the top of the gun, you know, And yeah, so what's what's your opinion how do you approach optics? You know, you're mounting, like, is there the best way to mount or there multiple ways? And then and then ultimately what are you looking for in an optic on top of your gun?

Yeah, So the whole laughing of rings and stuff, in my opinion, shouldn't be necessary. I've never done it. If you're using a good if you're using a good action with a straight rail and good rings, they better be straight.

So I've never laughed any rings. I've never had any problems with the scope.

So I don't think that you can ignore some of those things that used to be a lot more commonplace when guys laughed rings, when receivers were crooked and rails were out of spec and stuff like that.

So I think that element is mostly gone.

So I just I use good rings. I Nightforce makes great rings. I like the Loophole Mark four rings, Hocket. There's a lot of good rings out there, guys, So use use good rings. Don't skip on that. Don't make sure you're if you're I love actions with intego rails, you know, machined into the action. It's your If they're not. Take those screws out, clean them with alcohol. Use lock tight. You do not want your rail coming loose. I can't tell you how many guys, Johan, I'm in the jam.

We'll go up.

I was like, Eh, everything good, Yeah, everything's tight. Everything's tight. Like okay, we go up there and shoot four rounds. It's all over the place, and I was like, hey, your scope's you know, pull the scope off, check the screws.

They're all loose. And so that happens a lot. So just common sense, guys.

You can't assume you got to pull everything apart, clean it, lock tight it and then redo it.

I don't.

You don't need to lock tight your cross bolts on your rings toward those most of them are fifty five pounds on the cross bolts fifty five inch pounds. And then and then all your torch specs for your caps. They're usually pretty good. You can use blue locked out in your caps if you want, but just make sure it doesn't move. The biggest hang up I see with guys getting it, and I don't know if hang ups right word, but they're hesitant to spend the money they

Nothing's going to make sense. So spend the money on a good.

Scope, I would say, if I would say at least it's at least fifteen hundred bucks and scopes go up to forty five hundred bucks or more.

I mean some of the CCOs and the tangents. I don't know how much those are now, but they're a lot.

But if you're in that, you know that that loophole. Mark five range, Night four cent say night Force attacker. I know, guys, some of the guys are lacking the trigger.

CA on the ten mile.

I think there's a lot of there's a lot of good scopes out there, but spend the money on a scope.

Yeah, don't camp on a scope, don't buy.

I don't well, I don't want to throw anyone into the bus, but there's some scopes out there that you need to spend more money on if you can. I understand there's budgets and there's stuff, but if you can afford a you know, if you can afford a big truck payment, buy a nice scoe.

Yeah.

And uh, with that said, I think we both we both hunt with the same rifle, right, You're you're a Mark five guy on your hunting rifles and they are are they on your competition guns as well?

Okay?

And then I've got Mark five's on to my seven Palm and my three thirty eight edge and then I, uh, I shoot the VX six four to twenty four on my my six and a half PRC.

Okay, so I did. I did switch shot those enough if I.

Get questions about those, the VX five and six hds and I just have a mess with them enough.

Yeah, I've heard.

I've heard some decent things about my other light. I just I'm so reliant on im, so I just want the most durable scope.

I was. I had a hard time. I think I've said this before, like I had shot Loophold.

Years and years ago, and I had switched the Night Force just because they were tanks and it was the old Loophold Mark four and No zero stopped.

This is a long time ago.

But and then you know, I was talking with Reza over at Loophol then she wanted me to shoot for them.

They said, you know, the Mark five's coming out, and I was pretty hesitant because.

I didn't love the Mark four, to be honest, And so I've gained a lot of trust in the markive over the years. I beat that first one up, like tried to break it. Just I dented it. I've dented the objective. I hit the I beat the crap out of it, and it held up, and they've held up really good. I've had some big drops on hunts, I've had big drops on competitions, and I haven't had any issues with them.

So yeah, I've grown to trust them a lot.

I'm a nerd, so I'm always doing research. And that one thing the PRS does that it always shows you, like what go were the top one hundred shooters using what triggers, what barrels and and so I went back I think it was like twenty eighteen, and you go back and it's like us off picks and and I don't know if you get all the credit for this or if it's a group of you guys, But you go back to like eighteen nineteen before the Mark five was released, and you're like, oh, loop Hold has like

Yeah, two shooters, and they might do in the fifty to one hundred.

No, those two shooters were industry partners that got a free invite to the finale.

That's who those people got you. They were running the March the Mark eights back in the day.

Yeah, and nobody was running them. It was it was And now it's it's crazy.

Yeah.

I pulled it up the other day.

I think it was, well, it was December one, I remember because I was talking to Dirk and I pulled it up. I said, what's everybody in twenty three used? And then you go there and it's like seventy percent of the shooters are now using the Mark five, which it's it's kind of cool to see that change. So, I mean, you know, the top shooters in the world are now trusting that that that Mark five is going to do what it's supposed to do and what you've

It could be one.

Yeah, go ahead, sorry, yeah, I mean it's it's it's splitting hairs, but you could be point nine ninety ninety seven, which is all you know. And so I mean that that things is dialed, as you know. I walked mine around twenty m a at one hundred just to make sure it shoots the square and comes back to zero and the thing's been super repeatable and never off track.

Yeah.

Yeah, I do the same thing. I have a big, like fourteen foot tall board I tracked test. I put scopes on this big fifty pounds steel thing with a pickrail, and I've tracked tested a ton of scopes and I've had them.

I've had them all. We God, I had.

Early prototype one that was a little bit off, but that wasn't for sale, and every production Mark five I had this track really well.

I here's things on the eritor guys like, hey, are you really do you really trust the Mark five? I read this on the internet and I'm like, man, I haven't seen it. I do trust it. That being said, Nightforce makes an awesome scope. There's other companies that make great scopes, but I do like the Mark five. I think the balance for the cost.

I don't want this to be a sales pitch whatever, but the cost of the way and the performance is pretty it is pretty good. It's pretty in the locking elevation and then the I like the cap windage. Yeah, so you're going to scabbard on the horse hunt or something like it's it's it's a pretty durable scope.

Yeah, that was one thing that crept up and bid us on my dad's tour entered ultramag. We were in Colorado on a deer hunt and it doesn't have capped windage, and somewhere along the way it got off and he missed a shot at a great meal deer at like three hundred not even a long range shot, but his windage has got turned so much that it put him off. And so yeah, that's another cap windage. Yeah yeah, and

Yeah, yeah, you don't know a ton of what I can you know, talk about, but it's gonna be you guys will see it's the Mark four. It looks very very similar to a Mark five, a little different tube size. I think we talked about they're going to a thirty four on them instead of a thirty five on a bunch of them, but it's gonna be cheaper. They're taking a lot of the tech out of the Mark five. It's gonna it's gonna From what I've seen when i'm

Yeah, I'm excited it changed it.

It set of like a five twenty five.

It's a six twenty four type of brain, so they changed out a little bit to a four x.

But yeah, it's it's good, it's cool.

Yeah, you're excited about that. Now let's go in the issues you might So you've you've got your gun built. Now, we've got our optics mounted, We're we're all dialed in there. Like what issues could pop up if the gun builders did, like what have you found?

The first thing? Everything? Everything, but like what are I guess what's the most probable issue? And like where should you start?

I've I've seen so many weird things that I can't even I've had I've had good brass from companies that instead of testing and measuring everything, I just trust but open it up as it checked the necks and rock and roll and have issues with internal volumes that throw weird stuff off.

One of the weirdest ones lately is I.

Was fighting and fighting and fighting the carbon barrel a carbon barrel gun, and it was like I'd get some good groups and some bad groups. It just wasn't as consistent, consistent as I would like it to be. And I fought and fought and fought. I took it out, I checked, just redid it. I can't remember change the batting, I changed stocks, I changed scopes, I changed everything.

I went, changed bullets, I changed powders, and I could not figure it out.

The last thing I did was I pulled the muzzle brake off to just triple check that it was clean. There was, it wasn't carbon dup, and it wasn't, and I was like, screw, I'm going to put on a different brake. So I had a really lightweight, a titanium brake that was really light, and I just threw on one of my comp brakes and so I went from like a one ounce or a sub one ounce break

I don't want to say quarter age because that's whatever.

But I had three eighths consistently, and I went from I'm talking, I went from an inch and a half to just sub half inch, just like just switching the brake and it stacked at a one hundred and I was like, okay, this is I'm running the heavy break on this gun. And it just whatever that barrel, whatever the deal was with the HARMONICX and that barrel, the weight off the end of it just settled it down. And that's a lot of guys. The weight of a suppress or a way of a break will change things.

Thousand, forty eight thirty one varget. All those powders are great.

There's a lot of good powder, So go with trusted components, good brass, good bullets. Go try to eliminate as many variables as you can so you don't question things if there's an issue. But there's all there's always.

Stuff going on.

Like I said, bullets barrow speeding up, lots lots of powder change, and I've seen a lot of speed differences in powders the last handful of years since COVID. I don't know if everyone's manufacturing is stress and everything, And I feel like the lots a lot VARIANTCE was bigger than used to be. So if you guys, are you got three pounds of this and you run out and you go buy an eight pound of.

This, it's the same powder.

Check your speeds, pressures most likely will be different some real basic stuff, but a lot of things people overlook and even do some measurements when you switch lots on bullets. So I try to buy big lots of stuff so I don't have to do that. Like if I can buy like forty or fifty pounds at a time of powder, don't worry about that as much.

YEP.

I try to do that, But I need you also going through a lot.

I need you to explain that to my wife why I needed thirty two pounds of eight L twenty six at the same time. Was that was to make sure that there wasn't any lot, you know, variation, and yeah.

And you got to protect her when the world ends, you gotta.

Have Yeah, yeah, there you go.

But like you talked about good, good powders like my H one thousand, like my ees my my spread on three thirty eight edge is like single digits on the

I was, I've been amazed.

Like one thing that really kind of you made me like open my eyes is just how finnicky it is with tentsive grains of powder and bullet seating and the balance of that. Because you might have a gun that shoots you know, quarter moa as long as you're doing your job, but if you don't get that node just perfectly and get your bullet seated right, or get the right amount of powder and get that all to match.

Yeah, I think I don't. Honestly, I don't know if it does.

If you take a three thirty eight and you're running or whatever, If I take my NORMA and I'm running whatever, eighty five, eighty four grains, whatever happens to be if.

You drop if you go to if I'm shooting eighty.

Four grains and I go to eighty three point eight, so two tenths less and you go shoot a three shot group. Maybe that group looks tighter on that group, but it's not going to look tighter over over a sample of fifty. Yeah, it's just it's too small of a percentage. So what I don't think it does.

What percentage do you think matters are If you start to move a half a grain of powder, does it start.

To so in the bigger guns, I generally do bigger jumps, and if I'm having problems, I will shrink down.

But I don't think it matters as much.

I think what I've been doing more lately is is I try to stay anywhere away from pressure because they can get finicky. And like when you said about dropping primers out the bottom, you guys need to be careful when you're on really Like I live in western Oregon, you grow up western Washington. It gets really wet and

So you guys can do water tests.

You can pour out water on your animal feed it, shoot a couple of rounds, get that chamber wet, and see if you still are pressure free. So that's just a tip that you got to be pressure safe with water. So going back to the other thing, what I do I've been doing more lately is I generally will know there's enough information or I've shot enough calibers where I know there's a speed node for different calibers. For whatever reason,

Jumps, and then I'll hit that speed. I'll just load to.

Twenty nine to twenty and then I'll do seating jumps. I'll go twenty fifty eighty one twenty like, I'll do big seating depth tests and kind of make some corrections off of that. That will change your speed a little bit. The bigger the the closer end of the lands, you're two with your bullet loaded, your pressure is gonna spike real quick.

And that's like back in the day, would weather be you got all that speed. They just have massive freeboard built into their guns, so they get a bigger run and start with that bullet, slam it into the lands and you can get more speed that way.

You can load more powder all that stuff, So your speeds will change as you get closer and further way from the lands. But I've been doing some testing that way. It's been working pretty good, kind of tuning a load with seating depth and so. But yeah, I don't in the small guns, like when I'm shooting my dashes a lot, when you're loading thirty grains and twenty nine and a half or thirty.

One grains, like, I'll do the point two point three grain increments.

But but if your gun is going to change, like I don't want my gun to change if I load a tenth or two either way, I don't think it's going to. I think over a big sample side, it's not going to If you go shoot a twenty round string or a ten round group, you shoot a five shots and five shots and five shots, let your arycle whatever.

I don't think your group's going to be that much different.

I think they're all kind of kind of cluster into you either a half inch or a three quarter the whole quarter minute gun idea, God, that's interest territory. Everyone wants to all the gun that seems to do that. But that's when people say quarter minute. If I do my part, I just called BS.

Like the time. It's just a real rare gun to do that.

Yeah, and it's just in a light magnum. I just don't the shoot ability those is difficult. If you're in a interrst gun, I get it. I'm not arguing with interrest guys. The guys that shoot the you know, the PPCs and the hundred yard interest and then different things like that, Like those guys are shooting tiny, tiny groups. But that's a different thing than we're talking about. We're talking about and we're talking about field. We're talking about

You're not missing anything.

So I mean, if you can extrapolate that all the way out, you're shooting two and a half inches of five hundred and five inches of a thousand, you're not missing anything anywhere. And so I want it's slow and steady, consistent, day in and day out. I don't want big flyers. I don't want pressure spikes. I don't want to be anywhere near my pressure limit, which if guys are shooting reloader powders have been really really accurate for me, but

I just haven't had it as good as experience with them, gotcha?

So yeah, no, you like I said there, it's obviously this podcast you've got some topics. We could go down some giant rabbit holes.

We just don't.

We could do it.

We could do a series because there's so much to it. There's so much to it, and you know, even some info that I thought I had. You know, you've got different You know where we're we're doing these litt ladder tests that you know, point three jumps on a ninety three grain load. In my edge, you're saying didn't matter as much as we thought. It might have just been me shooting that group versus I do.

There's man, I don't want to like rock the low Bow, but no, dude, if you're doing one shot ladder tests, I think if you do a bunch of them, if you do the same tests three times in a row and check those flat spot I do, there are nodes, barrels whip, there are speeds that shoot better. Like I said earlier, it seems like I've like twenty ninety with a six PC. I like they it seems like they shoot there a lot. There are different nodes, so I'm

Your consistency. If you shoot that same test three four times and so it's thirty or forty rounds and overlay all that data, I'm okay with that. But when guys go out and shoot one round once and like there's a flat spot, I call bs on that, Like I've tried it, I just don't do it.

Yeah, I.

It's it's it's it's it's good info. It's good to have.

I just think that the statistical relevance of it isn't near as significant as people think unless you have bigger data samples. So some of the best shooters, one of my buddy like Jake and Morgan, those guys are like, Morgan's top of the game right now.

He's one of the He's a great shooter.

I travel with him a lot, and he's like, he just goes and shoots ten and twenty round groups and he goes, if it's five eighths whatever, he goes, I'm gonna win a match.

He goes, you're gonna you're gonna you know, so he just he doesn't even hardly do load development anymore.

Sixty five creed with a one to fifty class bullet running at twenty six eighty to twenty seven hundred feet a second, it's going to shoot there, you know.

If it doesn't, it's the barrel's problem. That's kind of his mentality. I geek out a little more than that, but.

It's when you shoot a lot of big data sets, your little one and two tenths tweaks start to go away, and it gets frustrated. You're like, oh, wait, this is kind of meaningless because I shot one three shot group here and I shot another series show group.

You know you need big data samples.

Yeah, yeah, no, no, no, it's great information and you know, it's like same thing on the archery side where we used to all pay per tune and now I'm to the point where, you know, depending on the bow, you get it set and I'm just going to get my

Want to I changed power. The guys are like, oh my gosh, you know, but you know you do tweak powder.

But just if I get to know a gun a lot, like I've shot a lot of six Dashers, six five creeds, twenty five creeds, six five prcs, three d enormous, there's a lot of guns I've shot a lot, and it just seems like I started all that with you know, three tents and half grain increments and up and down and seeing depth, and it just seemed like every gun tept coming back to a general bar ballpark. And that's why I'm saying that I started with the powder thing, you know, but I haven't changed a little.

Bit over the years. Some a little less time too. It's like, hey, I know it's going to get here. Let's get here as fast as we can.

Do a big seating depth test and try to do bigger sample sizes. You know, I'll shoot a three shot group with magnums.

I don't want to shoot a ten round screen, right, I'll do that with my camp guns and shoot like a ten round group and just see how it goes.

Both magnums. I'll shoot three, let it cool, shoot three, Let it cool, shoot three. So I'll have nine shots in a group or something like that. And I wanted to stay in there. You know, I don't want big flowers.

But if you're shooting half inch like, I'm pretty happy with that, especially in the light guns.

Gotcha. So yeah, thanks for coming on and John. We really appreciate having your your wealth and knowledge. You you know, you shoot great. Your your knowledge is goes deep into the end of the topic of long range guns shooting really well. And I love more so that you're not just a steel puncher that you you did all this because you love to hunt and then you like to go take what you know and into.

You put it in animals.

So do you have any big plans for twenty four that you're putting together?

Huh Yeah, I mean we're working on it. Got there's a bunch of connections.

Probably gonna go back up to the territories this year, kind of finalizing that for doll sheet, maybe Terribou.

On a trophy fee.

Trying to finish my North American twenty nine. I was up at Kodiak was number twenty seven. In December. I went up there and killed a pretty good block tailt there and so that was number twenty seven. So I have got a polar Bear left and a Rocky Mountain bighorn and so kind of working through that, maybe polar Bear this spring. There's a lot of stuff that's not in concrete that we're working on. So yeah, there's some hunts coming up, so we'll see kind of how things

So yeah, so we'll see. And then black I love black Tai hunt around here when time time permits. It was fun. This year was fun. They bumped the.

Oregon season dates back this year to like it ran to November tenth, and so I got back from the finale and I had five days to hunt.

Which was awesome. So I was running out with my rifle and passed on more big blacktails than I've ever passed looking for a giant, but didn't shoot one of.

I had a blast saw some big box at two three hundred yards that you normally wouldn't see because of the dates.

So that was a lot of fun. So cool, cool, Yeah, we'll see, we'll fink, we'll fit something in. And there was always hunts that come up last week.

So you're going to bring that six and a FPRC up there for the polar Bear. You're going to pick up a bigger gun, you think.

So maybe bring the six, Maybe bring the sixth dasher up there there. I'll probably just bring a thirty.

I was assuming probably just the three hundred normal, so I was actually gonna soccer with a guy we might actually shoot with solid just a test generally up there, it's I've been up there once before for bins for my buddy Ben's hunt in November and it's generally not long it's not a really long range uh hunt. The way it lays out, it's it's interesting. It's interesting deal. So I might take solid up there as a test, so we'll.

See cool cool? Well, how can how can all my listeners follow along? I know you're not you know you're You're all over the p r S and the n r L stuff and there's articles and then you know all the all the shooting support that you get. But don't seem to be huge on social but it is there.

I I just on my mostly just Instagram. I so far behind, didn't post on half my stuff this year. I love hate, mostly a hate relationship with social but I do need to.

I like to see other.

People and stuff, so I need to post more. So I'll be posting stuff on there, but just it's just John pinch It on Instagram j O N P y n c H. And I'm blocked, so you got to search.

Me to find me that.

I guess I'm a whatever I posted last, I posted this picture of I was up in Alaska and that we were on a bear hunt this year, and I show a harlequin. I posted a picture of that with a like an over under and my profile is banned for nudity because of that duck picture.

I was like, what anyway, So aya, that's where I'm at.

But yeah, follow on post pictures of mostly hunting stuff, a little bit of calm stuff, but reach out, shoot me a message if I can help you well, generally respond on Instagram relatively quickly, but yeah, if you have any questions.

More than happy to help you guys with what I can.

But yeah, yeah, I appreciate.

I appreciate chatting with you. Usually our conversations or John, I got something's not going right with this this load or this gun or so it's nice to sit down and have a chat about, you know, for sure everything shooting and not even everything like barely scratch the surface on everything shooting. You know, you could probably talk for days, but I appreciate having you. Good luck on all your hunts is here, John, and we'll stay in touch.

Thanks you too, Thanks for having me all about.

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