Ep. 248: Running with Guns

I can't say what because of the order. Yeah, I just I was just getting into that. Okay, fine, now he's got to reset the tim again. This might be the no, just leave this in. Leave this in so you can see what I have to deal with. Joined by the second Taylor in a row, though it might not be how you hear it, because that depends on whether Krian what she does. This might be the first Tailor, but for us second tailor Roll. Both with a great affinity for firearms, but in a very different context. The

other Taylor Taylor McCall um. He's got a song which could be your theme song. It's called black Powder Soul. That sounds exciting. Yeah, I don't think he'd be too. I'm guessing that he wouldn't be terribly handy with a gun, but has a great affinity four guns. Would you beat me up on that? Maybe he's handy with a gun. I would bet that you would have beat him in three guns. Don't shoot him, Taylor definitely would. Yeah, but I think even today you you would have. Yeah. I

think he's crafty at fishing. I don't think he's a crafty shooter. Yeah, he's getting into it. That was Taylor McCall. This Taylor is Taylor Thorn like Thorne Bay th h r an e from New Hampshire, New Hampshire, but not anymore. Well, right, you're still from there. You always be from there. Well technically I'm from Texas. Uh so, yeah, so the story gets that's right, but you got like a whole confused

like I'm from here situation. Yeah yeah, yeah, Well because I was born and raised in Houston, which you know, not everyone knows Houston is like the fourth biggest city in the country. Yeah, it doesn't get a lot of big maybe in Texas it does and the North people. If you ask people in the North to name big cities, they wouldn't get to it well, and the thing too is that so it's the fourth biggest one. But people say, like when I moved to New Hampshire, They're like, oh,

you're from Texas, You're roaming with the cows. I came from Houston, a concrete jungle, like it was a legal to own firm animals. And I'm like, um, so, y'all are roaming with the cows literally, So it was a culture shock for sure. Yeah, because they thought I would the hill billy, which was so weird. So I moved to New Hampshire when I was thirteen. Okay, hold that thought from bex. A couple things we gotta take care of, uh Johnie first, just gotta do a thing. He's got

to do a favor for a listener. We don't often get actual handwritten fans. Oh we can still get a lot of it. Well, the it's flow to me had become interrupted, and I recently discovered a large stash of male That's why you found that mail to you in my truck, I see. Okay, well we got one from Dylan because his wife say his name again shrup, And you realize you weren't supposed to say that that you

weren't supposed to implicate his wife. Yes, she said, if we give a shout out to Dylan please underlined, please don't mention it. I put you up to it, but I would have no way. How's it going to make her look good if he doesn't know that that's who did it? Well then, and I mean, what am I gonna do? Just just say that? You know what? This morning I woke up and I had a dream, and I remember my dream, and you know what, I was

thinking about this name. The initials were d s And then I continue to think and shrimp guy thought, it's just not gonna work right. So sorry, mrs that's for sure. If you took his name, I don't know. Do you have a way that you could have seguated it somehow? No, I was going to go straight on. I was going straight to the wife because that's the hero here, and why would she She's so pure of heart, But like

I'm worried about her. She loves her husband. Yeah, I want him to know that he that she was trying to do him a solid. Yeah, and he should what and maybe he brings home flowers, constantly, does dishes and whatever nice things he can for his wife all the time. But I would say, Dylan, you definitely need to be doing some nice things for your wife because she's she sounds awesome. But a couple of highlights here from this nice soul letter. She says that Dylan has this is Dylan.

I'm sorry, I'm gonna mention this stuff, and you canna get a little mad at your wife, but that you have man crushed on all of the meat eater guys, especially the Latvian the eagle. That's okay, buddy, I got man crushes myself. It's it's it's totally fine. Man own it. And um, she said they listen to meter podcasts relentlessly. She's learned more about everything in the in the woods, including turkeys and bears and this, that and the other,

and she ever thought she would. Um. She likes to busts balls and says that she doesn't like listening, but she actually enjoys listening. So anyways, Dylan, shout out, and um, everybody else listening, don't write in for shoutouts because we don't often do this. Just we're just really taken by Dylan's wife. So, um, there we go. That's so sweet. Yeah that I mentioned she had really good penmanship, very

legible letter. Appreciate that. Another letter we got the the new fashioned way, just an email letter, which kind of spook because it's because this guy was writing in in response to me becoming a deep drop enthusiast. He was saying the I'm gonna start with the end. Well he's he's a commercial fisherman from Florida, and he was talking about me, talking about deep dropping. He says, this is this is a heart this is a heartbreaking ship. So you should put like sad music. Keep put some sad

music in over this when you put this together. So he says, anyone familiar with deep dropping would have laughed at Steve's explanation. And I don't want Steve to be rejected by the deep drop community. Where where are he? Okay, he's telling me some stuff that I've heard from other deep There's this seems to be some debate in the deep drop community, but it's like an objective reality thing, like there's not like room for two people to be right. Do we need to explain what deep dropping is? Did

you see the deer in the headlights? It's it's when you fish super super deep. I figured it was something together. It made sense because what else would you be I don't know at what point of deep drop becomes a deep drop he talks about. It's probably like when you're using deep drop tackle. But he's talked about deep dropping in five feet, which I think is like, I'm sorry to throw an insult back your way. I think five feets piss and deep dropping. Yeah, nobody uses electric reels

at five feet. He's a commercial fisherman. I don't know, but I think that I think that the deep drop community is laughing at him, thinking that's deep dropping at five feet. Okay, what else was it about your explanation? One other thing quick, because we had to when we were out, oh you were there, We had this idea that we were going to lower Seth down. Have you

heard this? We want to lower Seth down into feet of water in order to shrink him into a little teeny seth from the pressure and then pull him back up and just have like a little seth. That would be casting movies and stuff. Yeah, but he well, he doesn't like as he was saying that. Um, he's saying that that. I was talking about how the current is

not strong out in so much water. Okay, he's saying, you just don't You don't realize how much it's ripping because you're far away from the shore and so your frame of context of looking at trees going by. He says, you're hauling ass. The currents hauling more ass out there than it is in the shallow And he says that that that the reason your tackle is always running away from you is you got all that line out and

the currents moving faster down deep mhm. And he said, my things kindly not affected by the wind on the surface. Like he's saying, my thing that it's more like the wind blowing the boat is an optical illusion, like like you lower your ship down and it's hard to keep the boat in fourtet of water. It's hard to keep like your bait directly blow the boat. It's like running away from you. I was thinking that the wind is moving you away from your ship, but he says, the

current is moving your ship away from you. And that's why I would be rejected by the deep Drop community for saying that. Other interesting thing. This guy, this is guy named Luke. You know peopleize put their name and their subject there, like line whatever. It's like m d pH D c p A. Right, you know what I'm saying, like, yeah, this is this says no credentials. I love that guy. Here's something about this. So we've talked we've touched on this in the past. Photo period. So can you know

what photo period is? No, it's like length of day. There's this idea that all that like the length of day. So all the all this stuff in the animal world, all this stuff in the plant world is triggered by length of day. Um, things that we might think are contributed are triggered by weather are in fact triggered by

length of day without the impact on weather. And so like if you look at things like wind, salmon migrate, right, Um, there's it's probably bracketed into an appropriate length of day window. Within that length of day window, there could be like little things weather could impact how something uses that length of day window, but the length of day window is fixed. So we talked about like like why do elk bugle and people like, oh, you know they're they're not bugling

because it's hot. The rut came late because of this

or early because of that. It generally someone with jenerry look and say like I can tell you that that rut is occurring in this bracket of daytime length, because right now you're losing three and a half minutes of daylight every day, right so that that it's occurring in this bracket, and within that bracket there could be these minor variations depending on temperature, all of these other conditions, but they're like the main thing that that thing has

gone by when a leaf, when a tree loses it leaves, it's mostly going by photo period. This guy has some interesting ship because this guy takes care of solar arrays, and so they have all these sophisticated meters that measure

length of day, intensity of daylight. And he's watching his solar arrays during these periods of intense smoke in the west from forest fires, and he said that on a on a he's betting on an earlier rot because he's like, anyway that you'd measure photo period about like intensity of mid day sun, length of day, like during the smoke, length of day shortens, intensity of mid day sun diminishes. Boy, you are really gonna throw our ranch into some people's

planning right now. That's gonna get some people thinking and turn it in their beds at night that they're thinking that rout could actually be changed by all the smoke this country has had this year. Well, the thing is too this dude wrote a long time ago. I've been walking around with this email on my phone. But he was fired up about hunting Labor Day for ELK. He says, I'm putting all my eggs in the labor day weekend basket.

Luke no credentials labor. It would not have not have paid out here in Montana, I don't think, because nobody had great act, great bugling action early. But that length of day is affected by amount of light or the time of the number of hours minutes in a day where there is light. Okay, So my aunt who was affected by the fires, sent me a photo. It was like ten am or eleven am in the morning within her living room and it was just black. She didn't have any lights on in the house. It was just

it's crazy. I just love California and it's a whole that like that's part of their life and it's so weird getting used to not seeing. So when I came further east and you know, northeast from California, it's like there's stars again, Like what is this craziness because I had actually gotten used to not seeing the stars or even seeing a blue sky, and the sun becomes this weird color and you get so used to this weird environment. Then it blows out and you're like, oh, that's right,

that's right, we have we have stars. We had speaking of photo period. Uh. I remember our little boy. Our littlest boy was real little. Uh. Days are so long in the summertime that he goes to bed when it's daylight, right, and wakes up in his daylight because it's like the nights never end, you know, or the daytime never ends. So he'd gone like this for a couple of months in the summer, which when you're super little, like that's

like a lifetime. And we had to go to a wedding one night, so he was real late and we walked outside of the wedding and he said, who turned the lights out? Because he'd like forgot forgot that. There's like the thing was called darkness because he has seen it ship in months. It's just like always daylight out And now here do y'all get where you wake up in the dark? And you okay, I figured as much because that's always interesting, not even just wake up, but get to work in the dark. And we work in

the dark. Yeah, I always feel lazy, Like I can't really go to movies in the daytime because when you come out of a movie and it's daylight, you feel like you're wasting your life. You know, it's like better to come out when it's dark so you don't feel like it's so lazy. But when I go out to my brother's place in the summer, when we used to drink a lot, you um, an anchorage. You'd leave the bar at closing time and it's still light out. That makes you feel like a real worthless That makes you

feel worthless something they still have daylight. Yeah, Like they close the bar, walk outside and you can see. Sure I could have been doing something better with your life. Alright, last thing for you for we before we dive into Taylor's inner psyche. Um, this guy rode in. So this guy goes down hunting. I never hunted this lake, real foot Lake. You know what it's like. Um, I only I've been on it, but it's in Tennessee. Yeah, my

brother in law hunted it. So big gass long email about hunting real at Lake and how they everything they do is different. And he says that he sends in a recording, this is like the actual hunt recording, and he says that the guide they're hunting with that this is normal, a real foot lake to yell at Mallard's yell, and he the benefit of the yelling. I don't know, he said that, and he said it works. So instead of going like, well the duck call wait wait, wait Wright,

So what did Ramsey Russell? How did he call it? What was the sound he what was the name of the sound that he made when he said that guys would voice ducks in? Yeah, I think that that's what this dude's responding to. Income or how did he say? Yank m ame? He had like a what was the word for it? You know what I mean? Yeah, I don't remember. So this is this guy, he said, if you know, play the sound. So and he said, this dude doing this sound brought birds in. I I sounds

like a kung Fu movie idea. Play him yelling again, he said, he said, this guy started doing it, and he's like, what in the world is this guy doing? And the watches this burgel come right back in. I I I'll tell you what. I love it, man, I'm trying. That's all it takes. I'm trying it next time. I just got an image of Jackie Chan like doing and then but afterwards he's defeated his like you know, and then it's like the squeaky floor of him, like we're

just walking away. It's like, that's a good little movie for that. Yeah, he might have been watching jack He might have been watching kung fu movies real loud and watched ducks get pouring in and eventually realized that all the fight scenes X started coming into That's amazing. Okay, moving on, Taylor, I'm gonna give you a choice. You can choose to right off the bat, describe three gun which is your compet your competitive shooter, Describe your what

do you call your discipline games? Or explain to people how you live in a camper trailer. It's like, I don't care which one goes first. I mean, I mean, and they're intertwined. Well, that's the thing is how do you go from from one to the other? Is it's super intertwined? Are you not going to include in either of those sort of how she got there? You can go backwards to get there? I think that each based on some time I stone Taylor, I think that each

would deliver us to the same place. I'm just curious how she chooses to approach. Oh gosh, she could be like, so the trailer, yeah, and then do the whole deal. Would be like, so I like three gun yeah, it's I would rather start with a camper first, because that's that's a more easy, bite sized piece. Right. So I started traveling. Gosh, I'm going into five months now. I live and travel trailer that I toe with my forerunner from New Hampshire in Montana right now. But what's interesting

is that I didn't come straight across the country. I went all the way down to Florida, over to Texas up through Colorado. So I've done like these huge vs. So it's not been from point A to point B. It's been everywhere in between, doing shooting competitions in the introim and it's been an interesting life. Living on the road is a full thing in itself, and living on the road swung back home during the five months. I flew back home because yeah, yeah, yeah, I was not

going to drive from California to New Hampshire. And then I just flew back. Most of the country is not close in New Hampshire, see, and I think I think that it is. It feels centrally located. Well, I mean, I think they put Strategic Air Command in Missouri, you think so, thinking it was close to everything. Yeah, well, it's just one of those things where there's so many states in New England, we always feel like we are a part of just because numerically there's a lot of states.

Because numerically there is a lot of people. I mean, and there is a lot of people for sure, and because you have those major cities like Boston, uh, New York, Philadelphia, that's all in that area. You do sometimes, you know. But anyway, so coming out to Montana for anything, I definitely feel like I'm outain the middle of nowhere here, but I like it for that. Yes, yeah, okay, So now, because you did that, explain three guns and now we'll go way back in time, way back in time, Taylor,

in the past. Three guns. Um So, I started competing three gun in my first competition was in two thousand and sixteen. But I don't count that. Explain it like I'm five years old. I would say it the same way I talked very maturely to five year old Is it? Yeah? What is it? Someone's like, I've never heard of this thing until today. I didn't know what the hell I mean, I knew just I was confused between Cowboy action pistol shots. Right.

You were asking all these questions about sass, and it's like they called sas s s so it's couldn't find a way to throw a y on the end. Youth like the youth league is sassy. You should ask them. I bet they would be up for it, because there are some pretty sassy people that shoot. When I heard when, when I used to think I had three gun and Cowboy action shooting mixed up? Did this like rock your world? Then? When?

Because I hadn't figured out before today. But I mean, had you talked to me a year ago, I would have been I was a tad confused. Okay, yeah, because Cowboy action shooting. So these are basically all the sports that we're talking about right now is action shooting sports. So there's all sorts of different disciplines within competition shooting.

Bulls eye shooting is that you know when you see the guys standing sideways with one hand and his pistol and he's taking a sweet time to get this super super tight group with his Normally it's like a twenty two or something like that. Right, So you have those kind of competitions you have Sometimes people ask me if three guns like buy athletes where you ski and then

you shoot the twenty two rifles. I guess that might be moving a little bit better and closer to the right direction because you're moving, But it is also again very different. Um and so with action shooting, you are basically running with guns, and it's all time and accuracy. So it's how fast can you shoot these target? It is it's legit running with guns. How fast can you be and how accurate can you be while you are

moving quickly? Which makes it a lot of fun. And why it's like, you know, even though we gotta keep it, we still haven't explained three guns. But that's my fault. Now, you don't like skeet shooters are not your kin folk. They are not. But I did spend my first three years of competition shooting in sporting plays. Yes, okay, so we'll hit that when we back. I maybe I don't think I knew that now you did not fun fact Why is it even called three guns because there's three guns. Yeah,

three times the amount of fun. It's awesome. So pistol, shotgun, rifle, and you transition between all those firearms under a course of fire, which is basically that obstacle course that we had set up today where you shoot all these different targets. And what's interesting, and we didn't even talk about this today, is how flexible these competitions could be and how the

stages can change. So what I mean by that is you could have a three gun competition where you only shoot one gun in a stage, but the next one you might shoot two, and then one after that you might shoot three. So there's an in the stage is like holes of a golf course. Um, I mean maybe I'm not as familiar with golf. Well, it would be like, um, like in a tournament. Okay, good, well know, like in a tournament like we did at one stage today, correct, it's correct? Okay, So we did one So we did

one stage day in which you shot rifle. We shot rifle at one to four or five targets, shot a shotgun at a half dozen targets, shot a pistol. Maybe how Ballpark nine targets in that order. So that was a stage. But in a tournament, all of sudden you moved to a new it. Yes, but how many stages might there be in a tournament. It depends on the level that the competition is at. So your average local match that's what we call them as match, um, will be you know, maybe anywhere from like five to seven

depending on the side to it. We did today seven different setups. You just rotate. Travis was another fellow that I'm guessing you know, well, you guys seem like you guys were buddies, but um, he also shoots competitively correct maybe as a pro even so, for those of y'all who are listening, we're talking about Travis Gibson of MGM Targets, Okay and easy, a pro three gunner, Yeah, okay, still now, well,

he's definitely an industry yeah, very well known. And he was saying that he had one recently where he shot sixteen stages. Is former military? Is it bad that I don't know, I don't know, I don't know's I don't know. I'm not sure, but I would I would hate to say if if he did have a stint. And but that's not how we got into all of this. There was there was nothing. I know that for a fact, Seth Bergsy was there and he was former military, right,

but that's yeah, but that's different. So but there's not always that that military crossover, um. But just to step backwards. So it depends on the size the level. We call them different levels of three gun competitions. So your normal local match will have again five to seven, you know, maybe eight if some match directors like super ambitious, and then from there you have sort of your you know, maybe regional matches if you will, and those will have

anywhere from maybe like seven to ten to twelve. And then your national level competitions will typically have at least twelve plus um, your your average national will be right around those early to mid team mark. Uh, you know what we ought to do real quick, explain the explain the guns you're shooting. You're shooting a a r platform rifle like walk through all the and then the shotguns like northing I've ever seen and compared to I mean, it's the same thing I've ever seen, but I mean

it's like accessorized the guns. So competition shooters, we have a lot of fun with our gearsh you have your handgun. And so keep in mind too that I could spend an incredible amount of time to ribing this because there's so many different divisions. So you have open division, a limited division, and heavy metal. I'm not even going to dig into it because yeah, you have to explain that so that you remember you when you asked earlier today, you said, does anyone shoot anything other than nine? Like

do they go for the bigger calibers? That's heavy metal. So those guys are shooting like a forty or forty five. They have a twelve gage shotgun. Um, and then with the rifle, they're using a larger caliber rifle, so they're not using six. Those guys will come out with a three o eight. Some of them have like M one grand. It's like, it's really cool, but it's a niche thing. Those guys are like in their own because because you

guys are totally mainstream. Oh yeah, yeah, I'm sorry. Do you have any idea how many competitive three gun shooters are there in the country. So it's hard to say numbers, but when you guestimate. So when when I've talked with people about marketing in the past, what we have said is that like, let's say you have a social media account or you know, whatever it is. If you gather ten thousand, you probably have most of the market, right, So that is the number that I could come to

the table review. It is yes and no. So it's the pre COVID yes right now? Oh yeah, everything. Yeah. So it's it's a really weird time because fire ownership is obviously rising exponentially. Um, but competition shooting isn't everybody traveling somewhere and getting together and having a hole down is well no, So the problem is that most of

the competitions have been canceled. Right. So I was supposed to have hit the road back in March, but then nationals got canceled or postponed, I should say, um, and then another area match got postponed. So all these things have been either postponed or canceled, right. Um, so that was a big issue. So how are you supposed to get more people involved if we are postponing or canceling all the competition? But when and I someone to get

back to the walk through the guns? But real quick, when did someone first utter the words three gun tournament? It wasn't ten was it ten years ago? Oh no longer than that twenty Um, I would say three gun tournament. Yeah, match, like you could have gone to a three gun match a decade ago. Oh absolutely, Yeah. So the the O G guys, I mean they come back from you know,

early two thousand's and it all started. Um it was like a law enforcement match basically where they ended up inviting um, you know, people who were non l e O and then you young whipper snappers started beating them at their own game. It just evolved. Yeah, it evolved. So it's it's been around for a while. Um, but maybe because of sources like YouTube, I think is probably why it's gained perhaps more public light, because it's getting more exposure where before we were just kind of doing

our own thing and then maybe knew about it. Does that make sense? Yeah, okay, do the guns, but do it like if you imagine one being on a sliding scale. A one treatment would be rifle, pistol, shotgun. A ten treatment would be like, um, this trigger tuned this way, okay, this upper, this lower Sarah coated like that's one in ten. Hit me with like a five okay five. The guns, Yeah, so I'll try not to dub it down to like

a three or four, but you have your handgun right. Again, it depends on your division as to what handgun you are going to shoot, but typically we're looking at nine millimeter when it comes to three gun in particular. Um, there's other disciplines out there where it can make a difference, but we're going to leave that out of picture. And I'm just saying that more for the listeners who are like, what about major power factor? We're just talking about three

gun right now? So that yeah, that listener, right, So we're just talking about three guns. So it's going to be nine millimeter semi automatic. Uh So today we were shooting SIGs the X five legions. Is that where you normally shoot? That's my gun, That's what I have. Yeah, so that's what a lot of people are going to be shooting as a striker fire firearm like that. Uh and then you have a lot of really great limited

or open guns that you could introduce as well. So all that is doing just so y'aller no, or those are custom built firearms that are made out of their their all metal, right, all metal, like think of a nineteen eleven. Are you familiar with the eleven? No, ninety. Imagine everything you love about a nineteen eleven and then you add twice the m oh oh oh yeah, because they're because they're because they're staggered in the magazine or what cor Right, So it's a double stacked like a glock.

Pistols staggered magazine. Right, that's why they're still like burly in the hand group. But it's um But a glock is a strike a fire. It's polymer gun, where a nineteen eleven it's nice and it's it's heavy, and it fits great and they shoot nice and flat. Right. Uh. Son are typically custom built. I mean you have some that are factory built as well, but in some form or fashion there's some sort of hand fitting going on. So they tend to be pretty expensive than open guns.

Uh So at the end of the a R you know how there is a you know, uh, there's a compensator at the end. Basically there's this muzzle break. So you put that on a pistol. And when you put that on pistol along with some other things, and again I'm really dumbing it down. Oh no, no, no, no, you would have known. So again for those listeners that are going in, I'm I'm dubbing this down to probably a three right now, right, Okay, I'm not going to get an open guns and its entirety because you can

see my enthusiasm. But oh, I want to go eleven. But you put a compensator at the end of those pistols, that's an open gun. Uh, that is going to keep you shooting. Just flat flat fluff flaff flaights awesome. So there's different divisions, but they're mostly all going to be chambered in nine and you shoot, so you should open site too, but you do use a red dot. Okay, So just so people don't get confused, open guns typically have optics on the handgun. What what Steve meant what

open site is iron sight? So I was shooting an iron sight fire. I do both. So I had the week before Nationals. Both my primary and my backup red dot went down in the same week before Nationals, so I went back to irons and I just haven't gotten the gumption to buy two more. And because I live on the road, right, the warrant he thing, it doesn't really matter because shipping is a nightmare. So yeah, they warrant heated. So I have one sitting in New Hampshire,

somewhere where you're going. Yeah, I mean I don't know where I'm going to be too. Are you? Are you breaking all those I had a red dot my kid broken like five minutes. What because like, like, here's a glass thing to put on the end of a gun like thing. He's going to do with it? That's no excuse. He instantly broke it, broke it in two ways, like, broke it twice. That completely unrelated breaks. Wow, because I mean you stripped the head on, stripped some of the hardware.

He's an animal, well, and then broke the glass. You should have him to You aren't act like he didn't know what happened. Wow, that's impressive. Well, I am really rough on on this stuff, and mine just broke sort of because I think that it's over time, right, so the electronic component was no longer functioning. So what happens. You would turn on and I would think it was on. I'd start to engage targets, and then um, the dot would just disappear, which is really inconvenient when you're in

the middle of the stage. Yeah, and that happened at both kind of like iron sights. Just the reliability, Yeah, I know, sad um, ask some more pills you got, Yani Yani? He kind of he might have question. No, No, I think we're pretty I was just gonna say, we can move on to the shotgun. Yeah, going in backwards order. I guess it doesn't matter. It could be whatever you want. Yeah, you taught us in backwards order. Why do you say that because we started with yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I

had my reasons for that. So what Steve was saying is that, you know, the stage we shot today was rifle, shotgun, then pistol. But that's not fixed either. It could be that was just today. But I taught them pistol, rifle, then shotguns. So that's why he's saying I taught backwards But anyways, that's a different conversation. I had reasons for why I did that. So Danny's new nickname is Teacup Ticcop. By the way, I love that. I think it fits

you very well. Well. I told him earlier that it was going to really suck to get whooped and burned by Teacup. I guess what happened? How does that feel? What was my stage name? Oh wait wait wait facebox facebox spots. Yeah, I poured dribbled t all over your face box. I am so sorry. This has just brought up a lot of really weird I will stick away from that. So the shotgun, that is, people ask me all the time, what's your favorite gun? And I hate

answering that. Didn't you say that earlier? Someone asked you, like, what's your Because it depends on the application, right, So it's all depended upon the situation as to what my quote unquote favor gun. But I will say, if I'm having a bad day, the shotgun will always make me happy. There's just something so fun about that scattered gun. And the other thing is I do think it's really versatile. Right.

So the shotgun, Um, you could do a close quarter stuff with it, right, Um, you could do home defense, you could go hunting with it. You have a bird shot, you have slugs, you have you know, buckshot, and then you could choke it too different patterns. So there is a lot of versatility with that fire. But the shotguns that we use for a three gun are semi automatic. There's some heavy metal guys that like to torture themselves with pump but that's very very rare in this competition.

Most everyone's going to be semi automatic fire UM for the shotgun and real quick on that on the heavy metal guys UM, so a pump a guy could theoretically be competing. I should point out to people that they're competing for time, like you have to hit the targets, but it's like doing it all really quickly. So a person would go toe to toe with a slide action shotgun need to go toe to toe with someone shooting a semiauto and still have a prayer to win if

they're good enough. There's very very few people that are good enough to do that, but there are one or two out there who who do. And you have to have the shotgun for it, right because as y'all know, there's some pump action shotguns that are just smooth as butter. It's like it practically does it for you. And then there's others that like forget about it, like that's not happening.

So somebody automatic and then twelve gauge UM. Technically per the rules, some like twenty gauge would be acceptable, but no one does that. You're just giving yourself less bbs to have on target. And in my personal experience, a twelve and twenty gauge when you're shooting. Semi automatic shotguns have about the same amount of recoil um. So I don't see the benefit with an extended tube that extends out the end so far that I thought that your

shotgun was going to hit the tube. Yeah right, the gun was going to actually blow the end of the magazine. It does, not sticking out way past the barrel. It is so these shotguns look, they look really crazy. It's all. It's all too It's all. The tube is what you're seeing. So the barrel is a normal link barrel of anything. It might be slightly shorter than what you would use really sporting plays or whatever, but the tube is is yeah, it's on yours. Yeah yeah, yeah, is like way too

long for this game. There's no use for it because most everything that we do is pretty close with the shotgun. Right. You might get some aerial clay presentations, but it's so far in between. You're not wanting to because a maneuverability factor because that the actube is already so long. I mean, you don't want to add to weight because weight is a big factor. You get you're so fatigued. I mean, Karen, you know because my shoulders or yeah, oh is your

shoulder bruised up from shooting today? No, I don't think. So. It was just when I was, uh that that gun just kept kind of yeah yeah, just like stopping and you know, and then I was like, I just took breaks in the middle because my shoulders just posturing and holding it a little tired, and just they got they got Bernie. Yeah waits waight. It's huge. So I just had a whole chain of thoughts go through my head. That was probably an eleven in terms of like, oh,

all the fun accessories I have on my shotguns. So I'm going to rill it in a five. So I'm gonna drop it right there. So what I shoot just that people are curious as a bread to be twelve eye, which is basically the same as a Vanilli in two right, which is very comparable to what you were shooting today with weather be very similar platform, but with the aftermarket like specialized everything. Yeah yeah, so strip it down and

put all new parts on a lot of it. Yeah, So uh I Dissident Arms is very very common aftermarket company in the competition world. So that crazy handguard, that the trigger guard, the trigger you know, everything, and then Briley, which you'll probably know just from regular shotgun shooting. Uh, there's a lot of those parts into it. So it's pretty it's pretty juiced up. It's pretty fun. Yeah. Yeah, so you spent a lot of time ranching on your gun. Yeah, yeah,

it's fun. That's uh, that's what we do. And are there rules and rigs about what you can do to your firearms? Uh? I mean I would imagine, because then people might have unfair advantages. But you know, is it is it very structured? Is it very kind of boundaried

around what you can and can't do? Or people can get really creative and so yes, So no, again, it's it's hard not to spend and I don't want to, you know, spend the entire time because I could talk like for probably an hour talking about the different divisions and what's acceptable within those divisions. But in a nutshell open which we talked about before, that has a compensator, that has the optic, you could pretty much do whatever you want. Hence open, it's open to possibilities. You can

do whatever you want, um as long as it's safe. Right. So some people will get really really into their trigger work and they'll make it too light, and so now the gun is unsafe because they breathe on it and the trigger is going on. That's a problem. Whatever the hell. It's not a league where there is some governing body that yeah yeah, yeah, uh and the same. So it just goes upon the vision that you're in is dependent.

So as shotgun, mag fed shotguns are huge now, I would say about three or four years ago, it's a mafed. So you know how that the pistol in the rifle, those with magazines, it's the lingo. But that's the thing is again, I am used to talking to people who this is also their world. So I love questions like

that because I forget about how much is our lingo. Plus, there's no like, there's no mag fed shotguns, I should say, in like in the mainstream in the in the hunting world, because I mean, like unless you go back to you like they used to be mag fed bold action shotguns. We had a couple that I was laying around, but just so like just rare. Right. Well, so two or three years ago someone came up to a competition with

a mag fed shotgun. Everyone would sort of brush it off because we're like they're going to have so many malfunctions anyways, they're not going to be competitive. Where now people show up with mag fe chocun. It's gain popularity incredibly. Uh, it's serious business. As someone who's shooting a tube fat chocun. We can't really compete with that. So again that's why we had different divisions. Right, I want to explain. I want to explain quad loading real quickly. Oh my god,

your face. So Taylor has like highly accessorized like a belt that holds all the magazines. It's like a tool belt, very sophisticated tool belt, and on it was the thing that holds Tommy holds shoun eight choculn shells. So y'all's had eight, um mine, I have to. I have one for eight, one for twelve, okay, And it stacks them so that you can just reach down blind. I don't

try to get too much detail. You can reach down blind and pull away four shotgun shells stacked like a stack of two and a stack of two and and and the stack is end to end, end to end stacked, so you're holding your your hand is gripped around four shotgun shells stacked end to end. Then she like, in a sort of moment of magic, turns the shotgun upside down so the so the feeding apparatus is facing up, and then loads with one press of the thumb. This

is free hand shotgun shells. Loads with one press of the thumb two into the tube and then two into the tube. But in like like a couple of seconds. I don't know, what the hell, it's less than that. It's like, I don't know, it'sensive. It's like, yeah, we're talking about in tents earlier, because in competition shooting we talk in tents a lot. And they're like, what you're You're down to that level. And I'm like, oh yeah, okay,

all right, let's really it back up. The second quad loading is really something picture the world duck hunting, where it'd just be two that you'd have one of those things to your the shoulder strap on your way do it and just yeah, instead of like digging around your pockets and ship looking for him, you just be like wha. It's so much more efficient. And that's what's funny. It's coming in today, so normally people the and again that's

where I could talk about this stuff forever. The evolution of loading a shotgund because used to, people would feed them in with their thumb one by one, which is maybe even how y'all do it right now? I don't, I don't know, um and yeah, forget that stuff. And

then dual loading. So used to because I could dual load, uh like eight rounds and about I would say, you know, four to five seconds something like that, right, which is very respectable, And in my opinion, because I have really small hands, I was like, if I could consistently dual load, then what's the what is it worth to start quad loading? Because it could go wrong real side, you know, sideways, real quick. Um oh yeah, yeah yeah um. If you

become proficient qualding, then you're that much more competitive. So coming in today, I'm like, am I going to make these guys quad load? And then I'm like, hell, yeah, no, no, it was good to know. Yeah, you guys have got to quad load. There's no excuse. I'm not going to start you off at these baby steps. We're just going for it. And I'm so happy because they'll look on

your face. You're like I could just see you being somewhere hunting and you're like, I need to you know, you know, where that will come in handyes on like a no plug snow goose hunt or even just like just do not. You can't quad load with for ducks because it's the three shell maximum, but you can still dual load, not for sure. Oh yeah, I mean if

you imagine just that whole. Sorry to interrupt, but just like the different um the way you flip your gun up and then how you put your thumb and orient your thumb and the way you push it in there, you're a lot less apt to get like the messed up thumb from jamming it in too far, like everybody gets at some point, you know, your thumbs are cold there in the duck blind and this is just like a much more efficient way to get that business done with. Okay,

hit us with the rifle. Now, okay, the rifle. So the rifle is almost always going to be a our platform, rifle chambered in six no way to hold your own with any other thing. Oh I mean, people do it again, like you know mentioned earlier, People come out with you know, fun like end fields or in one grands or whatever. They're having fun. But that's the most competitive platform. That's what most everyone's going to do. Regardless of you're in

a limited, an open class, or tactical class. Most everyone is shooting uh an a r that's chambered into six. That's really it. The the other people who are shooting different you know rifles that those are the outliers. Those those are typically your heavy metal guys that are just like, we're here to have fun. I got my grandpa's gun and we're you know the bayonet. Remember you nearly honest nearly stabbed target. It was impressive. Uh yeah, So they'll put their bandets on and have fun. And is it

always is it? It's not always scoped right Like you can use a red dot too correct. So if you're shooting limited, you have a that is an unscoped rightful uh unlimited, so you have iron sights. And then so I used to shoot limited, I did it with a red dot, which is unmagnified. So I've literally just got that one little dot. So they'll let you use a red dot and limited correct and then there's no magnification.

There's no magnification, it's just a dot um. And then when you go up to tactical, which is what we were doing them, that's when you introduce magnification. So today I think, so Vortex we had this strike Eagle, which is I shouldn't know because I had one years ago. But it's like a one to six, I think, um, and then all the way up to the new Vortex raser, which is a one to ten and that's a that's

a beautiful scope and on that. You know, I don't know if this is something I think people that hunt will appreciate, is you guys have a little contraption for dialing magnification. Like normally when you dial magnification on the scope, that accessory piece that the cattail, Yeah, you gotta grab it like you're trying to kill a chicken when normally when you go to dial when you go to dial magnification.

But you guys hooked that little lever on there, yeah, which just lets you like like a major mechanical advantage these things that walk I don't know if you noticed he walked away with one of those Oh you did this slow nod. I'm sick of trying to kill chickens when I want to dial up. Yeah. No, it makes dialing up like it really gives you like a strong lever. Yeah, absolutely, you can't know why would you not? I mean, but that's the thing is that we had to get into

our gear. That's why earlier I was so enthusiastic about talking about all this stuff because we are a how do you say, um? Like Yankee ingenuity. If you would think of it, you can kind of figure it out. Yeah, and the quick dial what's the name brand on that quick down view change view was? It had mine with me either way? Cat tail right, it looks like a

cat's tail hanging off there. The reason that comes in handy is the first thing you gotta do when they say go, you gotta shoot three targets at a hundred yards. They're like eight inch plates. It didn't steal. And then you got also shoot a bunch of ship's super close. So you might dial up to make the yard shot good, but then you got to really quickly be ready for like short shots. And so that saves you a lot

of fiddle farting around having that cat tail. It does, but I imagine even for the hunting world, there could be great application for having to do. But then it's just like stuff to catch on stuff. And that's true. But the ones that you have that that top half the part that you grewp on two folds down. M he didn't, like I said, he walked away with one. But it is. It is interesting. There is a lot of I think, things that could potentially go from the

competition and shooting world into the hunting world. Yeah. Oh I was paying attention to that. I was like, I was for technological you're taking notes. I think, just like some of the mind frame stuff, you know, just like staying calm under pressure. All that kind of stuff is nople But you didn't. You didn't grow up shooting guns. No, No, like almost the opposite, right in a way. I mean because I grew up in Houston. It's a huge city. And even though it's in Texas, like it's not not

everyone in Texas has like a gun person. Your parents like gunfriendly people. Oh, they were fine with it. I mean if you live in Texas, even if you are in Austin, which is the most liberal city in Texas, there's an assumption that firearms are still okay. Um, like we're in New England. If you go to some of the states there, like like especially Massachusetts, you start talking about guns like people will have you know, act like

you have three heads. It's like a general kind of naughtiness. Yeah, you feel it's like a taboo, which is absolutely terrible. But I did not grow up with firearms. Um, like you grew up like no guns in the house, no guns in the house at all. Yeah, and moving to New Hampshire that normal or not? Do more? I bet more American households don't than do. I grew up in New York City going to the house plenty I was. I did not say anything to anybody ever. Yeah. Yeah,

definitely taboo there hidden on my parents bed. No rights. Oh my god, I'll talk about that. Um. Were you asking if it's common for people not to grow up with firearms too? No, I was just wondering, like the split took up, it's changing now new fire and purchases are people who didn't have guns before, so that it's definitely changing. Yeah yeah, so whatever that that number was, it's it's different now. Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, my so my stupdad used to hunt when we moved to

New Hampshire. It was because my you know, my mom and my stepdad got married. Um, but his version of hunting was like he would take his like muzzle loader and walk around in the woods it was like a stroll, like a leisurely stroll. He got a deal I think like fifteen plus years ago once, Um, I'm so sorry. That was his groove, like take a most sneak around in snowy woods. Yeah, but he never shared that. That was never a part of anything. No, no, I was

never a part of any of them. Actively not invite you or just he would just disappear in the morning. I mean he would wake up earlier and he was gone, and then he was catching a moment. He would show back up. Yeah, he was having his moment. So I mean whatever, and no hard feelings because I you know, I used to race motocross. I had like my own thing going on so well, so I actually you saw

tally Am. I raised four wheelers. So if I raised a dirt bike, it would have been sandbagging on like a seventy c C with a whole bunch of twelve year olds. So with a four wheeler I could write a four fifty and be with you know, normal adulton aged people. You got into that in New Hampshire. Yeah, yeah, Well because behind our house, which is in Dumbarton, New Hampshire, it's all conservation land. It's called Clough State Park and Club State Park is a huge a TV trail system

and so I got into it from there. So I would ride my quad right from uh right from my mom's house into the state park. So are you like when you were growing up so you did that competitively? Yeah? Are you sort of in your head like if you're gonna do something, it just turns into competition. Are you getting this sense? So when I used to do before leaving Houston, kickboxing was big. So I had actually like to have like a winner, you have to Yeah, well,

so kickboxing I actually qualified for the Junior Olympics. Uh yeah, but we couldn't uh we couldn't afford it because the Olympic trials were I think in Michigan or something like that, and so I mean we couldn't afford to go. And then my mom was like, and we're moving to New Hampshire and there's no good dojos up there. I mean,

I'm sure that there. Maybe it was, but not to the caliber that I was used to before we had a We had a guy we worked with for a while and he was he was a skier and was wanting to be competit of and we're talking about Olympic skiing and all that, and he was saying something interesting that there's a point at which your ability to like as a young skier, there's a point at which your ability to be competitive is tied to the economics of

your family. Because he's like, rich kids, they ski six months of the year in North America, and then they spend six months a year in New Zealand. And he's like, you're not going to catch those kids skiing six months a year. It's just it's just like there's a there's a major function of just like can you afford to

be good? Which is kind of disheartening. It is, it is um but I think that if those those people who are naturally talented, even if they come from bad economic backgrounds, if they have the gumption to market themselves appropriately, they could yield that economic benefits. I'm so sorry, I just got an image of all these cowboy shooters and Steve just being I use sassy people. Uh but yeah, I mean, and again I don't see. So this is

what happens when you shoot three gear. You come home with a whole bunch of random ammo like in your pockets. That's why. Yeah, that's why you travel the country living in a camper. I don't deal with t s A. Well, I still deal with t s A because I do still fly. But so I'm actually I'm coming out with a piece. Um, I'm not sure when it's publishing about driving and traveling across country with fire and tell people where you right for so, I write for guns dot Com.

I cover all their competition related content, and I do kind of other fun stuff as well, whether if it's reviewing firearms or talking about again when it's like traveling across country with firearms constructional how to Yeah, yeah, and it's not as bad as as people think. You just have to be smart, you know, block your guns um in a separate compartment, so if you're in a car, it's in your trunk. If you're in an SUV, just keep it out of reach, right, And then I have

your AMMO in a separate compartment that's also locked. Don't have any magazines preloaded. Every state is different some states. All that stuff is fine, but you're given the recipe to how to be just cool going from state to state to state to go anywhere. Yeah, that's the recipe for for anywhere and other than that. Um, I always keep a copy of PAPA and uh the glob box of my car. So Farms Owners Protection Act. So that is the law, um that protects you from going from

one state to the other. So if you are illegal, point, because you might be in a situation where you need to explain it to somebody. Well, so let's say we're leaving New Hampshire and I came down south. Um so New York, New Jersey, all Massachusetts, all those states. Everything I own is illegal in those states. But I'm protected by FOPA to drive through those states. And you could stop for gas and stuff like that, right, but you're you're good, You're good to go. I could drive through

all of those states perfectly fine because of POPA. So I keep that documentation. UM, And I mean I love law enforcement, so won't say anything that's interesting about FOUS. So like I I don't know that I know, I know of the thing, but I never heard that acronym.

But um, you can drive through. But I remember hearing that people get in trouble because you can, like somehow you could be It doesn't count if you go into New York and then fly out of a New York Airport because I was tiring these law enforcement guys are saying, they're always people are always getting in trouble coming down from Pennsylvania, coming down to places flying out of JFK Leguardia, and they can like travel through legally, but they go

to like there, but now they're in there in the city, and so they're they're in what's like gathered up by the city of the port authority. So then there you are with a gun checking on an airplane and you don't have the necessary permit to have a gun in the city somehow in their view, And I don't know if this just it needs to be challenged. I noticed,

like I know that it's an issue. I don't know if it's constitutional or legal, but in their view, you had stepped out of those protections at that moment that you went to check it onto a plane. Sure I would have to reasearch. I never under like, I never got into it enough to understand like how that's true. But it's like you could drive past the airport, but the minute you go to check that gun in that thing, it's like not your it's out of your car. To I don't know how they viewed it, but it would

be that. But their thing was and it was always people being like but I thought like, no, dude, because you're standing here right now checking this gun in it's not the same thing as you traveling through with it in your car. I would still I would personally question that. Now, So FOLKA does specify interstate travel. It doesn't stay like like when I I'm sorry, maybe that's my accent. Interstate

like as in the highway. It does specify that, so maybe it does get different like you took it out, you got it out of your car and your you know whatever. Again, I I would question it. And there's so much more that we could dig into this. So, for instance, I flew out of California recently. Um So in California, most of my farms are illegal, right, but

I'm there for competition reasons. So there is a actual um I forget what they call it, not not a law, but you know there's a provision that if you're there for competition reasons and you're good, and so I could fly competition in California. Yeah, I know. I was very skeptical, but a thousand percent. So so they have like again, you know, whether if it's considered a law or bill

or whatever. We're if you're there for competition reasons, you could have those firearms that people generally have thought we're not legal in California. So I flew out of California recently with all my guns. But for anyone who's flying, I recommend you just to take everything apart because no one at the airline understands anything of what you're carrying on you. I mean they really they have no clue. So just take everything apart, make sure it's safe, and

for the most part, you're not gonna get questions. I'll point out to people because I don't want this stuff to be I don't want this stuff to then discourage people from doing what they want to do. And like they're like get overwhelmed by the complexity law. There are a ton of resources online to hop you navigate, like to help you stand on the right side of the law.

It's like it sounds like intimidating and complicated, but in practice, um, in practice, when you're generally going from somewhere to somewhere, like you're going to Canada or whatever, it seems intimidating, But when you go and do it, it winds up being fine. It's easy to find the resources you need. You know, it's not like people waiting at every corner and be like, got you, you know, you screwed this up. But just it does doesn't have that feel to it exactly.

And of course, right there's a disclosure that it's up to people to do their own research to make sure that they are doing the legal thing right, don't use the podcast as your guidance for this is what I should do. So anyways, do your research. But at the end of the day, it's actually really easy. Um and for the most part, you know, law enforcement or anyone you might run into, to be honest, most of them

have no idea what they're looking at. There. There's some out there who are super super educated, and a lot of them even compete, but for the most part, they don't know what they're looking at. And you're probably more educated about it than there. But that's that's like a funny little Yeah, I want to get back to bio, but like a funny little trade. You need to go throughout some airports as they want to inspect it. Oh and you open it up like they're not even pretending

to know. But they're like they know that they're like the air the person checking you in knows that they're supposed to like inspect it, but they also know that they're not going to bullshit themselves, like they don't know if they're looking at so like you open it, they look down and like, sure you're closing back up because like, hell, I'm looking for They have no idea, and it's like because they want to feel like they're doing the right thing. I think I think that appears to be a gun

up that they do. They just look at it and they're kind of like a dead snake. It's like no. And sometimes when they want you to show clear, it's like, okay, well, what position where do you want me to point this to show you that my fire is unloaded because you're in the middle of it. And but normally when you um normally when you do that, they're just kind of like, oh, um, no, no,

it's fine. But I've known some competition shooters will they'll take their a R right out and remember that charging hill and they go just go whack a whack, a whack whack in the middle of the air plant, just be like, yeah, it's clear. Well, I think That's why most people that do have to do that are very like, yeah, you open it, like hey, looks, looks get at me. Let's not get the gun out and play with it. Let's just put it back in the little box that

kills me. Okay, So not many guns growing up. Then all of a sudden you're like, I only get me a gun. Well so almost. Yeah, So m I had gotten out of long term relationship my high school sweetheart. Uh three, um, I mean you just it's when you're dating someone from sixteen to your early twenties. Just agen you just met in high school. Well technically he was homeschooled and I wasn't, but I alwa say high school sweetheart because it's easier for people to Actually it was

like at a party, you know. It was just like the party. A lot of people home school to kids. They don't wan him to party. It was a lot of people party home school. It's big part of homeschool not this is not universal. It's a big part of homeschooling is they don't want their kids to find out about They don't want to find out about dirty er. They don't want them to party, they don't want them

to like know about certain things. It's kind of a way to be like, I want my kid to just know about what I tell them, Steve, what other socializing would they get if they didn't go to parties or not school to other kids all day? You know what I mean. Yeah, it's just it's like a way to control what goes into their little brain. Yeah. Well yeah, I mean his parents did for different reasons, just because they didn't feel that the public school system was doing,

you know, the best education. But that's, you know what I'm speaking just a segment of that world. So when you say, like I was pard parting with the homeschoolers, it just seems funny to me. I think we should maybe name this episode party with Homeschoolers or running with guns. I don't candid running with party with homeschoolers. So there you are, your partying with a home schooler at sixteen. Yeah, yeah, and drink um. No, I don't think so, actually yeah,

I don't know. So he's like, no, I'm cool, and you met him, started dating? Yeah, we started dating, and then it's like any relationship when you're in your early twenties, where you know there's just immaturity right there. There's jealousy, there's immaturity. You're not mature as a person. They're not mature as a person, and you you grow out of it. So I had gotten out of that relationship, and I remember it was like, heck to find a place for

me to live by myself. I guys are living together. Well, yeah, I was twenty three. I'm not gonna be at my mom's with my boyfriend. Yeah, but you did so, so, um, you're not married now, okay, yeah, so I'm sorry if I'm not within the traditionalist. I'm always curious about whether people are married or not. Yeah. So you guys split up, couldn't find a place, Yeah, And I end up finding one place I fell in love with in Salisbury, New Hampshire.

So Salisbury, New Hampshire has no police department. And so now living by myself for the first time it's a single female, I'm like, Okay, Well, if something happens, I'll dine down nine one one in the closest state. Troopero show up whenever he can, and I don't know when that's going to be tomorrow morning, tomorrow morning, that way, tomorrow pretty much. And that's when I looked into buy my first firearm. And uh so in high school, Um,

I actually I used to wrestle again with the fighting background. Um, and one of my assistant coaches I knew he used to do competition shooting. I reached out to him, Chris Mullin's his name. He's a sweethel to be like, hey, if you were going to buy a gun, what would you What would I do? Because I didn't know what to do. I mean, like I said, my stepdad was just not, you know, like a gun person. He hunts once in a while. And so I reached out to him and he was just like, hey, um, you know,

I have a couple of firearms. So it is a glock seventeen and a bread and ninety two f s. You could try him out. And then I actually work at a gun shop, so if you want to buy one after, I could sell you one. So I was like, great, who worked at a gun shop. My friend Daniel, you called my friend the trainer, ye who also like to shoot? Yes? Yeah, yeah, So it worked out. So it worked out really great. And that's that's when I bought my first fire which was a glock seventeen. Um. And actually, so I had

a like a false start. Before that, I went into a gun shop and I told him I wanted something for self defense. And I'm sure there's if there's any woman listening to this podcast who've tried to buy a gun for the first time, maybe they could relate. UM. I said, I wanted self defense and target practice. Uh. And self defense what I mean by that is home defense, not concealed carry, but just home defense. Um. At the time, I couldn't imagine myself concealed caring. And so they showed

me a sig mosquito. If you know what saying mosquito is, It's like his name implies smallness and implies and it was pink, and I a bore color pink, and I just felt so insulted by the guy. I like a little my daughter has one of these, and I love it. And I'm like, oh my god, like do you what? Did you not hear what I just told you? I want something for home defense and har your practice, and you're showing me this little three eight whatever. So I got the glock seventeen UM shot with that for a

little while and actually really started enjoying it. So I used to go to the firing line by myself and just practice. Um, and I thought again, it was just it was different when you go to an indoor public fire in line the people who go there, as opposed to when I joined a club I got club. It's a super different minds. Did you get like hit on by guys just NonStop if you went down by yourself to shoot a pistol at a gun club, They're like,

she's here, look, she must be here looking for a man. Now. Well, I think I had a serious enough attitude where I kind of thwarted a lot of people. Um. I sometimes I feel like I'm not too Yeah, like I put on my game face like I'm not there, you know what I mean with a V cut shirts, so it's catching all your hot brass or heels or any of that. Because there's definitely women that I've seen at the firing

line where I'm like hot brass. Keep that in mind, Crane, if we don't go with don't part these two scars. That's hot brass from from the A R. And actually this this too, that's hot brass. Yeah. So when you when you shoot off of a barrier, sometimes what will happen is it will hit that wall. It don't come back and I'll get you. And so little scars on your shoulder from hot breast, yeah, oh that's yeah. When there's all sorts of other stuff, yeah, that it injures you.

But the point being is, uh no, but that when you were down there at the shooting range. Initially you were just like, I'm just gonna learn how to use this thing. Yeah, that was it. And then you kind of got like, I want to be better and better. So because I had to compete and I'm super competitive, well, I wasn't. Well, I guess it was eventually evolve to that right right, you can see right away where this is going. That wasn't my That wasn't my thought though,

So what had actually happened? So I started aiding someone new um, and he was like, hey, I have a clay thrower. You want to try shooting a shotgun? And I said sure, yeah whatever. So we shot it, you know, throwing clays in the backyard and he's like, wow, you're like way better than my buddy that I took out

last weekend, Like way better. And I'm like really, like, I don't know, you just aim it and shoot things like I don't know if the problem is and so about six months after that, again I got more into my handgun practice, and he was like, well, I've enrolled you in your first sporting clay competition. And I was like what and he's like, yeah, I think you could do it. I'm like, okay, the competitions no, no, so talent. Yeah, And so he put me in that, and so I

stuck with sporting plays for a few years. And so I would say about a year after sporting plays because again I really enjoyed my handgun um. And then you know, as any well, what's that world like the sporting clay world in terms of like the competitions and stuff. Oh

it's so different. Um, so I I love sporting clays like it's more more genteel Oh yeah, I mean, but the thing is that being a younger woman going into sporting plays, Oh, I got all the special treatment, like you know, oh, you want to use my fancy side by side to go to the indoor bathroom as opposed

to using the power to body. Oh yeah, I go take it, Like I don't even know who this person is, Like I used to happen all the time, or I like I would either hand carry my guns or when I got more gear, I got like a little buggy. They'd be like, oh no, you you could put your gun in my cart and stuff, so that you mean, it's like guys scamming on you or guys like being

like little ladies. These are the like little ladies like it's these are the people in your squads, like group of people that you shoot with because they just want to help you out. They do the same thing for junior shooters. So it's like it's more of a pity play. No, it's not pitty. It's like they it's gentlemanly and they want to It's the equivalent of like opening the door exactly. Yeah.

But the other thing too is that they want to encourage more women into the sport, and they would encourage youth into the sport, so anyway that they could kind of sort of take care of them. Did you feel it was there was over encouraging. No, because when it came down to shooting, I mean, yeah, we meant business just because they were nice, like you know now and then didn't mean that. I didn't think that they meant business otherwise, And is in the three Gune world, it doesn't.

It's very different. It's not there's no it's I could picture just from the crew were to day. I could picture that they would be maybe better able to play equality h but probably don't do the chivalry. Okay, So sporting place, uh is a fun sport. It tends to be a little bit older of a demographic, if you will. And I'm just generalizing, Okay, so people out there listening, there's not that like more in a good generalization, a

way to ruffle people's feathers. Like generalizations are sometimes like a little bit right, I get the complexes, but now that's the thing. I mean, it's like now they're like like lay it on me, like I could picture all the ways that these things are. Like it's more laid back, right. And so people they have it's very typical for them to have their cards and they're smoking their you know, cigar leisurely. Uh No, I'm talking like the three thousand side by side like the razors. Oh, these guys are

high rollers. Yeah, And I mean but you have to keep in mind with sporting plays, they could have uh you know like paraz Is that costs like twenty plus dollars that one gun. Right, so there's big money into it and they make big money. So three gunners, we don't get paid anything for winning competition. Sporting clay people they do. Uh so yeah, because that's even like that's there's you know, do do do any colleges have three

gun teams? Yet there's colleges that have sporting play teams? Yeah? No, you're right, and uh And to be honest, I don't know if any, but but maybe I'd be pretty surprised. Yeah. So there are colleges that have action shooting teams, which is generalized so they'll shoot us p s A, which is action pistol shooting. So there are colleges with that. Yeah, for sure. Um, we're three guns. We are. I don't know how to explain it. I like to think we're

more of a fun crowd. Uh, but yeah, I mean the chivalries, they're like, if you are a gentleman, you're going to be a gentleman no matter what. And I think that shooting sports tend to attract men who who like to be chivalrous. Right, But at the same time they are going to little lady you, They're going to assume that you know, at the end of the day,

we're competitors, right, So you're a guy. I'm a girl, like, yeah, sure, hold the door open for me, but I'm gonna try to I'm going to try to beat you, you know, and they recognize that. But it's also a team sport to like remember when we were stage planning, we were trying to we we feed off of each other. So it's very supportive. It's a very supportive community. How many women do you encounter in this community? Um? So my

social media handle is an h three gun Girl. I am the only girl in New Hampshire that shoots three gun there. Now, there are some I know I've been I've been told that I should add the in front of it, but there are some other women in New England who have picked it up, which is great. Since I started shooting in Florida, that's pretty common. Um, it's popular in Florida. Yeah, down south definitely Florida. In Texas, those are two huge ones. Um, I'm going to stay

top of my mind in Florida, Texas. There's there's all sorts of other ones, right, Um, Like we just had the pro am in North Carolina or South Carolina, one of the Carolinas. I should know because I was signed up for that match. But anyways, um we're able to make it. No, no, no, no. Um, so there's that, and they're they're everywhere, They're everywhere. But like percentage in percentage wise, oh gosh. Um. I to be honest, I don't want to be held to a percentage or but

if I had to generalize, it's going to be low. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so I would say less than less than ten percent and I would say so again, but it's sporting plays more. Uh was sporting craze greater female participant maybe slightly, But again I don't know what other areas of the country are like. In New England, there was not a lot of women in general. Um it was. It was common for me to be the only female in a sporting

play competition. Um so, and you compete against dudes though, well of course yeah, because it's like it does not have to support like a female division, right, yeah exactly. And you start with that sporting clay business for how many years? A few years? Yeah, a few years. But

I still like to shoot the pistol. Well, so I had started researching three guys I think year two into it, but I spent how many years ago that were so how many years ago from today, years ago from Jay when I was in supporting play, so it would have been two thousand fifteen ish. Um. And so I started researching three gun and it's like awesome. I started watching YouTube and I'm like, holy smokes, I need to do this.

But there's a lot of gear involved. So it took me about a year plus to save up all the gear to to shoot three guns. I mean, and I always tell people, if you want to shoot three gun, show up to a match and people will lend you their gear. I'm not making this up. You could be anywhere in the country and we will take care of you, period the end. Email the match director, but beforehand, tell them what you have and what you need and we

will put it together. I'm serious. Anywhere in the country when a time that a long time to assemble the gear was like, you mean saving up the money to buy it all. Well, that belt that you were talking about earlier, you described it as a tool belt. I've

done some math on that. When it comes to the belt system itself, and every single mag pouch and the holsters without AMMO is close to four right, because you think every belt grow thing, well, because you have all those mag pouches and each one might be forty dollars, right, and then your handgun holsters sixty dollars. Then you need the e l S attachments that go onto it. This is Safari Land for those of you who are listening,

you know what I'm talking about. And then that costs money, and it just starts just as very quickly, very quickly. And it's all modular too, which is one thing you're pinning. You can just swap out different sizes of holsters and yeah, you can get into it. So the shell caddy that I use, I'm sorry, I'm going back to eleven. No, I want I want to go to a nine on this belt real quick. I don't want I don't want to derail. I want to go to a nine on

the belt. The belts just like a thing in the world because it's like it's hook and loop velcrow and you run the fuzzy there's a belt with the fuzzy part, and you run the fuzzy part the underbelt through your normal belt loops and then you've got like a fuzzy belt on. Then the belt that holds all the accouterments,

uh is the hook. The hook portion of the hook and loop velcro that goes on over I feel like people in the trades should have one of those, dude, for everything, Right, it's so much more like I don't know how Like if if I was framing houses, I'd be right now going out and being like, I've switched my whole belt situation. I'm getting me a s fir lamb belt and hammer, couple nail pouches and shipped on that set up. Man spending your whole day trying to

pull your pants up smart, that's true. Well, so it's it's very similar to a law enforcement felt because it's so rigid. It's so rigid, and when you have that inner belt system that is really tucking it close to your body, and then you have what we call the outer belt, which is what you're talking about that has all of our attachments on it. That is such a rigid system because there's so much weight. I mean, when you think about it and you felt it, I know you felt it. I saw I saw it like that

twinkle in your eye. Because when I first started shooting the legion, which is a tungsten infused uh SIG three twenty, right, it's a heavy it's a heavy gun. Um, you fill it on your hip after a while, because especially with women, were just the way your hips are shaped and the way that belt sits on you, it just like it starts to bruise after a while. I don't know. I don't know what happens, but your body just gets used

to all that weight. I don't know. But when I first started shooting, even just having a Block seventeen, which is just a light polymer gun, I was like, oh man, that this hurts. And now I'm like, I don't even feel it. You know, when did you shoot the first tournament? That was in two thousand sixteen. But how do you go from like not oh Steve, you don't even You just find out about something, get the ship and go. You don't like spend like years like getting ready to compete.

Let's go over a quick story. So Taylor's first shooting season. This is me. I'm talking to the third person. Sorry, it was in two thousand seventeen, my first competition, uh like full season two thousand seventeen. By the end of two thousand seventeen, I started and have now ran for four years the biggest three gun match in New England. So I went from being a person who just started shooting three gun too, putting together and running a full

fledged match by the end of the season. Enthusiasm. Do you feel like you have? Um? Do you kind of have Do you feel like you have like a mild form of what's the word I'm looking for? Not you're like like, like, are you obsessive about stuff? Like I'm not like a like a savant? Or do you? But do you feel that you get obsessed with something and then like it runs its course and then you wham

jump into something else. It depends like if I talked to you in five years, are you could be like, oh no, I'm a competitive sailor and then you'll be like good a sailing and something. And some would be like you used to shoot three guns to that have no idea, But I'm shooting three guns competitive two years ago. I mean, I don't know what my cycle is going to be. You know, maybe give you way into something different in a couple of years. I don't think so.

I don't think so. So. My my evolution of sports, each each one minute end for his own reason. The thing that I love. It's not just that you drifted away. It's not that I drifted away. No not, I moved to New Hampshire. They had no good dojos. What ended shooting? Shotguns? Well that was three gun. I got in a three gun because I was like, man, that's not a natural end, that's just you that involved. It's it's still competitive shooting.

You know, it's still competitive shooting. So you don't think that you'll I mean in two or three years, you don't think you'll be into some whole new thing. But like way as in competitive shooting. Absolutely, maybe I'll get into PRS or maybe I'll get into something else. Three guns holds really close to my heart. Um, precision rifles shooting. Um. I think that a lot more of this audience will

probably know about PRS more than three guns. It's easier when someone says precision rifles kind of like yeah, I got it rifle. Yeah, No, it's actually it's it's a ton of fun. And I think that if you're a hunter, you should do a PRS match just to stay start sharp on your skills. Not saying that three gun isn't transferable, but PRS is directly transferable to hunting for sure. It's awesome. Here's here's a here's a question for you, But I don't know. I'm trying to think how to frame it.

I think it's safe to say that clay shooting is a like is a derivative sort of of of hunting of Wayne shooting. Of course, I think that they feed each other, right, Like especially some people to like to shoot quail, like guys that are like a way into two things that are very like you know, heavy shooting, like a lot like a lot of opportunities. Um, you go out for quail, you go out for dove like those. There's a lot of crossover between quail and dove hunters

in sporting class. But like three guns very strikes me is like very military, okay, but you don't have any like you're not out of law enforcement. You're not out of military, are you like an exception? And that you didn't come from military law enforcement? Not at all. Most people who do three guns do not have a military background. Picture if it wasn't if the War on Terror, if there hadn't been the War on Terror, I feel like

three guns wouldn't exist. But that's wow, really yeah, because I feel like I just feel like it's super well no, I just think it's super informed. By it's like very informed by UM, like moving through targets, Like yeah, I thought it was four in the podcast. Like years ago, I was invited down by the third Special Forces Group and I got to go down to Fort Bragg and

watch him train and UM doing different activities. And one day when when I was there watching them train, they were training like they were training transitioning from their rifle to their pistol, and it was like on the move going through with targets, and it was all about like

how smoothly you can move back forth back forth. And they're also doing a lot of stuff of like going into houses and like how to clear houses, move through houses, and it's like that like a lot of the like a lot of the movements and stuff seemed to inform it. It's way different, but I feel like it's like heavily informed by it. It's not informed by it at all. If anything, I believe that competition shooting has been influencing military.

Well that's what that's what I was learning today. Different things like you guys have a little gear twitch like gear fixes and strategies that flowed the other direction, which is surprising. Yeah, but you did say though that like it started basically because training, oh for sure, and it but I feel that it branched off very quickly. Um. And that you again, military we I have a lot of good friends who are UM active in the military.

They are current law enforce, mint officers of every facet right anywhere from you know, swat to a beat cop. They'll come out and compete. But that's the minority. That might be one or two or a few guys at a competition out of like people, right um. And at a national level competition, you know, we're going to see a lot more of those guys come out. But overall, because what I love is at a national level competition or one of these bigger three gun matches you have.

So the Marines they have a shooting team, right, and then they have a three gun team. Same thing for the Army, AMU, that is the biggest shooting team in all the military branches. A mu uh some other one of those military branches shooting team might be yelling at

me right now, but it's I think it's kind of known. Um. You know, they have an incredible recruiting program with a mu uh Dan Horner, who is one of the top three gun shooters he came from a mu um you know, uh Max Michelle, he was army as well, so that's one of the top guys. But anyways, um, so there are a lot of military branches. National Guard they have a huge three gun shooting team. So there's a lot of military branches that have these shooting teams. But is

it the majority? Absolutely not, absolutely not. There's an internet. There's a couple of things that you guys pointed out to me today. Is for instance, like things I had heard but hadn't really heard him articulated. Well, like the tendency to stand side like to like if you're shooting

a pistol. The tendency to turn your body so that you're like parallel in the line with your target comes from trying to like shrink your profile to a potential shooter and they're like open up, like you're not, you're not needing to do that. Or another thing with like a military rifle hold in and like what you guys like, there's a term someone used a close court um so military plowing your arm, employing your arm to help as

a protection to your body, and that's not needed. So there's like these ways in which you see like little habits people have. I guess I'm watching the news or watching movies and you start to like you think you know how to hold stuff, and then the competitive shooters being like no, no no, no, like you're doing like a cop thing that we don't do, like it's it's better

this way, you know. Yes, And and I've taken a lot of training classes before where you have uh ELO law enforcement officers and there are things that we do that may not be safe for them, like you know, facing straight onto your target. We're not shooting from behind cover. There's all these different things that may not be safe for them, but for us, we're thinking about time because a good point, there's no like utilizing there's no utilizing cover.

There is not. So there are different games for that. And at the end of the day, these are these are games are great training tools, but there are games h called I d p A, and so I d p A does their best to be as realistic as possible. I'm sorry you have my like little air quotes, air quotes going um and that's the training people how to like a roacha active shooters situation or then it's just they give you this scenario. It's not even about active

shooters or anything like that. They give you this scenario hypothetically where maybe there there is one, but they you know, it's part of the game. They have to shoot from behind cover, that kind of thing. But again, there's a lot of different disciplines within shooting sports. All right, Yanni, what do you got? What are your observations? Well, a couple more questions about shooting in the competition and you're you're shooting. So there's so few women that you guys

are just lumped into one division. So when the results come out, it's not like you're always taking first place in the women's division. You're just taking whatever place it is in the division. Or yeah, and the one that you entered. So where do you? Where do you? And the and there's another galuy you mentioned earlier. Where do

you guys rank against thousands of men? And there's what there's a handful of you hand I mean, so I consider myself a midpack hero, which means that I typically will finish you know, upper to midpack to lower to midpact, depending on how good of that her day I've done, right, So that that's where I typically place. I'm pack here and now I'm talking overall. When it comes to women, there's so little women that normally you know, I'm high

lady overall. That's not you know, because again there's there's that, there's that many of us. So I'm always looking at overall standings, um, in terms of where I complete in that um. And what was the other question? Well, you're saying that there was a like you mentioned Lena, I think she's awesome. You're gonna like, has she ever just straight out one beat beat the whole all the whole field? Um? So I mean, gosh, she showed a shot any locals.

I mean, yeah, she'd cream absolutely everyone in terms of And I'm so sorry, Lena, if you're listening to this, I can't remember if she's one overall on national competition. I think I believe she's come close. Um. So recently she placed a third um in a I believe it was an area match, third overall, which was very very respectful. That was respectable, very respectable of her. No prize money. No, we do all of this for bragging rights. Yeah, I mean,

it's it's crazy. You could you could get some sponsorships, um, you know, you can work with some companies stuff like that, but going pro was just you find a way within the industry to make like to make it most most anyone who is quote unquote pro um is they're just working in an industry. That's it one faster than the other. Well you got that little brainy, uh. I mean, do we want to dive into how it was for us,

because I mean we we went. I mean was kind of the meat of it all is that we went and and had got trained by Taylor that which took it probably take the better part of two hours, right just just I'm like putting my my head down into my hands deeply right now. Because they were like, hey, we want to learn how to sheot three and I'm like, fantastic, this is more ours. This is this is a two

day class. Then I was under the impression it was gonna be one day and I'm like, wow, um, how am I going to do this all in one day? And then Corin calls and says, actually, it's a half a day, and I'm like, I at least now say like what it is. I was losing my mind because we rolled in there and are our normal you know, operating procedures to roll in there and b asked with everybody. And as soon as we rolled in, Taylor is like,

get over here, we're going safety. I'm like, oh, this is serious, okay safe, And then it was like there's a rifle or a pistol on our belt, on our thing, and then the pistol on the belt and we were on our way. No. I think you're a good teacher. You don't mess around. You know, it's like a lot of good information. But it's like you don't take time to like, you don't you don't have like little can jokes you do and ship like that. You just like get into it. Man. Yeah, it was so much fun.

I'd recommend it'd be like great for us to get our families together and go and that class. It's so cool when kids get into three guns. I think I think your wife would like it. She'd like it. Jimmy is already asking about it. He was like, so he's gonna get away, He's gonna he'd come away from there with some many like bad ideas, so empty. When he went from knowing about single shot shotguns the pumps, it was just like a whole new thing. That world would be would just be too much from it would be

it would be way too much for him. But so interesting because I I did not know what to expect with y'all in terms of skill level. And so obviously you're good hunters, right, And but just because someone is a good hunter doesn't mean that they're necessarily proficient with their firearms. And you all would know this from firsthand, for from meeting some people that you might have hunted with who may not have the let's say, best marksmanship. Does that make sense yea, just like the whole Yeah,

hunters in general and in general this is not to everyone. Um, they like the point guns at each other, right, So their concept of safety it is very very different. In competition shooting safety is at the forefront of our minds at all times, and we have so many different rules to make sure we're being as safe as possible. Where in the hunting world there's just very different perspective when it comes to again safety and gun manipulation and efficiency

of movement, all these things. So I don't know what to expect with y'all, unless I want to back Taylor up, because right now you're at home and you're like, that's bullshit, you know, I don't see that kind of stuff going down. It's like I can tell you as a guide weekly. If not daily, someone would be giving you the old um tunnel vision as we called it, and it would get to the point where you'd be like, dude, one more time and I'm done. You can got someone else

can hunt with you. You can hunt by yourself, but like, I don't want to look down your rifle barrel again, do you unders damny? So yeah, you're you're spot on. Like there's a lot, there's plenty of that that goes down. It is. Yeah, we kept laughing about they make you go wait the truck if you make a mistake, oh,

if you get d qte yeah. But but what's funny there is there is an inside joke with you know, especially action shooters, that if you get d cute, you have to go to d Q and eat your ice cream so you don't have to bring it back for everybody else. That's what you're the one who got d Q. You have to eat your ice cream ice cream for everybody else. No, that's not how Yeah, so because the ice cream is not it's like a bitter sweet, right.

And what's funny is that if we're stage planning, they'll they'll be a moment where it's like I'm not going to eat my ice cream. On this stage, it's just like we instantly know what the other person is talking about. You don't want to go to dairy queen, you don't want to get d cute. Well, yeah, no, I mean even the difference I got called I got, I would of d Q just holstering my pistol at the very

end of my round. I think I had done everything right round and when she asked me, um, when you're done, they Taylor asked you. She was acting as the range officer, and she asked you to clear the gun and show that your hammers down, So you open the action and then you close the action, and then you'll pull the trigger to show that it's completely empty, right, and then

you holster. He right. Well, just the way that my hips were facing, the angle that I was angled off of that degree line that you can't pass, and then I went to holster and just that action was enough to basically get my gun pointed back behind me holstering it, you know, and I was pointing it down at the ground, but just that was enough to get it pointed. YEA. I wish I would have happened on the second round,

because that would have meant I won. Oh I guess if I d Q then yeah, if they would have called a d Q, I would have been like the victor. You would be the victor. Yeah, that's a terrible way to win though, but you would have counted. It would have counted because I meant that the other person. Um, I feel like like you could almost the first time you do it, Like the second time, you're gonna cut your time in half. I feel like the third time you're probably gonna cut it by a third. Then it's

probably then yeah, it's gonna start plateauing. So with you guys, who is amazing watching you again? You know, we went from the very beginning of the day working on pistol, and so I typically like to start with pistol because that gives you a really good calibration of how someone's overall firearm skills are, because that tends to be one of the hardest platforms to learn because there's so much more like with the grip in the stance and how

you're looking down the site a rifle. I'm not saying that there was a difficulty to it, but you pretty much you hold it up and you look down the scope and you pull the trigger and you're going to go with the pistol. There's there's so much going into it. So uh so you got named teacup because you were

doing that. The teacup and saucer h grip right, which is sort of like old school FBI movie Charlie's Angels type stuff, which is not something you don't think that there's I wanted we ran out of time because I wanted to explore this. I do think that there's like some revolver there's like some holdover from when people shot revolvers that your hand position, like the hand position you people are using is an appropriate to a revolver. So

maybe some people that's the case. I think most of it they're they're watching TV and they're seeing cop grips, they're seeing Charlie's Angels, are seeing all these movies, like cop movies like Stevens all these guys where they're just like, you know, grabbing it for the bottom and it's like, what are you doing? This makes no sense? Should explain. So the teacup is like, if you're holding that pistol in one hand, if you're a right hander then your

left hand. Yeah, it's like a little little teacup or a saucer underneath it from the from the bottom, you sort of supporting it from the bottom, where in reality you almost make like a like two fists together with the golf gripping a golf cloth. There you go. I

heard that analgy earlier today. So, uh, seeing you guys go from from that all the way to actually transitioning between targets targets, so shooting one target and shooting the other one while on the move, while you know, walking with with the handgun doing the same thing with the rifle, so up close. Shooting up close with a rifle is

very different from precision shooting with a rifle. Um and with the cadence because as hunters, y'all are making you know, one super meaningful shot from a distance, where with this, I mean we're doing at least two at a time and you're you're just getting getting after it. You know, Uh, things things get little spicy, and so when you're running with that gun, it changes things for sure. It really took me a while to be like, you don't have

to aim as much as you're trying to know. It's like it's the like brown is down all the all the targets happened to be brown that we shot today. That we're paper. But that's a famous deer hunting line. Yeah, I know that one. As soon as you're on paper, you can just squeeze twice. And like you said, there are different rings. But we weren't playing by those rules today. You just said, hey, we just want two hits on paper.

So I didn't really tell myself that's that's why I was going to come out with my own tournament and shrink those targets way down so we could do that. So today we shot what was called time plus, which is how much time did it take for you to run to the stage plus penalties. Right, so time plus scoring. Um, if we did something along the lines of USPS a multa gun um like comstock, then there would be a points system depending upon the accuracy. Right, So so we

we could we could dig into this crazy stuff um comstock. Uh, scoring with three guns is not normal, but it certainly happens, right and it is perhaps so I could specialize into that. Right, So if that meant a lot to me, I would recommend for you to start shooting usps A matches because that really will emphasize more more, more accuracy. Yeah for sure. Um, but again, you know, it was so cool watching you

guys uh progress. And then when we ended on the shotgun would showing the quad load because I'm like, I save that kind of for last, because you know how to shoot a shotgun right for the most part. If if you've shot a shotgun before, you could go into a three gun competition and kind of figure your way out. It's just the reloading part. And then again startling around to those quad loads you with your eyes light up

like saucers is so cool. There's another cool modification to that shotgun is that the gosh I don't know what you call that little part, but basically just when you're looking down into the tube and you can just see the brass end if you have a shell loaded in there, right and if the guns upside down, the lip that normally would just be perfectly around it is sort of shaved and ramped so that as you're sliding those two in there, your thumb doesn't catch and you don't have

to push it quite as far in there for it to catch. That's a nice modification. Yes, So he's talking about is the receiver. The actual receiver at the bottom of the shotgun, where the lifter is, where the shells going is opened up. So we called those milled receivers. So some people go into the CNC machine, they'll actually mill those outlets, have a program for it. And what I did with my first shotgun is I took a dreambal tool and I went to town and you'll find

that motion. Oh hell yeah. Most competitive shooters, we are. And it's funny because I've ran into other people across country who they teach classes, but they're not in the competitive world, and so I'm shielded. I started. You just heard my story. I started competitive shooting six months after the first time I bought a gun. So I've almost

exclusively lived in the competitive shooting world. I'm not exposed to the recreational shooter, uh per se, and so I'm not made privy to those weird um ideas that they have. And one of those ideas is that you can't modify your firearm and have it still be safe. We're in competitive shooting. We will take a Drumbell tool to our gun at blink of an eye. I mean we we will get right in there and open everything up and make it way better. Oh yeah, without having that like

well it's grandpa's old. Well we're not gonna do that to Grandpa's because Grandpa's got is not sophisticated enough for our purposes. We totally the total length that we actually ran, yes, which I'll I will say that I don't think I ever actually hit run For me personally, I might have gotten to like a you have a very long day shuffle, so you you would do like this this long saunter over. Yeah, I feel like it would almost slow me down if

I got up to top speed. It would take me so much again come to a stop or slow down or whatever. But again, we can spend so much time on this. Um. Yeah, so there a question is is about this? Is like we only roughly we went fifty yards, are still right from where we started to where we stopped shooting the pistol. There were other targets that were farther. We shot with the rifle right at the hundred. But like, how much is actual you looked at when I see you,

I think that person is an athlete? How much is athleticism really play in this? Good question? Yeah, No, that's an excellent question. So I will tell you right now that it makes a big difference. But you don't have to be incredibly athletic in order to be successful in action shooting, right. And so to give you an example, there's this guy back home. His name is Don Celeski. Actually he I don't know if he's familiar with y'all, but he's got an Africa whole bunch to hunt and

stuff like. He's such a cool guy anyway. So he's this old geezer. He wears two knee braces, right, and he like has this hunch, but he is like the most accurate person ever. He takes his sweet time, but he's just accurate and he places very well. And there there are a lot of people who don't necessarily have the economy of movement, but there when they do pull that trigger, they mean every time, they're very efficient and

so they do well. Right, But when you get up to that upper you know, level, that upper of shooters, the athleticism does make a difference because, um, the when you are being very very conscious of how you're moving your body, that's efficiency, and that when we start breaking down the tents of a second, the difference of Um, like what you said, when you're sauntering over, you concern about stopping in time, so we do like a stutter step, right,

So the difference between having a efficient stutter step into a stop and already having your gun up on a target versus running somewhere, stopping and then drawing could be two tents of a second, and that could be the difference between winning or losing a match. So it's like choreography. It is choreography, So you don't necessarily have to be athletic per se, but you have to really understand how

to move a body in efficient way. I can see at a point like competitively, Um, you could be like a great shooter and have great hand eye coordination, but in the end of like you would save seconds off your time if you were super agile. And again it isn't necessarily like you're proving everything like your equipment. You're trying to make your equipment maximized. You're trying to make your your procedures and methods maximized. Like you're probably gonna

wind up maximizing the physical component. Like you want to make everything better, right, Like how are you using your body and space? Are you being specific with your movements or just yeah, you're all over the place and it's yeah,

undermining efficiency. I guess absolutely absolutely what observations questions you got grind, I guess, uh where where you feel like the application is to hunting and you know the speed or I was talking to Garrett earlier and he was saying one thing about practicing three gun is like target acquisition. So something right like if something an animal is is moving you're looking carefully, is moving between trees disappears, you know, there's some kind of speed, the accuracy, like you're just

trying to dial that in. I've seen more game get the slip on someone because they didn't get on it and shoot when they should have. Then then they missed like like right right right there, and the like I can't find it. I'm like getting on. I think getting on. I think the shotgun stuff is really good for like just being fast, especially picture and like hunting cotton tails

or you know, quail whatever, like wing shooting. I think that just that ability to like see something and shoot, see something shoot, I think, um, that's probably I guess the most obvious ones. And then also just a thing of like learning that mindset of being methodical, being finicky about your gear, knowing that like this goes there, that goes there. I do this, This is my routine, This is my method, you know, I shoot this way right, and um like getting in that mind frame of procedure. Uh,

it's helpful, But I don't know that it would. I think that there'd be like more like if you wanted to just train to uh just trained to be a wing shooter or just trained to be a good big game hunter, I think you would find ways to train obviously much more specifically. It wouldn't be as much fun,

but you can train much more specifically. I think that's a great point is working on those those transitions and understanding your scope, going from that dialed in you know, three power at hud yards all the way down to you know, one point five to one. And yeah, I think that there's a lot more applicable with hunting shooting. I believe overall competitive shooting makes you very proficient with

your platforms, right, and it's just general firearm handling. You guys fiddle around with your stuff, you know that, oh how this work well? And that's the thing. When I first walked into a gun shop when I was you know, newer to it. You know, I remember sitting there so nervous, like I couldn't remember how to pull back the slide and have it stay open, and you know, all those controls.

Just it made me anxious. And now it's like if I walk into a gun shop, normally, if they see me handle a gun, they just stepped back and they're like, really, you do things clearly, you know what you're doing, but you know so again, when you take it upon yourself to be a better marksman, whether if it's through competitute, Tissian shooting or another avenue, than overall your understanding of

firearms is going to expand exponentially. And the difference between competition just going to the range of practice is that you now have you have all of these rules, as you have people who are pushing you, You have ways to gauge your improvement, and you have something to hold you accountable. It's a very social support, right, and so every you know, weekend or once a month, or however much you want to compete, you have your buddies there at the range, and the commodity is incredible, and so

you you build this this conjured spiritment. They hold you accountable, Like if you don't choke for a match or two, they're like, hey, where the heck were you? Um and so again that dairy queen. If you're not safe, they're not gonna if you're not safe, yeah, they're not gonna ascend to dairy queen if you just don't show up, Like, hey, you know, I think you deserve it. You hold accountable. I meant like, there's like a very I would like to point out that there is a um extremely strong

emphasis on safe handling. Oh yeah, yeah, I mean you know, and y'all probably saw it today. I would get asked a question, but then out of the periphle of my eye, if I saw something I didn't like, I'm like, I literally hold up my hand be like, hey, what are you doing over there? You know? Are you breaking the one A d are you? You know? Loading that guy? And when I didn't tell you loaded or you know whatever? Uh so we are above. There's a lot going on.

You gotta pay You gotta be like spatially aware what's happening. You have to be very aware. Tell tell people how to tell people how to find if they want to come check out because Instagram is cool, because you can see what you kind of get like a sense you put videos up and ship like that. Yeah. So I put videos up on and I'm probably more strong on Instagram than anything. People keep telling me to do YouTube. So I don't know any girl. H three gun girl

is Instagram. Um, and you're writing your videos are on guns dot com they are? Yeah, So I do so all my travels because we're talking earlier about how I live in a camp for travel across country. I post all those to my stories so you can see my awesome photography from you know where I'm at. All my stories, um, and then all the videos that I do on fire and reviews, educational videos, those are with guns dot Com.

So they have a YouTube channel, which is like probably the most popular platform, and then they have a website as well. Um. But that's that's most the work that I do for them. So that's that's how you can find me. And then where if people want to go and they want to go, uh spectate at a three gun tournament, what's sort of like the what's like the hot website for seeing what's going on in that world? Ah? Yes, okay, so this is the moment I have been waiting for

this entire podcast. If you want to get into competitions shooting, um look at So first of all, go to practice score. So that is like think of the word practice and then the words score, so it's actually practice score, sear not practice practice score. Yeah, practice score. So go to practice score, pull up your town and you could type in us P s A three gun whatever. You could just plug in your town or your state, like I

already pulled him up in Montana. There's a club in Big Sky UM that does usps A competition, so I might try to hop into one of those UM anyways, So you could go there and figure out where your local competition is from there, then you could get the contact information for the match director and ask him like hey, I'm a new shooter, I need gear or I need advice, and I would guarantee that they're going to be helpful

to you and getting into competition shooting. And then on Facebook you could just research local groups and they're yeah, okay, so Instagram at n H three like numeral three gun girl. That's it. And then practical score. If you want to get into competitions and guns dot com, great you are l just lay it right out yeah, it's very it's very guns Stockholm. That's why I love it. The problem though,

is because it says dot com. When you start to type it into social media, they automatically want to like link to. And it's like when I'm texting someone about guns dot com and automatically is trying to give me the website. I'm like, no, I'm just trying to say it. I don't want to share it, but I digress. Well, thank you, Taylor Thorne. Thanks for it was a great day. It was like a genuine range day, awesome day. It was a range day and it was a fun range day.

It was awesome, all right. Thanks a lot. Thank you.