What An Ex Scout Sniper TEACHES HUNTERS — Brian Poor, Gunwerks

Brian Poor, a former Marine scout sniper and SWAT instructor who now teaches Western hunters through Gunwerks sat down with me to break down what actually matters when an animal gives you an opportunity at distance.

In this episode:

• Why truing your ballistics is the #1 thing most long-range hunters skip — and why a half-minute error means you miss half the time at 800 yards
• Why prone is overrated in the field
• Loading the bipod, cant vs. pan, and the rear-rest mistake that sends 4 of 5 shots high
• Buck fever decoded: why "timing" the trigger through the vitals is the worst thing you can do
• The kneeling, reverse-slope tripod setup that keeps you concealed
• Reading mountain wind, setting your real limit, and why a tricky day can cut 300 yards off your max
• The four stock-design features Brian won't shoot without

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

This conversation was recorded at Gunworks for the Pursuit with Cliff podcast.

SPEAKER_03 0:04

Brian. Well, here we are. Yeah, man. Good to meet in person on your home turf. Yeah. Well, thank you for uh taking the time to come by. Yeah, yeah, of course, dude. I like to do these in person if if possible. And uh I've always wanted to get out here and shoot with you. I know that you teach a bunch of students. Uh we've been we were just talking about it, but uh I want to just dive in with a question and we'll your your background's gonna come out come out. Alrighty. But you teach, I'm sure you teach a lot of guys across the spectrum, but they're guys that for the most part are interested in western hunting to some extent. Am I kind of yeah?

SPEAKER_01 0:37

No, that's that's what I really love about it. Is I mean, I spent a lot of time in the tactical world, but everything we do now is just like 100% geared towards does it work for hunting, mountain hunting, western hunting? And there's a lot of stuff from the tactical world that doesn't really apply that much. Yeah, or it's just very difficult to make it apply. You know, so it's like plucking those pieces out that really work for a hunter. Yeah, that's what I really enjoy about it.

SPEAKER_03 1:00

On that subject, if let's say that you, and I'm sure you actually run into this, let's say you've got a guy, he shows up, he's got, he's got, let's say he's got basic fundamentals down, he's got basic safety down, and you've only got I don't know, an afternoon with him, three hours with him. What do you focus on? Like what's the low-hanging fruit for a guy, or maybe the stuff that you don't think, guys that are gonna be in the Western hunting context, spot and stock uh opportunities, I don't know. I mean, you know, maybe those opportunities that are between 200 and six or seven hundred yards, like what's the easy stuff that a guy can work on?

SPEAKER_01 1:37

You know, I think if you understand how to use a ballistic app, yeah, and then you know, get it get yourself a good zero, understand the factors that can make you think you've got a good zero when you don't have a good zero. And two of the big ones are like Mirage off a suppressor and then parallax in the scope. Yeah, you know, but once you get that stuff down, you get a good zero, you run a chronograph, you know, shoot some distance and true that trajectory up, you know, to make sure that your live fire data actually matches with the what the computer's telling you. Yeah, you know, and then once you've done that, you've got a custom profile for that rifle. That's kind of like the that's the foundational building block for your, you know, assuming that you know how to shoot, that's your foundational building block for your ability to shoot some distance.

SPEAKER_03 2:16

Sure. And and on that, so the setting up your your your uh ballistic program correctly, be it on your phone, your range finder, whatever system you're using, and then truing uh truing your ballistics. Do you think the average guy that's out there that's shooting kind, you know, it to me, Brian, anything in the hunting world that's really above 350, 400 yards to me is long range. Yeah. You know, that's kind of my perspective on it. So guys that are out there that are either capable of that or feel like they're capable of that, that haven't say haven't shot with you, haven't taken a in-depth course. Do you think a lot of them are missing that? Like they they miss, they they miss out there and they think it's due to, you know, maybe their position or whatever, but it actually is due to just not true in their ballistics. Like, do you think that's is is it significant?

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Yeah, I mean, I mean, because um we'll commonly see about a half minute error in whatever the computer says versus you know, it depends on which bullet you're working with, you know, because most of your most of your bullets are running off of a G7 ballistic curve. You know, and that's just a computer generated model of a prediction of what a bullet's gonna behave like. Yeah, and most modern long-range bullets kind of follow that pretty closely, but one bullet will track exactly with it, the next bullet, you know, the next type of bullet or a different bullet may not track exactly with it. Yeah. You know, so if you get a half minute of error out of seven or eight hundred yards, I would say you're gonna miss half the time. Yeah because you've literally, even though a half minute at eight hundred yards is only four inches, if you take the center of that eight-inch group and move that center up four inches, yeah, you're gonna miss over the top or underneath about half the time.

SPEAKER_03 3:56

Yeah, yeah. And you're already shooting at a distance where all your other things matter so much to you. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So um that that's interesting. And I uh I should know this already, Brian. But when you true ballistics, are you trueing to muzzle velocity or do you actually change BC? So as long as we know our muzzle velocity is correct, we'll true BC. Can can you can you give me like the the the low IQ version of why you would do that instead of just changing muzzle velocity?

SPEAKER_01 4:24

So you basically got two variables. You know, you got your variable is your either your muzzle velocity is off or your ballistic coefficients off. Yeah. Now, muzzle velocity, we can precisely measure. I mean, we put a chronograph and say this is our muzzle velocity. So that's a that's a known. And once you know your muzzle velocity is correct, you know, you want to eliminate parallax, aerodynamic jump, you know, there's some vertical issues that could be perceived as being the it doesn't chew right, but once you eliminate those issues, you know, the only thing left is your ballistic coefficient. Yeah. And you know, ballistic coefficient is a it's a moving target, you know, and most of the manufacturers are pretty good at quoting the ballistic coefficients as being within a velocity range that most shooters are gonna shoot. Yeah. You know, but that that ballistic coefficient changes based on muzzle velocity. You know, it changes based on twist rate. You know, a faster twist is gonna give you a little better ballistic coefficient than a slower twist.

SPEAKER_04 5:16

I gotcha.

SPEAKER_01 5:16

You know, and in fact, Hornedy, if you look at their specs, I mean they'll tell you with this twist rate, this bullet does this, but with this twist rate, this bullet does this. Yeah. You know, so it's it's such a I guess ballistic coefficient is such a moving target. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:28

You know, I I you you're you're making me feel so naive. I actually had no idea. I thought ballistic coefficient was was a set variable essentially based on the shape of the bullet. That's incorrect.

SPEAKER_01 5:40

Yeah, I mean it it's a computer generation based on the shape of the bullet. Yeah, you know, but there's a stability factor that goes in there. I got you. And your twist rate completely affects that stability factor. So the actual true real-world ballistic coefficient that you experience downrange, like I've I've literally seen where one seven millimeter barrel will true at this BC, and the very next seven millimeter barrel will true at a slightly different BC.

SPEAKER_04 6:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

You know, and it's like depth of the rifling is how much damage it does to that bullet, how deformed that bullet is when it comes out the muzzle. Sure. I've seen direct thread suppressors that don't have any means of centering them or any sort of a gas seal in there. Yeah. I've seen a rifle that'll true right at the you know, burger's quoted BC with a muzzle brake. All of a sudden you put this suppressor on that doesn't have any centering device, and my belief is that your bullet's traveling a little closer to one side of the you know, those inner um baffles than the other, creates a little pressure pressure differential. And we'll see that true to a much lower BC than that same barrel, that same bullet with a muzzle brake. You know, so there's just a lot of variables that go into it.

SPEAKER_03 6:43

Yeah, it's it's so interesting to me that when I ask you like kind of what the low-hanging fruit for somebody wanting to get in, you know, starting to hunt long range, and it's trueing uh uh trueing the ballistics, because I'll be honest, Brian, I didn't I didn't actually even know that was a thing for many, many years. And then when I start when somebody showed me it, I well, when somebody explained the concept to me, I thought, well, that's a that's an interesting concept, but of course, when I shoot at longer ranges and look at it, it's gonna match. And it never does. Yeah, you know, that's that's what so it's it's to me it's kind of funny that you brought it up because I'm like, yeah, that is that makes sense for that to be the baseline. Like you gotta you gotta first make sure that you don't just have a hundred percent uh like uh trust in the app because it's not the case, yeah. Uh you know, all the time.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Go ahead. You know, three out of four guys will probably go to true and find out that they're fine. Yeah. Like, okay, it works. Sure. But one out of those four will like, man, what's going on here? Yeah. You know, and you just gotta be open to that concept of like, hey, with your gun, it may not track quite what it does, what the computer says, and that's okay. Yeah, you just gotta true it.

SPEAKER_03 7:50

And how do you do it in the field?

SPEAKER_01 7:52

You know, so essentially, at least in the Revicap, you know, you basically we have a truing feature in there. Yep. You know, so you make sure you got a good hundred yard zero, preferably do it on a day with pretty minimal winds so you're not introducing other variables, and then you shoot at a longer distance. And we say I'll shoot at 80% of the distance I want that to be good to. Okay. So if I'm trying to have a profile or ballistic profile that I trust to a thousand yards, I'd want to do my trueing at about 800 yards. Okay. You know, if if I wanted a 1200 yard profile, I'd want to try to do that truing at like 900 or a thousand. You know, because I trusted about 20% past how far I did the true at. And so um then you shoot at that distance, and if you got to make some little adjustments until your your water line is center with your bullseye, yeah, you know, and shoot a decently sized group, not just you know, three or four shots, you know, so you really get a good center of group there. Yeah. And then wherever that center is, yeah, you measure it. Is that center a half minute low, a quarter minute low, whatever it is, you know, or perhaps it's a little bit high. Yeah. Sometimes we get lucky. Yeah, yeah. The bullets actually do better than we think they're going to. Sure. But um, and then you go into the trueing function, you punch in that range that you shot, and you punch in what your real MOA come-ups were.

SPEAKER_04 9:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:04

And then once you enter that, it calculates and it says, okay, for that to be true, either your muzzle velocity must be this or your ballistic coefficient must be this. I mean, it calculates it for you. And then once you like we know muzzle velocity is correct, so we hit set BC. And then once you do that, you'll notice that you go back in your ballistic calculator, it now says what you actually shot at.

SPEAKER_03 9:25

Right. Yeah, and it's it's uh the reason I ask, because I'm I'm what I have found when I true, particularly if I try to get out there and you know, six, seven, eight hundred yards, is I find it if from a practical standpoint, it's hard to find somewhere to do it and hard to find conditions where you're not battling a ton of wind. And I know it doesn't matter, like you should really just be focusing on the vertical, but it's tricky. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:49

Aerodynamic jump throws a loop in there sometimes. So it can be in it, you should get another variable. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, because you're yeah, you know, you throw aerodynamic jump, you know, which is basically a a vertical component to a horizontal wind. Yeah. And that effect happens just in front of the muzzle.

SPEAKER_04 10:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:03

You know, if you got a crosswind just in front of the muzzle, you know, and if that 10 miles per hour usually equals about 0.4 m away, so just under a half inch at 100 yards. So you could easily have a half inch error in your 100 yard zero. Yeah. Yeah. Or you can also have a half minute error when you're shooting distance. So anytime you're trying to do this with a crosswind, you're introducing another variable that could potentially get it. Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_03 10:25

So you so because I've heard a lot of people say, oh, when you're when you're trueing, you know, find uh find a hor you can find a horizontal line, just don't, you know, don't worry about the if you've got a little wind, you'll be okay. But you're saying you got to be wary of that.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

You just got to be wary of that. Yeah, if you got enough crosswind, yeah, that it could actually introduce some aerodynamic jump, that's just one more variable into your calculation. It's like, yeah, we can turn it on and account for it, but it's just one more variable.

SPEAKER_03 10:51

Yeah, yeah. No, I got you. That that makes sense. Uh, it's interesting. We went we went with the question. I thought we were gonna be like kind of be go around some technical stuff for a while, but we dove right into it. But I think that's uh that's a great one.

SPEAKER_01 11:03

I mean, it's kind of your baseline. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I get it.

SPEAKER_03 11:06

It's like, look, we could we could go into positional stuff and all this other stuff, but if that's not working, you're gonna be frustrated. Oh, you're gonna be frustrated because I mean it's essentially it's essentially an extension of zero in your right. Exactly. It's really what it is. All right, guys, it's some of my content. You're gonna see that I've been using this chest holster from Invader Concepts. This is with my 10 millimeter. I also use it with my Glock 19 and even a PMR30. I'm gonna do a bunch of content here in the next couple months on that around bear defense. It should be interesting. It looks a little awkward to have your gun under your bino harness, but if you test out all the different variations, it is the best and you have it on you all the time. I do have a discount code, it's CliffG, and it's for 10% off. Go check them out. But um, I do want to ask because I have found for me, Brian, uh, as a guide, that positional stuff and getting in a position is to me, that's low-hanging fruit for most hunters. You know, many hunters I've I've taken on very expensive hunts, and uh I this is not a knock on hunters. I mean, got a lot of the I mean guys who who go to your training, who buy your guys' rifles, like they got a lot of other shit going on in their life, you know. So I'm not blaming them, but it has it has stunned me that a lot of time, effort, money can go into a hunt, and then literally when the animal provides an opportunity, it appears that it's the first time that individual has tried to get into position with the rest they have. So, I mean, do you have any thoughts on rest, what people should focus on? Any any thoughts on that subject? Yeah, or field positions, you know.

SPEAKER_01 12:36

Yeah, on the field position things is like I like slam dunks, meaning like I like to be so stable that when I shoot, I am 99% sure that's gonna be an effective shot. Otherwise, you probably shouldn't be taking that shot. Yeah, you know, and you definitely don't want to blow an opportunity or draw blood on this once-in-a-lifetime trophy that you lose because you made a bad shot.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

You know, so I err towards being ultra stable, yeah. Which means we're always trying to run two points to rough support, you know, front and back, you know, rear bag in the back, a bipod in the front, um, tripod in the front, armpit supported in the back, you know, pretty much all our field shooting positions, we're using tripods a lot.

SPEAKER_04 13:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

You know, because that gets you up off the prone, which you can't get into a lot of times in the field. Yeah. And, you know, and it's interesting, it's like people find this counterintuitive, but we shoot standing tripod. Guess what animal we shoot the most standing tripod with the stuff kind of the some of the things that we're gonna do.

SPEAKER_03 13:28

Yeah, I mean my my like intuition, but the way you teed it up, I know I'm gonna be wrong. I would think like antelope.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

Exactly. Oh, it is, okay. Yeah, yeah. And but people don't think that they think like wide open spaces you get prone. The grass is always too tall. And usually you're just peeking over this little rise that's a hundred yards in front of you, and you can just barely see over the top of it. You know, so standing tripod, you know, we've killed a lot of antelope in our classes and hunting events, you know, standing tripod on antelope at you know, four or five, six hundred yards. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:55

Well, all on these rests, like tell me where I'm wrong in on this, Brian. I what prone is great, but I have found as a hunting guide, it's almost never used. Oh, yeah, it's very difficult to get into it. I mean, there's you know, there's the odd sheep or mountain goat where we're on a flat rock and you know, it just works great, but for the most part, like vegetation is the showstopper, right? So and it doesn't take very much at all. Um, you know, so so it's to me it's interesting uh because most hunters spend quite a bit of time, I think, uh prepping in prone, but they don't get that opportunity. But you you mentioned something there with by bipods um that I'd love to you to love for you to get into a little bit. I have found that yeah, uh adding a bipod to the prone position, it helps, but um I still feel like hunters are are fairly limit fairly limited in terms of like the angles they can take. Um I mean, are there some things that you teach that make that better extend the ability there?

SPEAKER_01 14:55

You know, I think um first off, all not all bipods are created equal. Okay, you know, and the advancement of bipods over the last you know, literally five to ten years has been huge. Yeah. You know, if I look at the old Harris bipods we used, you know, way back when, or even the you know, some of the ones more recent ones, we were so limited by the height and the amount of adjustability that was in them. Yeah. You know, but if we look at the height and the adjustability, I mean, you know, we're running bipods that get us this far off the ground now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:21

Are you guys are you guys shoot are you guys shooting uh prone only off a bipod, or do you also shoot seated?

SPEAKER_01 15:28

It's generally speaking prone only. Okay, but usually it's kind of an elevated prone because you know everybody's used to kind of the flat on the ground prone. Yeah. And when you're flat on the ground and your chest is on the ground, we want that bone support, you know, it puts a really steep angle in your neck. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, you're not clearing more than anything that's more than six or eight inches tall in front of you. Right. You know, so a lot of times what we do in that rough drain is we'll we'll lay our backpack down on the ground, you know, put our chest on the backpack, and that automatically puts our muzzle this high. And if you got a bipod this tall enough, you're basically shooting a prone off your backpack with a tall bipod. And now your muzzle's this far off the ground, and it took that really steep angle that was on your neck, yeah, and it kind of spreads it out across your back. Okay, and it makes the prone a lot more comfortable.

SPEAKER_03 16:10

Yeah, I got you. So you're uh it's it's too bad we're like not out in the field to see this because I've never done it before, but I'm imagining you're literally elevating the the humans laying flat, you're putting it back under so they're uh they're more in line.

SPEAKER_01 16:22

And you're actually angle angling their upper body up. Oh, okay. So their legs are now below.

SPEAKER_03 16:27

Yeah, it's more comfortable. Okay, I I I got you.

SPEAKER_01 16:30

And it puts your it puts your face in a much more natural position because rather than looking out at the top of my eyeballs here, now my head's kind of in an upright position.

SPEAKER_03 16:37

So if a guy learns that position, he's much he's he has more options to use.

SPEAKER_01 16:42

Yeah, he's so much more comfortable. Like a lot of guys with fused necks or just spinal issues or neck injuries, and you know, they just literally absolutely can't get in the prone. But as soon as we put a bag under their chest, you know, and and just raise their chest this much higher, you know, we don't want to be propped up on our elbows because that's you know, you you want the bone support of having your rib cage on the ground, but your ribcage is on your backpack, yeah, and that makes it a lot better.

SPEAKER_03 17:04

That's uh I'll have to I'll have to try it because I for sure personally uh I have a preference towards seated because I like because it's more comfortable for me. Yeah, it tends to be more applicable like with any vegetation or anything that we've already kind of hit on. The other thing, Brian, is it gives me more ability in like a real hunting situation to follow up on animals or more because I have more like I mean to simplify it, my muzzle can go down a lot further and my muzzle can go up a lot further. Yeah, whereas in prone, I always feel like when I'm shooting or if I'm shooting with somebody, they're very limited. Like how how they can go down or up. But it in my understanding, right, that if the person's elevated, they get a little more down upward control. Am I thinking about it right?

SPEAKER_01 17:49

Yeah, yeah, you're yeah, you're basically seeing more. Yeah, yeah. Because if you're shooting off a ridge and you're just in a very low prone, yeah, if that animal comes 10 feet towards you, you probably can't see him. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's out of sight now. Whereas if you're a little bit elevated, you bought yourself a little more of that. Yeah, yeah. Should they come closer?

SPEAKER_03 18:05

Yep. No, I gotcha. While we're on the bipod question, I I got I gotta ask two technical, or I guess they're technical questions, maybe they're opinions. But um this loading of the bipod, well, how do you guys do you guys push on the bipod, pull on the bipod? Is it is it relevant? Oh, yeah, absolutely. Let me get it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure.

SPEAKER_01 18:24

So essentially, you know, this is one of our bipods. So if I was running a little bit taller position here. Okay, so first off, any bipod, okay, I want it to have that flexor. So you see about that half inch of flexor. Okay. Okay. So what happens when we I got my bullet and my powder charge in here. Okay. And as soon as that starts accelerating down the barrel, the rifle starts accelerating backwards. Okay. Okay, that's just Newton's law. Yep. But because the bullet's so much lighter, it gets a lot more velocity than the rifle does. And then if I take the ratio of how much does that bullet and powder charge weigh versus how much my rifle weighs, I can actually use that, apply that same ratio and figure out, okay, in the amount of time that bullet travels 20 inches, how far is the rifle go to the rear?

SPEAKER_04 19:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

And so if I run that calculation on a pretty lightweight hunting rifle, especially in a 30 cal, that rifle moves to the rear about a tenth of an inch before the bullet exits the barrel. Okay. So that line of recoil straight.

SPEAKER_03 19:18

Which it sounds way more than I would think. I thought you're gonna I thought you were gonna say like a thousandths or something like that, which is still a thing, but a tenth of an inch is that I mean it's actually so if we do anything to disrupt, you know, that tenth of an inch of rear roof movement, our zero accounts for it.

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Yeah. Because it should be the same every time. Yeah. But if we do something that disrupts that movement not being straight to the rear. Any sort of torque or torque, and especially a bipod. So if you imagine this is rough ground, and if I just pull this gun back into my shoulder like this, the instant it starts going to the rear, these feet are hopping across whatever's in the ground. Yeah. And there tends to be you know, we tend to make little divots to put the feet in, sure. And it makes the gun want to jump. As opposed to if I come back, I put my shoulder in the gun, and then I push the gun forward and sink into it. Now, now I put that forward load on it, and now it's got a half inch track to the rear before anything moves down here. Yeah. And that's that's really one of the keys. And as far as recoil management, if I can have something good and solid there, and so I got enough friction there that I'm not holding on to the gun at all, but I got shoulder pressure.

SPEAKER_03 20:23

Yeah, and so and then and then what you're saying is that movement that the the movement that occurred that potentially occurs while the bullet's going out, it's absorbed by a smooth movement just in here. It's just so before it's like obstructed by crap on the ground or whatever. Okay, I got it. Yeah, yeah. I I that make that makes sense. Do why you have it out? Um, because I know I've heard differing opinions on this. These bipods, they don't um well, I guess two things, uh, Brian. It do you ever the the idea of recoil in a bipod, right? Like now, I don't know that this one so you so it how many accesses does it have?

SPEAKER_02 21:00

Just two.

SPEAKER_03 21:01

So it doesn't pan. No, we don't have a pan. Okay. It so no pan, it does have a little can't. So the idea of can't or or pan, um, I've heard people argue that one of the issues is that you're gonna get your recoil is gonna be is you know, it's it's not gonna be aligned, right? Do you have any thoughts on that? Is it is it relevant?

SPEAKER_01 21:23

You definitely have to have a cant adjustment. Yeah. You know, because this bubble level up here, that's like most one of the most critical pieces of equipment on the back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you have to have that cant adjustment.

SPEAKER_03 21:32

Yeah, so you because otherwise, otherwise you you'd have to adjust with the legs, which would be a pain in the ass. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

But yeah. As far as a pan adjustment, I personally think it's completely unnecessary. Okay. It's like unnecessarily complex in the tripod. Because what you'll see oftentimes when you have that ability to pan and you're trying to load the bipod, yeah. Is one leg sticks and one leg doesn't, so your bipod ends up cammed all the way in one direction or the other.

SPEAKER_03 21:58

Yeah, and I would think that that same dynamic. You're dealing when you load the bipod with the what you're talking about. When you get recoil, you're gonna have like you get screwed up recoil. Yeah. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_01 22:08

It's like everything's not either parallel or perpendicular now. I think that's because it's at an angle. So I'm not so sure it necessarily hurts you. I think it's just unnecessarily.

SPEAKER_03 22:17

Yeah, complication that you don't need. Yeah. I I I get it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:20

Yeah, we're never gonna have to try to pan so far that we're gonna have to take ability to that pan function. You know, we're gonna move our body behind the gun. Yeah. As opposed to trying to just rotate the gun. You know, we're not shooting at something that's running 25 yards in front of us. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where you need to have a pan function.

SPEAKER_03 22:36

Yeah, and even I have noticed on the bipods that I have that have can't, I don't I use it kind of how you're you're you're saying. Like I don't you nobody uses it in an extreme sense. You know what I mean? I at least I don't. Like I just adjust it a little bit just so I can get my gun level.

SPEAKER_01 22:51

Yeah, you know, we find, especially in the mountains though, like having quite a bit of can't in there, because as soon as you put that bipod on like a crooked rock, yeah, you know, you don't want to have to mess with the layers. Yeah, it's like having you you run out of cant adjustment very quickly. Pretty quick.

SPEAKER_03 23:04

Okay, gotcha. Um the the follow-up question to all of this, I mentioned it before. I over the last 10 years, I I I've been doing it less lately, I think because I've been trying some different things, but I have shot off a taller tripod. I've used your guys', or excuse me, bipod. I've used your guys' bipods uh quite a bit in the prone position, maybe more so now if I try what you're you're talking about. But I haven't I have other bipods that are tall that I've used a lot historically in the seated position. Yeah. What do you guys don't you don't teach that? Uh in in I'm I'm curious, like what's is there a negative to that? Is it better just to move to tripod? Like, what are your thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 23:46

Yeah, I think you're more stable moving to the tripod. Okay. But you know, I've shot animals seated off of this.

SPEAKER_03 23:52

You know, you find that right, you know, because if you put this in the tallest position here, you know, which is and I understand, like one of the issues is in order to shoot seated, you end up you end up with a very tall bite. I mean, you end up with a a trade-off with your bipod, right? It's tall, yeah. Okay, so I get pretty tall. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:10

So I've I've shot that seated. Yeah. You know, it's just not as stable as a good tripod position. So you don't make it work.

SPEAKER_03 24:17

There's not like a you there's no giant negative that I don't understand. Okay, gotcha. Gotcha. Um, do let's uh while we're on the rest uh subject, tripods. You you teach a lot hunters, uh you teach hunters uh how to shoot with tripods quite often, right?

SPEAKER_01 24:35

Yeah, you know, we're pretty heavily focused on tripods.

SPEAKER_03 24:38

Like give me give me the the low-hanging fruit on that. It from a guy from a perspective that I don't, and let me let me give you the context of why I don't. Okay. I'm not negative on them. I think I'm just I think I'm just naive and I haven't shot them a whole lot in the past. I have the one the one negative I have seen with clients, and it has it, I'm sure it has to do with preparation, is it's like another thing. You know what I mean? It's like what okay, now you're yeah, the the elk's at 250 yards and you may only have 45 seconds here. Why are you getting your tripod out? Yeah, it's a whole level of complexity sometimes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's that's my only that's my only gripe against it. But having said that, Brian, like uh, what are what are the key things if a guy's gonna shoot with tripods?

SPEAKER_01 25:22

Yeah, I think you know, you kind of touched on it is you gotta the equipment management on learning that tripod. Yeah, like when we run a tripod clinic or like a field shooting clinic, you know, I mean they probably get tired of it, but it is repetition. All right, set your tripod up, set your position up, shoot two shots. All right, break everything down. Yeah. All right, set it up again, two shots. All right, break everything down again. All right, let's go to kneeling. Yeah, set it up, two shots, break it down. Sure. You know, just the repetition on you know, getting in the position, getting used to getting those legs oriented correctly, getting used to getting that height right, you know, so you're not fighting it, you know, because there's a you know, there's a little sweet spot in the height that's only an inch or two, you know, variance, and that works for your body. Yeah, you know, and just getting that stuff right. So the more time that people spend, you know, working with that ahead of time, and you can completely do it on the living room floor.

SPEAKER_04 26:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:07

You know, just getting used to getting that gun in there. And you can completely judge yourself on how well you did without firing around, yeah, just by having something to aim at and looking at what's my wobble zone. Yeah, you know, because whatever that wobble zone is, whatever little pattern those crosshairs are created, I make a little change. Yeah, you can you'll know immediately. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:26

Yeah, that goes for like all rests, right? You can do so much, yeah. You know what's funny, uh, and we we'll we should get into this, Brian. I I always tell people to do like dry fire practice or whatever. And the thing is, is because it makes logical sense. I I personally don't do it that much. I would way rather take like my little, you know, I'll shoot with my son some. We got two little bolt action uh Tika 22s, you know. And it's so much more fun to shoot with live ammunition. Oh yeah. I don't know why. Like I'm the same way, yeah, yeah. It's so funny because it's like it makes such logical sense, but in a way, and I prescribe it to everybody, but in a way I don't do it, I'm much more likely to just be like, let's go shoot. But but regardless, you need to have a variation of like actually prepping these rests.

SPEAKER_01 27:14

I think just our you know, the positions we're at in life, we have the opportunity to shoot a lot.

SPEAKER_03 27:18

Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:19

Yeah, you know, I always have. You know, so I try to tailor a lot of the training to recognize that a lot of people all they have access to is occasionally going through the hundred-yard public range. Yeah, yeah. You know, and the range master complains if you do anything but shoot off the bench. Yeah. You know, so how do you work around that handicap and still get kind of comfortable with your equipment?

SPEAKER_03 27:35

Sure. Yeah. Man, it seems like uh this is we're a little bit off topic, but it seems like in the pistol world, do we need to we're getting obscured by the bipod? Um in the pistol world, there's a lot of these like uh like mantis systems and those sort of things. Do you is are there any good ones in the rifle world that you know of?

SPEAKER_01 27:55

You know, honestly, I I have not paid a lot of attention. Yeah, you know, I think most of the ones in the pistol world are designed around making sure your trigger press is right. Yeah, yeah, because that is by far the biggest issue shooting pistol because you know, you're applying you know three pounds of pressure to something that weighs less than three pounds. Yeah. You know, I'm not saying that trigger press isn't important in the precision rifle world, but it's not nearly as important as it for effective pistol shooting, I think. Yeah, I gotcha.

SPEAKER_03 28:22

Yeah, and that's something easier for them to build design like the at-home training thing for.

SPEAKER_01 28:26

Yeah, you know, so it's like you know, if if I'm teaching someone to dry fire, showing them how to dry fire, it's just like whatever position you set up in, yeah, you know, you got that wobble zone, those crosshairs are moving around a little bit, you know, press, press, press, click, and the crosshairs just keep doing the same thing they were doing before. Yeah. You know, but if it's click, then oh, you did something. Yeah, because you had that little jerk in the try in the crosshairs right when the gun went click. Yeah. You know, and that's with dry fire, and you can get that out of your system.

SPEAKER_03 28:54

Yeah, for sure. Um, before we jump off of the tripods, do you teach a lot of using them as rear rest too?

SPEAKER_01 29:01

Yeah, you know, in fact, um you know, so um in fact I was gonna show you here. Yeah. So one of the best ways to use a tripod. Especially if you have this long line like this. Or the long tripod.

SPEAKER_03 29:21

Okay. Yeah, you just see the clamping uh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:31

I'll usually put a finger in between uh my grip here and use my grip to control your height. And then if you imagine this position in the seated with two tripods, you're like, yeah, the air has a tripod and say the guy has a tripod. This is a shooting match. Yeah, sure. This is so close to being as stable as a shooting match. You know, they're using a tripod for your rear support. You know, and if you've got a tall enough tripod, you can run this all the way up to the standing if you're running a tripod in the front, a taller tripod in the back, and I've had clients kill analophone like 550 standing on a true tripod setup like this.

SPEAKER_03 30:06

Yeah, you know, it's it's it's funny and it makes sense. Um I I was in Africa two weeks ago, and I honestly hadn't shot off sticks a whole lot, you know, Brian. Yeah, but what's crazy is the the traditional the traditional sticks that you see, you know, the the tripod sticks that you see, it's just a front rest. Yeah, you you can even see in Africa, they those are for just my perspective was those are kind of part of the pH culture, yeah. But more and more of them are using the front rear rest. Yeah, the front rear sticks. Yeah, I mean, you know, they're they're gonna shoot standing a lot all the time. And I think the type of hunting, you're not shooting all that far a lot of times, so it does make sense to carry a tripod. But they're a lot of them are moving to like the front rear sticks, and they're so much better, man. Yeah, than just the front. It's like night and day difference. It's the same exact dynamic with that. The the rear the rear rest thing. I think, I mean, I don't know what your thoughts are on it, but I think hunters is as a whole, maybe not your crowd because you're tilted towards long range, but hunters as a whole, don't shoot with a rear rest when there's almost always one available.

SPEAKER_01 31:16

Yeah, I mean, if you can get that two points to rifle support, you know, and like once we start running, like, you know, especially in the mountain shooting package, like as soon as someone loses their rear support, yeah, like as soon as they get in a prone position where that rear bag's not supporting the back of the gun and they're just dependent upon that gun being in their shoulder for the rear support, like four out of five times they'll shoot over the top of the target. Oh, really? Because that that back end settles under recoil. Yeah, and as that bullet's going down the barrel, the back end's settling, yeah, and it it takes that shot high. Yeah. You know, so that rear support's pretty critical.

SPEAKER_03 31:48

Yeah. No, uh, no, for sure. And it's it's just one of those I to me, it's like low-hanging fruit for a lot of a lot, a lot of folks. It this is a little bit outside of the long range uh context, Brian. But do you teach or or even outside of your the classes you do with gunworks, what about positions like like to me with the tripod that you just showed, that's a great position for when a guy has time. Yep. Right? He you know, he you know, there's I I think regardless of how much you practice it, that's still gonna take some time to get out. Do you it like what about a quicker supported position? Do you teach anything over a pack? Do you do you teach any of that sort of stuff?

SPEAKER_01 32:30

Yeah, we don't really teach that. And the reason being because um, you know, and it's not to take away the usability of that, yeah. It's just that, you know, we're for the longer range shooting that we're doing, you don't get the necessary stability. Yeah, you know, yeah, and so it's like can you shoot over that and can you sometimes kind of get lucky and sometimes get a good hit? Yes. Yeah. But if you don't have that real solid support, you know, so basically the ultimate test in any position is if those if that wobble zone won't comfortably stay inside the vitals, like if you're fighting to keep the crosshairs inside the vitals, most likely you're gonna snatch the trigger. You're gonna try to time that shot when the crosshairs look right and you're gonna make a bad shot. Yeah, you know, so kind of our caveat is if you're gonna take the shot, that wobble zone has to be comfortably staying inside the vitals. Yeah. You know, and to get that stable, usually you have to have tripods, bipods, that kind of stuff. You know, it doesn't mean it, you know, that quick 200 yards.

SPEAKER_03 33:24

Yeah, yeah, it's a different, it's a whole different context to what's going on. It's just kind of outside of the scale. No, no, no, no, no. Yeah, yeah. No, I in that in that I think that's like the bet that's the best answer. Yeah. It's basically like, look, if you don't have enough time and you have to use a certain rest, then you probably shouldn't be shooting beyond X distance or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 33:42

Yeah, because there's there's so much stuff I'd love to teach if time wasn't a factor. Yeah. You know, when I worked at Scout Sniper School in the Marine Corps, yeah, that was a 10-week school. Yeah, and we didn't think it was long enough. We're like, it really needs to be 12 weeks. Right. You know, and so now I'm trying to teach ever people everything I can in two days here and two days here and three days here. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's like you just kind of have to prioritize and okay, what's our mission statement? Sure.

SPEAKER_03 34:02

Yeah, you're you're you're teaching a long-range course. You're not you're not teaching the 30-second shoot an elk at 250 yard points. Yeah, no, no, no, that and that's that's totally, totally fair answer. Then the other thing you said, guys, biltong, okay? I've been obsessed with this stuff for three or four years. Ever since I got on a keto, carnivore, paleo-esque type of diet, I've had a hard time finding healthy snacks. Biltong is a great option, particularly the slabs that have this fat on the side. That's where your energy is if you're a fat burner like me. Super simple ingredients in this, guys. Literally, one, two, three, four, five ingredients. Pair that to your gas station jerky, a great snack in the backcountry or just day-to-day. Biltong Depot is a huge supporter of my content. Go to their website, biltongdepot.com. Use my code cliffgray, C-L-I-F-F-G-R-A-Y at checkout for 10% off. And to support this content. Thanks, guys. I don't know if you feel this way when you say it, but I say the exact same thing to hunters all the time. Like if you're if your crosshairs, your wobble zone are going off the vitals, don't shoot. Yeah, we're like get closer or get more stable. It seems odd, it seems obvious, and I'm sh and I'm guilty of it too, but like when when your heart is pumping like crazy and you're excited, it's amazing how many people will. I mean, it's the thing, they'll shoot at an animal, and then afterwards, I'll ask them as a guide or hunting with buddies, how did it feel? And they'll say, Man, I wish I wouldn't have shot. And what they're saying is that the wobble zone was all over the place. And it's just a crazy psychological thing because it makes no sense. Like if the crosshairs were going off the animal, why would you shoot?

SPEAKER_01 35:43

It's you know, and I and I actually talk about it bit a bit when we talk about like advanced martianship. Yeah, you know, it's essentially buck fever. Yeah. You know, and really what buck fever is, is our brain doesn't like the stress of that stressful situation.

SPEAKER_02 35:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:55

Our brain doesn't care if we're successful or not. Our brain just wants to make the stress go away. Once it's over. So how does the brain make the stress go away? Hey, hurry up and get this shit over with. Yeah. You know, is essentially what your brain does to you. So I always tell people that, you know, just as a warning, it's like, hey, you're gonna feel this urge to just hurry up. Yeah. Ex at exactly the moment you should be slowing down, taking a couple breaths and being calm, cool, and collected. You know, and then I think I think the other thing that really helps with that is if you have a process that you go through, yeah. They, you know, and archers are really good at this. They'll have a mantra, they'll have like a process. Yeah, you know, and basically what you're doing is you're distracting your brain from that pressure and saying, hey, just focus on this process process you've done a thousand times before. And that's a really good way to function under stress, I think.

SPEAKER_03 36:36

Yeah, no, absolutely. I I think you I think you nailed it. It's like it's this urge to get it over with the very hard to control. I think we've all we've all felt that. But you you added something to it, Brian, that I think is is worth uh mentioning. How people deal with it, I think psychologically, is the wobble zone is all over the vitals, it's coming out 20% of the time, 30% of the time. But what they do is their their mind makes a quick judgment of like this is okay because I'm gonna time it. Yeah, I'm gonna pull the trigger when it comes through the vitals, which is which is I mean, at the distances and stuff we're talking about is completely illogical.

SPEAKER_01 37:14

You can't yeah, it's almost all I mean, anytime you flinch, like like literally, they would have a better chance of being successful. You know, if it's let's say that crosshair is out of vitals 20% of the time. Yeah, if they just press, press, press and let that gun go off whenever it wanted to, 80% chance that they'd end up in the vitals. But if if they try to time it, I'd give them about a 20% chance of actually vitals because they're almost certainly gonna snatch that trigger.

SPEAKER_03 37:38

Yeah, in a way, because they're take like it's like okay, you've got a group at whatever distance, and your crosshairs are going all over the place. Well, if you just focus on the fact of like squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, you're gonna end somewhere in that group. But if you flinch, you're taking the you're shifting all the time. Yeah, and then you're almost certainly gonna, yeah, which is con maybe counterintuitive to our brain, but it's reality. Yeah, you know. I I see it, it it is it is uh, I don't know if you've ever done this, but looking at trigger cam footage of myself shooting, it's really it's odd because you can see it when you try. Oh yeah, you can see it when you try to time it, and and it's those shots on the trigger cam, they make you feel so dumb. Yeah, because you're like you're you're you literally are like perfect, perfect, perfect, boom.

SPEAKER_01 38:26

Yeah. It's like I I moved the crosshairs off just to shoot.

SPEAKER_03 38:30

Yeah. So it's one of those things that's just just kind of a funny, a funny, uh, a funny deal to to to experience, you know. But um any other positional stuff that we that we haven't really hit on.

SPEAKER_01 38:43

You know, I think that like one of my favorite a little bit on the tripod stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, and and where it came from. You know, I spent a lot of time in the SWAT world. And when we first really started using tripods, it was at the you know, Marines started coming back from Flugia and Ramadi and places like that. Yeah. You know, obviously I was connected with the Scout Sniper program. And man, the tripod techniques that I learned from these guys when they came back, where they had learned to shoot, you know, standing tripod through these loopholes in the wall, 10 feet in front of them, and hit and hit somebody, you know, six, seven hundred yards away.

SPEAKER_04 39:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:11

Was a complete game changer on how we deployed in the SWAT environment. Yeah. Because once we had good solid tripods, it's like it was so much easier than stacking refer, you know, stacking dressers on top of beds trying to get an elevated position that was uncomfortable as hell. And you know, it's just completely changed it. Yeah. So I think I brought that to the hunting world a bit too. You know, to the point now where I'd say, I'd say if I had to, just thinking roughly, I probably shot one out of five animals prone. Probably the next three out of five have been off the tripod, and then one out of five is just like over a log or just some grabbing a tree or just some improvised thing real quick. Yeah. Yeah. You know, but my absolute favorite tripod position that works in the field is kneeling. Okay. And the reason for that is that if you just look at the what the slope of the ground, for me to get a comfortable sitting, you've got to be on top or a little bit on the forward slope. Okay. So you're completely exposed.

SPEAKER_04 40:03

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 40:04

Okay. And the same thing with prone. You've got to crawl up on top of that hill, or you've got to even maybe slightly on the forward slope, so you're completely exposed. Now, if they're 800 yards away, you might get away with it.

SPEAKER_04 40:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:13

You know, but especially if they're closer, my absolute favorite is kneeling because kneeling works on the reverse slope.

SPEAKER_04 40:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 40:18

So you set up a kneeling tripod where your height is right, that you're just peaking the top. And we used to do this, you know, we used to use this concept of snipers a lot. Yeah. You know, because you're worried about if they start shooting at me, how do I get away? Okay. Well, you want to be behind that, you want to be behind that death blade. So if I'm 10 feet back from the crest of the hill and I'm just peaking the top of the hill, so from animals' perspective, they just see a rifle barrel in my head, all my movement's concealed. Yeah. And with a tripod, that's a 400-yard position.

SPEAKER_03 40:44

Yeah. I got and and so just so I understand conceptually what we're talking about, Brian. You're you're kneeling. Are you kneeling? Uh are you kneeling with uh which knees up?

SPEAKER_01 40:54

Well, actually, usually both knees down. Oh, okay. Now I understand. We'll go both knees down. Yeah. We'll straddle our backpack so your weights, a lot of your weights on your butt, not on your knees. Yeah. You know, so if you can imagine straddling your backpack, it makes it a lot more comfortable for most people. Yeah. And then you got your tripod set up in front of you. You know, and you got a little bit of wobble in your body. Well, if you put just a little bit of pressure on the tripod, you can use the tripod to take some of that wobble out of your body. Yeah, I got you. You know, and we actually teach a sling, like a tripod sling position. Okay, that's kind of hard to explain, but it's basically. Yeah, it's a it's an attachment that you that you carry on your belt that you carry in your pocket that you clip to your sling. And once you're putting down pressure on that rifle, it kind of takes away for that lack of rear support. Yeah. And it it cuts your wobble zone about in half.

SPEAKER_03 41:41

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 41:41

As opposed to not using the sling.

SPEAKER_03 41:43

Gotcha. Do you get do you have any videos online or anything of it?

SPEAKER_01 41:46

Yeah, I think there's pretty sure there is. Okay. But I couldn't tell you where to find it. Okay, gotcha.

SPEAKER_03 41:51

Some YouTube searching. Um so I'm gonna I'm not saying it's not me that's gonna push back, but there's an intuitive pushback that I think exists. Because from my perspective, all that you're saying makes sense, but I'd have to practice it a lot. All right. Absolutely. Now, I think some people are gonna push back and say, hey, tripods make a lot of sense from like an ambush sense, right? Like, and I've you I've done this a lot as a guide. Like, hey, we're gonna sit on this meadow, we're gonna have the tripod set up, we're gonna have your gun locked into the tripod, you're ready to go. Makes a lot of sense. Really, really solid support. But what you just described is like an active tripod position, right? Like we're doing a stock, we're using the topography to get to that last spot where we've got you know a little cover to to make the shot from, but it's it's during the stock. Um, I'm curious, Brian, how do you how do you uh I mean it how does that look? I mean, do guys are you do you teach guys to have their tripod like already at the height, like during that last segment of the stock? Uh is that important? Like, what does that look like? Does that make sense? Because I'm I'm envisioning like, okay, we get within whatever distance to that last point uh part of the topography where we know if we expose our spell us ourselves to animals gonna see us. Am I do I do I before I get up there, do I have all my stuff set up and then just walk with the tripod in my hand the last distance?

SPEAKER_01 43:18

Yeah, yeah, okay. And and actually, like, you know, like as a guide, if you know they're gonna shoot off a tripod, yeah. Like having someone just to assist with setting up the tripod makes that process a lot quicker. I gotcha. You know, if it's been practiced ahead of time.

SPEAKER_04 43:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:30

And then even doing it by myself individually, I'll have the tripod out, you know, and then like literally, I'm I may set up the position a couple feet lower. Okay. You know, I've already peaked and I know where they're at. Yeah. I might set up the position a couple feet lower, and then once everything's kind of set and established, I just start, you know, walking on my knees up the hill until okay, yeah, my height's right. Okay, yeah, yeah. You know, so you basically you're out of sight, there's no movement, obviously requires an undisturbed animal. And there's you know, there's times when you're not gonna have time. Yeah. And the way I look at it is like, well. If you didn't have time, then it that situation just didn't work out because you certainly couldn't have shot it without the tripod.

SPEAKER_03 44:05

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. At certain diagnoses relative thing.

SPEAKER_01 44:10

Yeah, it's kind of a distance relative thing.

SPEAKER_03 44:12

Yeah. But that makes sense because that's how that's how I've historically like it. I've guiding hunters that are going to use a bipod, one of like my pet peeves was, is like, why now that we're exposed are you getting the bipod out? Like we should have done it like down here. You know what I mean? We we we had an hour. I mean, that's the reality too. A lot of these situations, you're actually you you're actually not time sensitive. You're you're not time sensitive until you're exposed. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:42

And once you learn to shoot some distance, like you know, I always tell people it's like, if you can, you know, I'm first off, I always tell people, it's like, I'm not here to teach you how to shoot elk at a thousand yards. Yeah. Most of us probably shouldn't be doing that, you know, except in just when all the stars completely align that day. You know, but if you can shoot five or six hundred yards, it completely changes how you hunt the country. You know, because you can hunt most hillsides from the opposite hillside or most valleys from the opposite side of the valley. You know, and I would much rather have that undisturbed five or six hundred yard cross-canyon shot than the rodeo when you go over there and spook them and you're trying to get that running hundred-yard shot. Oh, yeah. You know, and I think you're much more likely to be successful. So I think you know, because we you know tend to shoot from a little further, we're almost always shooting at undisturbed animals. Yeah, you know, and that buys you time.

SPEAKER_03 45:29

Yeah. Yeah. I I've heard it described as like it's so much easier to kill them like once you're in the bubble, or excuse me, harder once you're in their bubble than it is when you're out. Yeah. You know what I mean? I it's funny because uh it like again this Africa experience is is so fresh in my mind, but we did a bunch of culling in Africa out of vehicles. Yeah, some of the hardest shooting because all the animals know you're there. Oh, yeah. It's so hard. Like people, you know, you people would think you'd you'd conceptualize that as be like, oh, that's easy to drive around blasting stuff. Man, if there's any distance, jump out very hard quick. Yeah, it's very hard because they're they're they're always they know you're there. So you know, they're not they're not they're not giving you big chunks of time. It's like 10 seconds, okay. Move a little bit, now they got 15 seconds. I find that to be some of the hardest shooting, you know, because you you you're then you're very time sensitive all the time. Whereas if you're just sitting back stocked in somewhere, you a lot of times you have quite a bit of time.

SPEAKER_01 46:25

Oh, yeah. You know, yeah. I mean, half the time you're just waiting an hour for them to get up. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you're like, I'm getting kind of uncrocked by where someone make a stand up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But you know, we used to have the same, you know, I wouldn't say issue, but you'd see the same, you know, kind of like, you know, guys kind of have their preferred style. Yeah, we used to do a lot of antelope hunts in New Mexico, and some of the guides down there were kind of in tune to, you know, peeking over a ridge and seeing what's out there and doing some spot and stock, and others were just pretty content just driving around and jump out of the truck real quick. Yeah. You know, and some clients kind of enjoy that adrenal of the quick. I mean, myself personally, it's like I don't really care for that style of hunting because I want I want to have a good setup.

SPEAKER_03 47:02

Yeah, you're you're you're I I think that comes from Brian, like part of the successful hunt is like the whole shot process. Yeah, it's not just something dead.

SPEAKER_00 47:10

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 47:11

So so if you if you blast something that's like aware and you know it's not quite right and it's dead, you don't feel as good as if you got like the right setup.

SPEAKER_01 47:18

Yeah, it's like I like to have that, you know. You know, I like perfect shots. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't want the shot to be a question. Yeah. You know, I mean I might spook them, other things might go wrong, I might not be able to find them, but when the time actually comes to shoot, I want that to be like a slam document.

SPEAKER_03 47:31

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, for sure. Yeah, I think that's a good um, a good segue into a concept that I wanted to discuss with you. And and I saw a good podcast you did, it's probably about a year ago. You talked about how you set your personal limitations and how you thought about that whole that whole thing. Uh one, I think it's probably one of the most important things that somebody can do before they hunt. Or you know, or at least, I mean, I obviously you're gonna calibrate it depending on the conditions and stuff, but having a a good concept of like how far you're willing to shoot, I think is a very key thing. You know, uh how how do you think about it?

SPEAKER_01 48:10

Yeah, I think um I think kind of in the beginning you gotta you gotta break it down to what's the rifle's capabilities.

SPEAKER_04 48:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:18

What's my capabilities? You know, and there's some situations where you know if you're prone on a calm day, it's basically determined by what's my rifle's capabilities. Yeah. If that rifle's capable of, you know, putting the first shot in a ten-inch circle at six or eight hundred yards, then absolutely that's uh that's a very doable shot. Yeah. You know, and then then you got to look at wind, you know, as how much experience or how much practice do you have shooting in the wind? And sometimes you'll see charts or something where it says, ah, if it's more than this much miles per hour wind, to me it's not so much how the wind's blowing, but can I see the wind?

SPEAKER_04 48:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 48:51

Or can I accurately predict the wind?

SPEAKER_04 48:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:53

You know, and this one kind of blows a lot of people's mind. You know, it's like I'll always ask people, it's like, given a choice, I go to this knob over here and I got a straight headwind, tailwind, or pretty much a headwind, tailwind. Or if I go to this knob over here and I get a crosswind, which one do you choose? Most people choose a headwind tailwind. Yeah. And I actually strongly disagree. I will take that 15 mile per hour consistent straight crosswind all day because I know it's not changing. Yeah. But what happens with that headwind tailwind is it never stays a headwind tailwind. Is it'll go from 12 o'clock to one o'clock and then back to 11 o'clock.

SPEAKER_04 49:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

And so if I got 10 miles per hour from here, 10 miles per hour from here, if I work at the cosines on that, there's a five mile per hour crosswind component to each one of those. So I got a 10 mile per hour spread that's changing in a over a 30-second period of time. Yeah. Now, if I can see Mirage, it's doable because you can see exactly what it's doing at that moment. But if you can't see Mirage, then that headwind tailwind is probably, I mean, it's basically a it's a don't shoot scenario unless you're like four, you know, 400 yards or something like that.

SPEAKER_04 49:55

Yeah, yeah, I got you.

SPEAKER_01 49:56

Um, you get that same wind from the cross, you know, if it fluctuates from three o'clock to two o'clock and then the four o'clock, that's like a 15% change. Oh, yeah. So there's only a 1.5 mile per hour swing in our wind variability. So, you know, oh, you know, if I get that straight crosswind, wind meter, 11 miles per hour, laser rangefinder, toggling 11 miles per hour coming from the right, boom, tells me to hold three and a half minutes. That three and a half minutes is gonna work.

SPEAKER_03 50:22

Yeah, I got you.

SPEAKER_01 50:23

So five minutes from now, ten minutes from now.

SPEAKER_03 50:26

Dude, so this is acting this is very interesting to me, Brian, because you're not you're talking about a hypothetical not to just to explain a point. This actually exists in the mountains. Yeah. This scenario. Like you may have an opportunity where the it's it's you're talking about the same wind, but from one position, it's coming at you, and we all know these mountain winds are, you know, it's gonna come up with it, you know, it's shifting all the time or kind of cycling, right? And so that the fact that it's not consistent is much more, much more relevant if it's coming, you know, coming to you or or a tailwind than it is if you're looking at the same wind and it's across. Yeah, is I I mean that just it makes sense, but yeah, yeah, yeah. I gotcha.

SPEAKER_01 51:04

Yeah, because you're you're yeah, it's counterintuitive because you got to hold more wind. Yeah, so it's affecting the bullet more, but it's just consistent and it's very repeatable.

SPEAKER_04 51:12

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:12

As opposed to that headwind, tailwind, especially in the mountains where you can't see mirage, yeah, you really don't know what it's doing.

SPEAKER_03 51:17

Yeah, yeah. Cause I get what you're saying. Because I that's you do notice that uh and and I I I know that even at where I'm at in terms of reading the wind, it is very if you have a wind that's like cycling and you've got a good feel for what it is, and then you and then you you're you you start to go through your shot process, and then you for at least for me, all of a sudden I start to feel it on my ears, like, oh, the wind we're talking about just quit. Yeah you know what I mean, and now it's back. And so it's like now not only do I have to, you know, not only do I have to de like hold the wind, but I also have and and aim at the animal, I also have to consider that I need to shoot during the wind that I actually called, yeah, which is a lot for me at least.

SPEAKER_01 51:58

Yeah, you know, and I think the one and on a short-range shot, then yeah, the wind right where you're at, you know, changes. And maybe you can it and it is extremely important, but you can't negate what's going on up there. And I've I've made this mistake before where you know, I think wind kind of does this. Like if I got an 800-yard shot, it may be gusting a little where I'm at, but then it's calm down here, and then it gusts down here and it's calm where I'm at. And so it just goes back and forth. So I remember one particular case where this lesson got drilled home with me. You know, I was with an antelope hunter, and uh it was like nice calm morning, like eight o'clock in the morning. This buck's standing out there like 800 yards. Yeah, you know, we crawled up on top of this little null prone, so just completely stable, pretty calm morning, like perfect setup for a pretty long shot.

SPEAKER_04 52:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 52:41

And uh I was running the wind meter and I was feeling it was like like, I don't know, like two or three miles per hour wind coming from my right. You know, and so I'm like, all right, we're gonna hold like a minute and a half right or something. I can't remember what I told him. And uh he's getting set up, and like right when he's getting ready to shoot, I just felt the wind die.

SPEAKER_04 52:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 52:57

I'm like, eh, hold center. Yeah, guess what happened? Went right in front of his chest. Yeah, because that wind was still there where we were at, but it still existed, yeah, you know, somewhere downrange.

SPEAKER_03 53:06

Yeah, it might have started 30 feet in front of you or something. Exactly. Based on the topography. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 53:10

Yeah, so I just I I I'll just get an average and then kind of trust that average. I mean, I'll avoid shooting if it's like gusting at the moment. Sure. Like, yeah, let's not hold off. It's gusting right now. Yeah. But then once it kind of returns to status quo, you know, I just go off of whatever that average I'd gotten was, and that works pretty well.

SPEAKER_03 53:27

Yep, gotcha. Now, taking that back to back to the question, that uh in terms of your your limit.

SPEAKER_02 53:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 53:35

You're you obviously we've got we got off on win because it's relevant.

SPEAKER_01 53:38

Yeah, yeah. So I mean, I mean, I I would say like using gun worse guns, you know, on you know, most of your hunting-sized animals, you know, certainly 800 yards if conditions are perfect and marksmanship isn't a factor, that's kind of like your starting point. Yeah. And then you start subtracting from that once you introduce variables. Yeah. You know, so you introduce a wind variable. I mean, at 400 yards, you can ignore a lot of wind and still get a good hit. So you get those really windy days. If you just get in get inside 400 yards, and then you're probably gonna be pretty successful, you know. And then you introduce the martianship variable. What position am I shooting from? What's that wobble zone that we talked about? You know, so it's like it's a combination of all three of those things. Yeah. You know, what's my system capable of? What am I capable of from this position as a shooter? And then what unknown variables like wind do I have out there that I either I know what it is, so I'm confident I'm holding correctly, or I can't really read it, so I'm not really sure what I need to hold.

SPEAKER_03 54:36

Yeah, but but even what you just said there, Brian, I think is is really interesting for people to hear. You know, to me, somebody who's comfortable shooting 750, 800 yards is an exceptional shooter, you know what I mean, with the exceptional equipment. Uh, and and I'm not saying there's not people capable of doing it, there's lots of people capable of doing it, but you're you're saying like uh a tricky wind today, even for you personally, could knock off 250 yards from 300 yards from it.

SPEAKER_01 55:03

Absolutely, yeah. You know, and the other thing that you know like wind will do, especially in the mountains, is like it's pretty easy to shoot like out hunting antelope in the plains. Yeah, it's pretty easy to shoot in a 15 or 20 mile per hour wind. Yeah, you know, because that wind is just going flat across the ground. You know, as soon as that that same wind, if we're on one ridgetop and we're shooting across a bunch of broken terrain to another ridgetop, now instead of that nice smooth flat wind, we just got a lot of turbulence out there. Yeah, and that same bullet going across really rough, broken ground that's creating a lot of updrafts and doundrafts and tumbling wind and stuff, you know, it's like I've seen, you know, we got a scenario up at Sheep Mountain that we shoot it's like 730 yards on a like elk vitals. Yeah. And on a good day, most people nail it first or second shot. Sure. I've seen eight students go through there and it only get hit twice. Yeah. With everybody trying five or six times just because you have that wind coming over the ridge behind it and you get that tumbling wind. Yeah. You know, where you're just in turbulence and it's blowing like 20 something, and it's like minute right, minute left. Oh, you're a minute high, oh, you're two minutes low. Like no bullet is going through the same condition as the bullet before it, so it's impossible to predict.

SPEAKER_03 56:08

Yeah, you can't you can't get it it figured out. It's it's interesting that you started with like the sheep mountain, and that's your guys' just so people understand, that's like your your mountain range, right? Yeah, it's kind of my play, kind of my playground too, where I get to play with stuff. Yeah, yeah. We were talking about before the podcast, you guys are lucky because you have that so so close. Um, but I've shot at your flat range before, and and the thing that's interesting about the flat anybody's flat range, but a longer, you know, range has got seven, eight hundred, nine hundred thousand yard targets, is man, you can you can feel even with wind, you can feel overconfident. Oh, yeah. I mean, you had me hitting, you know, you had me hitting stuff 900,000 yards. It was it's super fun. But even me, and I've shot a lot, I'm like, yeah, but we go up in the mountains, it's gonna be different. Well, that's what I mean.

SPEAKER_01 56:54

It's funny, I always say that people leave like a level one, level two course where we should where we're shooting the flat range. Yeah. They leave that thinking, man, I'm good at 800 yards. Yeah. They leave the mountain course going, um, maybe 500 yards.

SPEAKER_03 57:05

Yeah, but that's kind of like part of the process, like recognizing when when you're gonna be capable of it, yeah, of it or not. And and I always I always thought that was an interesting dynamic as a guide, Brian, is um the there the the the idea that there is uh overconfidence among among most hunters, I think that is the case. Yeah, and then what's what's interesting is as the as you get into the side of things, which I'm sure a lot of your students are and and people you deal with, where they shoot a lot, it's they're they're much better at the craft, but they're in a way less confident. And and they depend on more, like they're all of a sudden privy to they understand these other variables that make gigantic differences. Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? They're they're not the type of guy that you ask him, hey, how comfortable like a guy that I've found that a guy that's very experienced and shoots a lot, if you ask him how comfortable or how far he is comfortable shooting, he won't have an answer.

SPEAKER_01 58:03

Yeah, because it's so situational.

SPEAKER_03 58:05

Yeah, yeah, he'll just like give you a blank stare. Yeah, the like the the the early part of the learning curve, it'll be 400, 600, 700. Yeah, you know, like then an answer. It starts ratcheting back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It ratchets back and then it has a lot of like caveats. Oh, yeah. You know, then it's it's I think it's very interesting. It's like I think it's well, I can't remember what that effect's called. I think the the Dunnen Kruger effect or whatever, but you kind of feel very, very comfortable, like you know everything, and then the more you learn, you kind of shift. Yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about.

SPEAKER_01 58:35

You know, once you understand what can go wrong, you start realizing what can go wrong, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 58:41

Yeah, yeah. But in a way it makes you, I mean, it makes you astronomically more effective.

SPEAKER_01 58:45

Oh, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 58:46

Because you can control, you know, you all of a sudden recognize when this is like a lot harder than it than it it is under another set of scenarios. Yeah. So uh yeah, no, it's very, very interesting, man. And then uh yeah, so is that that that pretty much that's how you that's how you figure out your distance. Those those big variables, right? Yeah, what's the system capable of?

SPEAKER_01 59:07

System, wind, yeah, and then what's the wind? Yeah, I see the wind, and then what's my shoot? What's the accuracy perspective from the shooting position? How well can I shoot from the shooting position?

SPEAKER_03 59:16

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, I know for sure. And then rests are easy because it's basically like you say, just look at your wobble zone.

SPEAKER_01 59:22

Yeah, yeah, you're just looking at your wobble zone as long as that rifle is gonna recoil naturally from that position, then your wobble zone essentially tells you where that bullet's gonna go.

SPEAKER_03 59:30

Yeah. The uh no, that's perfect explanation. You know, the last question I want to ask you, it just it just popped in my my mind, and and then I'll I'll let you go. I know you got students to teach you today. Uh, what do you think about magnification? Do you guys always use high magnification like the highest magnification on your scopes? Do you are you a proponent of lower? What's your thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 59:49

No, so um, you know, so going back, and I'm kind of the old guy that hates to change, you know, and when scopes started getting more and more powerful, you know, we shot 10 power scopes when I was in the Marine Corps. Yeah. You know, so I always had this attitude of-like fixed 10s? Yeah, fixed 10s. I mean, I I would prefer a low, you know, a variable three to ten. Yeah, I got to do that. Something like that for the for the closer. But my attitude was always like, I shot a thousand yards, no problem with a 10-power scope. You don't need anything more than 10 power to shoot a thousand yards. Sure. You know, and as scopes started getting more and more powerful, you know, the one thing, the one thing I do like about power and a scope is it makes it easier for me to call my own wind.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:23

Like I will turn that power up to 20. If I got 25 power, I'll turn that power up to 25 when I'm looking at Mirage. Yeah. You know, and just like you use a spotting scope and you focus it closer to you, I'll take the parallax and I'll crank that parallax to like 200 yards. Yeah, yeah. And you're focusing that scope closer. And you can you can look at wind through a 25 power scope kind of like you do a spotting scope.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:42

You know, but of course you gotta make sure you get parallax back to where supposed to be.

unknown 1:00:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:45

But then I'll turn it down to shoot. Like I'm gonna turn it down to shoot. And so kind of what dictates what power you should shoot at is legitimately what caliber you're shooting.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:55

Because the bigger a caliber you're shooting, the more recoil movement you got. I don't ever want to ideally, I don't want to have so much recoil movement that the target leaves my field of view under recoil.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:04

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:05

Because boom, you fire the shot, my eye is trying to find the target again. Yeah. And because I'm trying to see that bullet hit, especially if I'm by myself, which most of the time I am, you know, if I don't see what happened with that bullet, I have no idea how to fix it for the next shot.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:19

You know, and that's you know, that old joke about, you know, how does someone accidentally shoot two sheep? You know, it's a very expensive mistake. Yeah, yeah. They come out of the scope, they didn't see that one drop, and now they see one running away, and maybe it's whimping a little bit, and they hammer that one. Yeah, you know, and so we really preach just like, you know, stay on the gun, boom, look for that impact. You know, past about 400 yards, you know, depending on the how much recoil, you can actually see your bullet hit.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:44

You know, and then any wind call is just an educated guess. Yeah, now you got real information. Yeah, my wind call is just an educated guess. But as soon as I fire that first bullet, that first bullet tells me exactly what the wind's doing. Yeah. And then so if I see it and I can follow it up within about five seconds, you know, I have a great opportunity to make a second shot that's even better than the first shot.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:04

You know, so we always teach multiple shots. You know, if that animal's still standing, he needs to be hit again.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:08

You know, especially shooting distance because you don't really know how well you hit him.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:12

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:12

You know, and so you follow it up, and like I said, you get a better second shot.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:16

Yeah, yeah. Well, and plus the I mean the one advantage of shooting distance is you're more you depending on the recoil of the cartridge you're shooting, you you can get that information.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:24

Yeah, and so I guess to to back up to your question, you know, like your six fives, they're probably about a 15 to 18 power gun. Yeah. Where you have a big enough field of view and you probably still keep that gun in your that target in your field of view. Like my 30 nozzler, that's like a 12 power gun. Yeah. Yeah, like literally it's like it's got a 15-power scope on it, but I shoot it at 12 most of the time, probably, just because any more power than that, and that target's completely outside my field of view, and I don't see what happened to it.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:52

Yeah. You know, it dude, what you're taught. This is just like fresh in my mind. Uh, this last week I went and I shot a ton of rounds of 308 through a bunch of different stocks. I I get lots of questions on stock design. Um, and you guys, I I view Gunworks as very I I I see a lot of what you guys have done in in stock design. It's trickling into a lot of other people's stocks. You you you guys know that. But I I I get a lot of questions about stocks and I don't really answer them, Brian, because I've never shot one then shot the other. Like it's been like it's been stuck in my mind. Like, I gotta go do this test because I I don't I can shoot one for two weeks or whatever, and it's I don't really have an opinion because I'm not shooting just from a practical standpoint. I'm not taking the action out of this and then putting the others and re-zeroing the gun or whatever. So finally I went and got you know a bunch of different stocks, bunch of the same exact cartridge, and shot like five-round group, five-round group, five-round group, and I did it all in a trigger camp. Okay, because I wanted to see like, is there a real difference, or is this all like marketing mumbo jumbo? There's for sure a real difference. Oh, yeah. Yeah, like there's there's a real difference, and and we could get into that a little bit, but I don't want to keep you forever. But one of the huge differences is uh the ability, like, is how much you get off target. Yeah. And so it's it's analogous to this, right? The same deal. Like you're gonna, you're gonna you're you're gonna be off target more if you have a tighter field of view or if you're shooting a bigger cartridge. In this case, the stock variable is relevant. Like some stocks for sure, you get on target faster. Man, in the trigger cam footage, it is like stunningly different. Yeah, yeah. Like if you get well, yeah, and if and if I because it's me shooting, and I'm critiquing myself shooting, but if I lose the target, uh huh, how much longer it takes for me to get back on? And what's what's crazy about it is I'm working the bolt during this process. Yeah. But if I if while I'm if I I I get recoil, the target, the target's, you know, obviously not in the center anymore, but it's here, but I see it, I can work the bolt and get right back on it. Yeah, man, if I if I shoot and I lose sight of it, then I work the bolt, it's a it triples the amount of time for me to get back on target. It it's like a huge, it's a huge, it's to the extent I had this weird psychological thing that I could get back on it so fast that my groups would open up because I was I was it was like I was like, oh, I'm ready to shoot again. Boom, boom, boom. Yeah, so you know, I'm not taking the time to go through my process correctly, that sort of thing. But huge difference. Yeah, like it's gigantic. So, anyways, I I got off on on a thing, but I think it's way under way underrated, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:31

Yeah, I mean, just like a you know, a couple things on stock design, like it was, you know, I'm kind of setting my ways on what I like. Yeah, I won't even touch anything that doesn't have yeah, I want to hear it, man. Probably about four features. Okay, I want to hear it. It's gotta have a toe line. Yeah, like because we run a rear bag under there, so any skeletonized chassis style stock that doesn't have a nice toe line under there, yeah, you know, it's just it's not gonna work for me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:54

Um and you and you you like to have a little angle, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:57

You know, strictly from a perspective. Perspective, a flat toe line would be perfect.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:03

You know, because as that rifle recoils to the rear, nothing's changing. The orientation wouldn't change. Yeah. You know, but from a field use, you know, perspective, there's a little compromise there because you want to have a slope to it because that's how you get your height adjustment. Yeah. You know, either by a taller bag or a lower bag, and then that slope and the comb, it makes you you can make adjustments by going forward and back here.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:22

You you feel like you can make your rear rest adjustments quicker and more effective if there's a little toe. Yeah, I want to have a little slope there.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:28

It just gives me more adjustability for field positions. Yeah. Yeah. Without taking away too much shooting capability.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:35

It's funny, not that it's relevant, Bryant, but it's also what we're kind of used to, like seeing cosmetically. It's like a little, you know, a little yeah, yeah. I I I have shot both, like flat, flat. Yeah. And and back to this trick, like the flat, flat man, particularly if you let it like almost free roll free recoil. Stays right on target. Yeah, it's like stays right on target. I didn't mean to get off the room.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:58

Yeah, no, that's completely right, though, because that's what we're talking about, is how that gun recoils. Yep. You know, so I'll accept a little bit, giving up a little bit. Yeah, to have the ability to shoot ability. To have the ability to adjust it. Yeah, I got you. And then the next thing is just a natural pistol grip. You know, that matches, you know, so this is not comfortable. Yeah. This is comfortable. Yep. Um, a little bit of a negative comb on the top. You know, so what happens when that gun recoils, it actually recoils away from your face. Yeah. As opposed to a flat, especially if you combine it with um like one of those scalloped-out backs where your shoulders sitting lower than the axis of recoil, it basically just encourages that thing to punch you in the face. Snack you in the face. Yeah. And then so those things, along with a flat foreend. Okay. It's amazing how much like a sling swivel stud, you know, over your backpack, or if that sling swivel stud is impacting your like just into a sandbag, how much it'll make that gun jump and how much it'll make the accuracy go south. Really? Because it's just that tiny little bit of initial recoil movement before the bullets left the barrel. You know, if I got this little stud sticking down, it's making that thing jump. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:04

It's the same dynamic you're talking with the bipod. You're saying that I've got the recoil. So let's say I've got the recoil, uh, or not the recoil, the uh the sling swivel stud is sticking in my front rest, maybe my backpack, maybe maybe bag, whatever. When it recoils, it's like that jumps. That tenth of an inch, it's obstructed during that. Yeah. Because it's like, yeah, okay. Yeah that makes that that makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:28

Yeah, and I I completely caught myself. We were shooting some stages up at Sheet Mountain getting ready for you know a match we're hosting up there. And uh shooting a couple of stages, there were like these awkward uphill positions where you're putting a bag on a rock and some rear support with a tripod. And I missed it a couple times. And then I realized because I had a sling on my rifle and I was just laying the sling on top of there. As soon as I unclipped the sling from the front, so now it's flush again. Yeah, all of a sudden I was hitting. Yeah, just that little thing.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:52

That that that's uh that's interesting. Do you have a um so those are the those are the big ones on stock design? Do you have an opinion on uh like uh uh comb relative to bore?

SPEAKER_01 1:09:03

Yeah, I I want to be able to get my shoulder like directly in line with recoil. Okay. You know, so I like that butt pad to come up so you combine that with a reverse cone, you know. My my the long axis of the barrel is here, like I want continue the long axis of the barrel, I want it to basically run into almost like right at the top of the comb. Yeah, you know, as opposed to the ones that are scalloped out in the back and push your shoulder low. That gun's gonna jump a lot.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:27

Yeah, that that's a real difference I noticed too. Like you like all the the rifles I have from you guys, they say they're they're all designed that way. Um, I shoot tikas and like a factory tikka stock, I it's brutally low. Like you know, you know what I mean, because it's the extreme other end of that. Um it but it's just a very noticeable difference. Yeah, you know, um, and it's uh it's a real thing. So I always always wonder and and I I had a conversation with a buddy just a couple days ago, like, why is that? Why are so many of these stocks so so far below borderline?

SPEAKER_01 1:10:02

No, I think it's just it's it's a holdback from, you know, I mean, on a dangerous game gun is great. Yeah, you know, because you're standing on your hind leg shooting, yeah. So it's just the way your body works, you know, and it's just like they're stuck in that tradition. So even though these rifles aren't really meant for shooting offhand anymore, some of that stock design is still being influenced by that tradition.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:19

Yeah, or or a lot of them have a lot of them were you're shooting with iron like iron sights. Yeah, so your eye was lower anyway. Yeah, yeah, you had to get down, yeah. So you almost had to, because if you think about it, tell me if I'm wrong, uh Brian, but if you're if your comb is too high and you're shooting open sights, you can't it won't work. Yeah, you can't get your head low enough. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:38

And then the other thing too is like we we run into this a lot, is a lot of people think they need a cheekpiece, like an adjustable cheek piece. Yeah, you know, and so if you run that stock way out on your shoulder here and laying your head over, then yeah, you're gonna have a gap here and you're gonna feel like, hey, I need something to do. You gotta get down there, yeah, yeah. You know, but we teach running that stock inboard, yeah, you know, more on your upper chest. And so now if this is my stock, it's literally my jaw weld's right here. I gotcha. And I don't feel that need for a cheek piece anymore. Yeah, you know, and it's like I always tell people, it's like in my old line of work, you know, was that adjustable cheek piece there? Was that there to help me shoot better? Was that there just so I could stand to look through the scope for an hour at a time in case something happened? Yeah, it was completely there for comfort just so I could stand to look through that scope for an extended period of time. Yeah, I didn't need it to shoot.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:20

Yeah, you know, no, no, no, I gotcha. Um, man, tons of interesting stuff, Brian. One thing I got if you do are we okay on time? You got five minutes? Yeah. Okay, yeah. The uh on the um cartridge size and recoiling side, we we got to touch on that because it's like it seems to be such a big topic. It's interesting how you frame it up because you seem to not frame it up by the pain of recoil and the flinch, you frame it up in in a lot of ways to this this distance, like the fact the the guns moving while the bullet's in there. And and you don't have to focus on that, but I mean, what are your thoughts on like cartridge choice and that sort of thing in terms of yeah?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:59

So I guess I kind of fall in the middle somewhere. Okay, you know, I'm I'm not a fan of the big cartridges, you know, just because they are hard to shoot. Sure. You know, and it doesn't has really nothing to do with how well I can how manly I am and how well I can handle recoil without flinching. Right. You know, it just has to do with the the physics of how much that gun is gonna move before the bullet exits the barrel, and the lighter the bullet versus the same weight a rifle, the less movement I'm gonna have. So the less finicky that rifle is gonna be about me being it'll be more forgiving of me being perfect, not being perfect behind it if it's a smaller cartridge. Yeah. You know, but yet there's some guys that take this all the way down to the six millimeters and the twenty-two caliber cartridges. I'm not I'm not quite in that that camp either.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:39

From a hunting perspective. Yeah, from a hunting perspective.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:41

I mean, I think, you know, I think like like if someone asks me, generally speaking, I'll tell them it's like, hey, if you're an elk and antelope or a deer and antelope hunter that might go hunting elk once or twice, yeah, like a six five PRC, you know, that's probably that best compromise for you. Yeah. You know, if elk is on the menu on a pretty regular basis, then I would really like to see you shooting a seven.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:01

You know, and then if you're hunting Alaska and moose and bears and stuff like that are in the mix on a pretty regular basis, then yeah, maybe the 30 cal for you.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:10

Yeah. You know, um do you have a strong opinion? I know like your guys' Nexus uh has a has a you know, you can switch the barrel on it and the bolt face and all that stuff. Um, so that's kind of a convenient way to do it. But outside of that, do you do you have a strong feeling about like trainer rifle, hunting rifle concept? Is is there a big downside to that?

SPEAKER_01 1:13:29

No, I I I always tell her everybody needs their hunting rifle, and everybody needs a six five Kriegmore to shoot coyotes and steel and whatever with that has you know similar scope and similar, you know, even if it's not the same gun. Yeah, you know, but just operate similar and is especially if they have the same scope on them.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:44

You know, because the ability to go out and practice with a six five creedmore is shooting in the wind and shooting coyotes and you know, shooting white tails, and I mean that's it's a pretty effective cartridge, really. Yeah. You know, people like to bag on it, and I think the reason it's so effective is because people generally speaking shoot it very well.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:57

You know, and so I mean, I've killed quite a few animals and I've seen a whole lot of antelope and deer killed with a six-five creedmore out to six or eight hundred yards. Oh, yeah, sure. It's a very effective cartridge. Yeah, but I think the fact that people shoot it so good. But if that's your practice gun, and then you have a similar hunting gun that you don't put a tremendous number of rounds through, obviously you gotta be familiar with it, but you don't burn that barrel up. Yeah, you know, I think that's the ultimate combination.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:19

Okay, yeah, yeah. I always I'm I've been asking everybody I talk to because it because that's what I I shoot a trainer rifle and a and then a and then a bigger rifle typically when I'm hunting, unless it's just a smaller, big game animal. Um, and I'm like looking for the downside. I mean, obviously the downside is cost money to have two guns. Yeah, but I mean that you know for most people don't really view that as a downside. So I'm always looking for like what's the negative of trainer hunting rifle? And it doesn't seem to be one.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:43

Yeah, I don't really think there is one.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:45

Yeah, good deal. Brian, I really appreciate your time, man. Do we miss do we miss anything? Do we miss anything?

SPEAKER_01 1:14:50

No, that was a great conversation. I enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:52

Well, where where can people follow you? I I see that you've been doing a little social media. I'm sure these guys have have been uh prodding you. I saw some shorts and stuff, but they're they're good stuff. I mean, where can people follow you?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:02

So it's uh on Instagram, it's at Long Range University. Okay. Spelled out. I don't think Long Range University has a Facebook page yet. I know we're working on it. Cool. And then obviously Gunworks is both on Instagram and social media. A lot of stuff that I put on Long Range University will get reposted on Gunworks.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:18

Okay, cool. So thanks, man. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:20

Thank you. Great time. Good deal.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:21

Thanks, Brian. Yeah, awesome. We covered some good stuff. Yeah, that was fun. Yeah, thanks, dude. If you enjoyed this content, do me a huge favor. Subscribe on whatever platform you consume it on. Spotify, Apple, YouTube, whatever works for you guys. Everything else is on my website, pursuitwithcliffe.com. Go there, and it's gonna be very apparent to you that I work my ass off just to not have a real job. All the hunts I guide, all the seminars I put on, all the unique experiences I offer and the membership site, all the details are there.