(SHOW EP17) Inside the Winning Strategy at Can-Am + Cactus Cup Preview

Jeff Geary joins the show to break down his recent Can-Am victory, including what was going through his mind during the match, how he approached the course of fire, and what it took to close out the win.
The crew also catches up with Clay after becoming a new dad, discusses gear and cartridge setups, shares stories from the road, and previews upcoming matches including the SAPRL Cactus Cup and King of Coal Canyon.
In this episode:
• Jeff's Can-Am match recap
• The mindset behind a winning performance
• Clay's return to competition
• Gear and cartridge discussions
• Match director insights
• SAPRL Cactus Cup preview
• King of Coal Canyon predictions
• Plenty of PRS banter, stories, and laughs
Whether you're a seasoned competitor or just getting started in precision rifle shooting, this episode is packed with match analysis, lessons learned, and a look at what's ahead on the PRS schedule.
Thanks for watching. Be sure to like, subscribe, and let us know your match predictions in the comments.

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

All right, hey everybody. Um, welcome to the show, the PRS podcast. And we're here without our director, Ken Wheeler. Where did he go? Did he quit the PRS? Is it just us now?

SPEAKER_05 0:13

Stay tuned and see. Can't wait to find out what's worse. Your Excel skills or the structural integrity of Jeff Geary's knee.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

Watch Beamer look completely incompetent trying to pick Canadians.

SPEAKER_03 0:24

Stay tuned for some awesome insight on the Sacrol Cactus Cup match.

SPEAKER_04 0:29

All right, all that and more. Uh thanks for tuning in and enjoy the episode. All right, here we are. How's it going, fellas? It's good. It's been a bit of an absence for me. Yeah, yeah. We need we need to talk about that.

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Jeff, uh it's uh going pretty well for me. Had a really nice weekend and it's continuing on and lasting uh uh another maybe couple days. So we'll we'll see how long it lasts. But it's um it was nice. I kind of needed that one, I think.

SPEAKER_04 1:04

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll get into it shortly. Um so first of all, let's address the elephant that's not in the room. Uh there's no Ken Wheeler here tonight. He uh he he thought that you know baseball with his children was more important than his PRS children.

SPEAKER_05 1:23

So the real story is ratings were down. We had to make moves, we had to get this thing back up. So that's that's true.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

Yeah, what if this one gets like a ton of views? Is he gonna be able to get his jersey back or is he he's out?

SPEAKER_05 1:36

Uh starting spots are not safe around here.

SPEAKER_04 1:40

Well, I've been picking up the slack as much as I could since you've been uh absent, Clay, but uh, you know, now now can now Ken just feels like he can hand over the reins to me and well see if we can't run this thing right into the ground tonight. Get the get the sponsors run out of here, piss off the ground. Yeah, yeah. Here you go, Ken. This is what you wanted. Right. All right. Well, let's let's let's start with uh getting everybody uh caught up with Mr. Clay Blacker. You've been uh you've been very busy for the past uh what is it a couple of months now? Is it one month now? How long has it been?

SPEAKER_05 2:20

Um it'll be eight weeks on Saturday. Um it's been uh it's been an adventure. I think it's the absolute coolest thing that has ever happened. I uh I mean, you know, the the paternity leave part was awesome, you know, sitting there like having like you know her napping on my chest in the morning. You know, that's what we do in the evenings, watching the Thunder game, which can you're welcome. I'm gonna be missing a lot of that um for this. But uh, you know, it's just been absolutely awesome. I wish I had a you know wish I had five of them by now. Well maybe not five. But I'm I'm I'm I'm a two-kid kind of person, but it's it's been a whole lot of fun.

SPEAKER_04 2:56

Well, you can always borrow a few from the truits if you need to.

SPEAKER_05 3:00

Yeah, they're not very far down the road. I'm sure they'd be happy to loan them whenever I need them. So uh you had a little girl. Right? Yep. Yep. What's her name? And uh she was born a little north of ten pounds. Um and uh whenever we were leaving the hospital, the nurse was like, Yeah, we're not gonna see another 10 pounder for many, many, many months. So um, and she's right at you know, probably getting pretty close to four now. Uh Merritt. Merritt?

SPEAKER_06 3:28

Okay. Two R's, two T's.

SPEAKER_04 3:31

That's a key name. Well, how'd you guys come up with that one?

SPEAKER_05 3:35

You know, I really don't have a uh a great answer for you. We you know, we talked about using um you know my grandmother's name. Um, you know, we just I I really don't even know how we how we landed on that one. We just we were really good at saying no to names, but we didn't really have a very big list of of what we liked. So it just kind of came down to to merit and and ruth and merit went out, and here we are.

SPEAKER_04 3:58

Heck yeah. Heck yeah. Well, that is amazing. Uh super happy for you, buddy. And uh I'm sure everybody listening back home is also so and uh not to mention uh you've been busy, so uh people have been out being able to get out and shoot and not have to worry about beating you.

SPEAKER_01 4:19

When are you gonna shoot your next match?

SPEAKER_05 4:22

Um next weekend at uh North Dakota.

SPEAKER_02 4:26

Oh you're going you're going to Ratown? No, to North Dakota. So we can have North Dakota. Okay. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_05 4:36

Haven't uh haven't shot. Yeah, that's the Northern Light one. Haven't shot since the uh since the Iowa match, and um we're gonna see what happens.

SPEAKER_04 4:48

Heck yeah. That is gonna be fun.

SPEAKER_01 4:52

Go put the podium streak onto the line.

SPEAKER_04 4:55

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:57

My good first, my good last.

SPEAKER_04 5:01

I doubt that uh you forgot how to pull the trigger badly while you're while you've been holding your daughter.

SPEAKER_05 5:08

I was gonna say it didn't take a whole lot of muscle nigger to do this.

SPEAKER_04 5:11

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm right there with you. I'm gonna have uh my bad motor skill now.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

Oh yeah, that how's that how's that finger doing?

SPEAKER_04 5:21

It's doing good. It's doing good. It I got my clean bill of health from the from the surgeon today, so I can return to duties.

SPEAKER_01 5:28

Yeah, when you went into that store even last weekend, I just saw the band-aid, and then as soon as you went in the store, it was like wow, this this completely took a different turn. I was just expecting you cut it on something.

SPEAKER_04 5:39

And yeah, that was Yeah, yeah. Infections are bad. Yeah, yeah, infections are bad, and um c 1250s can get kind of dirty and nasty. But uh anyway, uh so let's uh let's uh let's talk a little bit about uh uh this match that you went shot this past weekend. Jeff. Uh let's uh let's uh I'm gonna go ahead and share my screen and uh pull up the picks that we had. Uh this doesn't seem super important to the the story of everything anyway, but uh yeah, Mr. Ken Wheeler uh smashed us, picked uh Jeff for the wind, uh Josh Licky fourth, Keith Rudolph five. So not even close. This was this was Ken's note in the spreadsheet. He went ahead and added that in for us.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

But uh that's that's probably what I thought when I remember adding it up earlier in my head.

SPEAKER_04 6:40

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 6:41

So uh I can't I I obviously haven't seen all of them, but uh I'm not sure that he's put a knot even close whenever he's got his butt whooped. So seems like there might be a little bias.

SPEAKER_04 6:54

Yeah, I think so. I think uh I think he's real proud of himself for doing good, but uh you know that's what happens. Now that uh now that you're back on the show, Clay, maybe we'll get some more uh see I since you you pick you make your picks with statistics and numbers, and I I just pick from the heart. And uh, you know, that's how things have been making. I know it's been working out for me, okay, but we'll see if we get a little more accurate this week. But uh Jeff, why don't you go ahead and tell us about your match and uh how it went?

SPEAKER_01 7:28

Yeah, very unexpected. First match I can recall. Well, not first match, but going to where I I honestly did not think I had really a chance to win. I was I recently actually spoke to Clay about just trying to maybe have more fun shooting again. And I just had missed some of that and wasn't even sure how to do it, but I was like, well, let's just go have fun. I'm riding over there with a good buddy Tracy Smith, who he hadn't we hadn't shot together since October. So it was just fun to hang out with him, drive over, and and everything just felt real relaxed. Uh shot maybe 15 rounds on tune-up day just enough to know that data was good, never even shot a positional shot and went to bed just well, let's get out here Saturday morning. We'll we'll just kind of see what happens and uh look through the course of fire, and it looked pretty pretty conducive for for movement. So Shannon, obviously, I was joking with people. He obviously got the check I I sent him for the course of fire, but um that was a lie. It was I gave him cash. Uh yeah. Um but yeah, started out and and did okay. I I gave away one on on the second stage, misread kind of a prairie dog, which was uh kind of silly, bad mistakes, giving away one that early, super easy conditions, not much wind, so it's just kind of the typical couple tents left. Let it let it eat. If and um, and then yeah, went yeah, pretty good for the next few stages, got over to the 700-yard mover that's kind of up on the the the top section there. He has sort of a 700-yard mover and then a confirmation circle, and and I was worried about that one, dropped one wind change, so be it. Happy to get through that one, and and then got through unscathed. It was a pretty easy course of fire. It felt like uh a collis from a few years ago where the targets were kind of generous, and maybe he had a few enough small ones, 15 to 20 spread out with some KYLs and small targets, but for the most part, it it just wasn't all that difficult. You just uh it can you cannot afford to make any mistakes uh with wrong targets. Just you cannot do that there. And yeah, thankfully I was kind of in my wheelhouse as far as what I used to do grew up, or didn't grow up, but kind of got brought up on the scene at KM. I've practiced that range as much as anybody. So I've I just started feeling really comfortable, rifle shooting good. I can physically do this discourse to fire. So, you know, midway through day one, I was like, well, gosh, yeah, we might we we might be in this one. And if I can get through the top section, which has historically been kind of my downfall at the the very last few stages up top, but the targets were bigger this year, was seeing better, got through all that, and then I was worried, had to finish on uh stage two, which normally is kind of the the worst place to finish there. He would have the MOA circles at six, seven, eight hundred. He didn't have that this year. It was it was kind of a 908 rack and then a reset target at at 350. It was it was definitely a different course of fire. It had a a fast feel where you just needed to to shoot fast, think fast, make quick decisions to get through the course of fire. And and again, that's that's just kind of my my strong suit. So got done with day one and felt pretty good physically. I was I was beaten. He was was was bothering me, and I I must have looked pretty bad walking around with my stroller. I think every wife was offering, hey, can I can I help you? What what can I carry of yours? And oh, you poor. I think even a pregnant woman was offering to like push my stroller. Uh I was like, maybe she wants practice. I I uh or do I look that pathetic? Uh but the shooting part was was great and and got through that and and saw I was one back of KO. And I I just remember thinking, gosh, I'm I'm gonna have to clean tomorrow and KO is gonna have to give me two, even even to win. I'm I'm gonna have to clean the day. Never done that before, but I'm shooting the front side, I love the front side, that 1200-yard line, uh, and just kind of got going day two pretty early. And and it was just a weird day. I I actually look back at matches, and I think I've only had like four of these days ever where it just it just felt like I couldn't miss and everything was just happening and and slow motion. And yeah, so I I just felt like okay, well, I'm just not gonna miss. And I didn't even bother looking at the scores until we got to the last stage. It just it just didn't matter for for whatever reason. I was like, well, either Kale gives me two or he doesn't. Well, we're gonna find out. And then finally got to the last stage, and I remember seeing Kale, uh, Kale and Tungett came over, and uh that probably indicated that I didn't know if I needed to clean it, but I figured I probably did, and um, yeah, luckily was able to do that. I failed that at Gravestone earlier in the year when I had a decent lead, and Francis and Chad came came walking down right before I shot the final stage. And uh yeah, I still remember just sitting there and I fired on the last one, and I knew I was like, oh, it should have hit by now. And it didn't. And that was just a a crushing feeling, just that time. It felt like a 10 minutes of when I knew the bullet hadn't hit, and and that I you don't want that feeling again, so I was not about to miss one of those, and and it was only one, it was a troop line ipsy. We did far to near three three shots, maybe 850, 750, 650, say, and then there was a rack at 650, big to small. And the small one was probably it was still, I bet, over MOA, but it it you know required attention at least. So I you know focused on that one, and then the last shot also paused, so I needed three tenths left, and I was just like, one, two, three, three, yes, okay. Uh yeah, took a little extra time with that one.

SPEAKER_05 14:08

But I was gonna ask you if that's uh you think that was strategy, you know, them coming over thinking about gravestone or whether they were just coming to be supportive or watching or what was going on.

SPEAKER_01 14:18

I thought about that. I'm not quite sure. I'll I'll have to ask Kale about that. But um I I didn't know. They did not get on glass or watch. I think they just stood back there and and watched. I you know, I got I got no problem with with something like that. If I if that rattles if that rattles me, I mean, do I yeah, deserve to even win? So yeah, it was it was kind of fun. And then to see the to see the disappointment on Kale's face just warmed my heart a little bit as he walked away. Because I mean there's no denying the season he is he has had thus far. I mean, he basically won impact and a couple seconds on a skill stage away from winning all five of his matches that he shot. So I I I fully yeah, was aware of of the season he has, and then yeah.

SPEAKER_05 15:12

I'm sure you definitely don't have any uh any dogs in the fight trying to keep him from touching your win record.

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Yeah, definitely. No, I'd I'd remember calculating, I was like, wow, that would be neat if he had won Texas, and then he would be going for five in a row at collis, just like I did last year. And and so I was like, yeah, I gotta be there uh to try and stop him if I can.

SPEAKER_05 15:36

Uh you're just limping to the firing line thinking, like, gosh, like I just gotta do it myself. Nobody else is getting it done, so I'll go out and handle it.

SPEAKER_01 15:44

Yeah, yeah. The OK guy, y'all don't seem to shoot K and M as well anymore. So uh yeah, it's like I don't know who else who else is gonna come do this.

SPEAKER_05 15:55

So Yeah, if we'd have known that they changed stage two, you might I mean, I'm not gonna say you would have, but you might have got an oakie or two out there. But I mean, I I think that the only time that I've ever gotten above a three on stage two was uh the last year I shot him, which was twenty-four or whatever, with somebody else's gun, and I got a four.

SPEAKER_01 16:12

So it was nice to see that one go. And uh and he had a couple, there was uh the stage 20, he usually does like that speed bunker where you usually shoot just five quick shots, so then you can get down to stage one pretty quick. And he kind of did, he did a I think it was 60 seconds still, but it was like a thousand yards, or actually I had the math book, it was three incredibly it went out to almost 1200 yards, and with the time of flight, okay, yeah, 1079, 1123, and 1167. And it was just, you know, double tap, double tap, double tap the far one. But one when we got up there, the the sun had just come out, mirage. I mean, the the target back there was wiggling so much that we had a couple shooters get zeros, and and we're watching the last you could see the first one well, the second one deep pretty good, but the the last one, uh we had so many shots. I was like, man, what a I don't even know what I hate not to give a give a guy, but uh we're just not seeing anything. It it was tough. But some you did. It it was weird.

SPEAKER_05 17:20

Yeah, it's getting a sporty. Yep, uh pretty sporty.

SPEAKER_01 17:23

Yeah, well, that was probably the only one that I I'd say he probably would want that one back, but otherwise it was it was a fun course of fire. I mean, I I I like I do like the matches where you can drop quite a few and feel like you can come back, but sometimes I get a little lazy there, and it it's fun to be challenged to be perfect. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:44

Well, you guys were you down, was it three and four?

SPEAKER_01 17:47

Yeah, I dropped, yeah, three, three on day one, and then yeah, that was my first time yeah, ever cleaning cleaning a day. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 17:55

That's awesome. I guess I'm a little surprised that's your first time to clean a day. I figured you'd have done that, you know, half a dozen times or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 18:01

Yeah, Bushman text me that I was like, uh it's shocking, I know. Uh but yeah, I it's weird. No, I I'd always gotten close and somehow just blown it on uh on something near the end. So yeah, that was fun uh fun stuff, but yeah.

SPEAKER_05 18:17

Are you uh are you gonna be done for a little while now to let the the knee fix up?

SPEAKER_01 18:21

Yeah, I think I'm gonna I'm gonna take at least a month off whenever I need to look, whenever the twisted barrel matches. I think the scorcher thing, if that's still early July, uh I was gonna go to that. I at least now feel I can compete at the finale uh since it is at twisted barrel, just the way the way out there. If I can do KM, I can do their. So I've got a little more hope now going forward.

SPEAKER_05 18:50

Did you was that one of the matches that you tied for first at uh Twisted Barrel?

SPEAKER_01 18:55

Yeah, thanks thanks for bringing that one up. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 19:00

I was just trying to think of the times that you had how many times you'd shot it. Like you're obviously gonna be pretty comfortable there.

SPEAKER_01 19:05

Yeah, that was I've only got that was my only uh two-day match because yeah, last year I couldn't shoot it because I was, yeah, recovering from from a knee thing as well. So I I was I think 2024, and yeah, Caruso, he tied me. I dropped one on the last stage, mover stage, to let him tie me. And I knew he had me on the skill stage, so there's yeah. I assume do you uh kind of remember your bad sort of beats more than your good victories, or you stew on them every now and then?

SPEAKER_05 19:34

Uh not as much as I used to, but I mean I can pretty much tell you every shot that I've missed, you know, pick a stage and I can tell you, you know, some of them burn more than others, but um, you know, I just I was just curious how many times you'd shot it. That's you know obviously meant the style match.

SPEAKER_01 19:50

Just uh just two, one yeah, just one two-day match, and then uh uh I think the first ever regional match, Greg Bell was actually down there and put on that match and went and shot that. So yeah, I have not been there and yeah, so it'll be close to two years now, but it I like the layout. It seemed like it would fit me pretty well.

SPEAKER_04 20:11

Did you end up um running your your scope cam at uh KM? No, no, I took it.

SPEAKER_01 20:20

We we had a lot of rain in the forecast, and that's the one thing those trigger cams, I mean, not only does it kind of shrink your image a little bit, it gets a little darker. Trying to spot some of those berms at KM in the morning if it's rainy and and foggy. Uh no, no, didn't want that at all. So what did you end up running out there? I've ran a six-dasher with what it was 109 hybrids. I've historically kind of been a 105 guy, and and the new uh, I guess it's not newish, but one of the CRB barrels I got from from Austin uh a few months ago. Randy diplomat all three of them. I think this one's number two, and uh it's been been really good. Uh so I ran that one with with the six-dasher, yeah, 109, right at like 2835 or so. Yeah, I do have the the 25-dasher barrel I've got coming. I think it's in the mail. I'm anxious to just try that for fun, but uh I don't think I'll shoot anything other than the the six-dasher going forward. Yeah, maybe a six by 47 actually. Now one of those three.

SPEAKER_04 21:36

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

It's good to have options. And then that what's that one? I saw the 120, is it 120 burger that's uh coming out? Oh, I haven't seen that.

SPEAKER_05 21:51

Is that not supposed to be out? Yeah, it's probably not supposed to be out. There was somebody that uh made a Facebook post that probably should not have. So Realistically you know, it it it had probably kinda gotten out, but you know. What are you gonna do?

SPEAKER_01 22:05

Yeah. Well that yeah, that almost nullified it. Seemed like, well gosh, do I even need to do a twenty-five dash or if you can just shoot that at twenty seven fifty or to however fast you could probably get it versus so yeah, we'll see. But I don't even know when they're gonna be available for people like me. Clay obviously probably has some stuff to weigh.

SPEAKER_04 22:28

Yeah. Done lun done low development on about five or ten of them by now.

SPEAKER_05 22:35

Nope, haven't seen one in the real world, just heard about 'em.

SPEAKER_04 22:38

I shot one at uh STC a few weeks back. One of the Oki Precision guys brought one up. Felt like a dasher. Not a big difference. But uh, you know, probably got a little little slight advantage. It shoots as good. But I can't I think he said it was running just a hair over 2700 with a 135.

SPEAKER_00 23:03

So that seems uh yeah, that seems pretty quick.

SPEAKER_04 23:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 23:08

It does seem quick. You know, I run right at that speed with a 47 case, you know what I mean? Yes.

SPEAKER_04 23:14

Right.

SPEAKER_05 23:14

I mean, but I everyone seems to be running them around there. That I mean, the dasher case just does it just does that up. I mean, you know, I I saw a guy um a post the other day of a guy shooting a uh a six-dash when he's running 32 eight of Arget, and it was a box of his ammo, and it had like 25 or 30 pierced primers in there. He's like, Man, it's not a hot load. Um everybody in the comments is like, no, it's a very, very hot load. He's like, No, if it was a hot load, they'd all be piercing. It wouldn't just have happened after shooting 50 of them. He just wouldn't see wouldn't see reason on the deal.

SPEAKER_04 23:51

But yeah, I guess you'd find a way to justify things.

SPEAKER_01 23:55

Yeah, I started out, I think uh, you know, Shannon and Brian Allen were telling me loads, and I want to say it was like 33.1 grains of Argot in a Dasher case with a 105. I mean, going like 2975, and you know, they're they're the ones telling me this. I'm not I'm not really questioning it or anything, so I'm I'm running with that. And it's funny enough, you're here, Clay. I had that rifle that I was shooting at that speed, it would have been the 2019 MPA summer shootout that you won. You were the one that blew it with you day one.

SPEAKER_00 24:30

My rifle blew up.

SPEAKER_07 24:33

God dang it.

SPEAKER_05 24:35

I guess I didn't know that that was you. I just knew that a rifle had blown up on day two.

SPEAKER_01 24:40

Yeah, I was clean for that second day, and so I was like, well, we were tied, so I must be. I mean, I still had I was shooting the fist, so I would have had like another five stages to go, but yeah, I was I was getting all the red flags, I mean the heavy bolt lift, and I'm I'm running right through all my flags, and then poof, and uh yeah, it's funny because Patrick that Patrick Proctor was in that squad and he I remember him looking at my eye because I had a you know a bunch of powder that had kind of gone back, and I ended up, yeah, just I had a backup rifle, but I it didn't feel great, so I've I jetted home and went to the the ER to have it checked out, but I had no idea Patrick Proctor was like a cardiologist or something. I I would have given his analysis that it was probably okay more more weight had I known he was a doctor.

SPEAKER_05 25:37

You know, you say that, but a guy that uh gets caught stealing stuff off a prize table and cheating, you know, how how legitimate is that degree?

SPEAKER_01 25:46

This was like day two, I think, of knowing him. So I yes, that was yeah, looking back for sure. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 25:54

That that was actually the first match I'd ever shot A tips. Um they had just come out. Tate had been shooting them for a while, and I got some from uh Powder Valley, you know, got them delivered, and I didn't change anything on my seating stem. I didn't do any load development. I don't know how Tate convinced me to go to the match because that's not like my go-to maneuver. I like to have a gun that I know is shooting, and uh showed up and it just had the shot the tiniest groups at 2850, and I was like, okay, I think this'll I think this'll work, but I'd never gotten to run them out before. I don't I have no idea how he convinced me like that that was like what I needed to do. But that's what you needed to do. Wow. Sometimes sometimes you get lucky.

SPEAKER_04 26:36

Yeah, well that's that's all this sport is really, is just luck, right? Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 26:42

So uh so also if you say send me that trophy whenever you got time. I know you're busy, but at some point.

SPEAKER_05 26:50

Would you rather that one or the the the Peterson one that you were sending pictures of the other day?

SPEAKER_01 26:56

Ouch. Yeah, yeah, that was yeah, went through a little phase of looking at all the second place trophies. That one hurt.

SPEAKER_05 27:05

If it makes you feel any better, Jeff, I have the most second places in PRS history, so that makes you feel any better about that.

SPEAKER_04 27:13

That's a heck of a stat.

SPEAKER_01 27:14

Okay. I'm gonna have to count catalycs, but I could see by sheer volume you would have more, but percentage-wise of podium, so I bet he's got the highest percentage of seconds of podium of just podiums.

SPEAKER_04 27:32

Probably anyway, yeah. Well, uh let's uh let's talk about a match we got coming up this weekend. Um the uh Thunder Beast Arms Co. King of Cole Canyon that uh I am going out to help uh run with Derek Love. Which uh I'm gonna tell you guys right now that uh being a match director for three PRS matches in a year is a silly thing to do. And being a match director for two Pro Series matches that are two weeks apart from each other is an even sillier thing to do. And I don't recommend that anybody else does that.

SPEAKER_01 28:19

I've got a new appreciation for the I don't I hadn't really thought about from a match director's point of view as much as I probably should have. And after listening to Shannon last week, and and I I am absolutely gonna thank match directors much more than I have in the past. Uh yeah, that's a that's a massive amount of work.

SPEAKER_04 28:43

Yeah, there's a lot that goes into it. I've been getting bombarded with emails about both matches lately, and uh, I've got a giant project going on at work right now, so everything is just perfectly lined up um for chaos. But um we should have a a fun match for everybody coming up. Uh I haven't even looked at the weather, but usually it's pretty nice. I guess we'll just see what happens.

SPEAKER_01 29:09

Yeah, other than when it flooded that. I'm I'm I'm curious.

SPEAKER_04 29:12

That might I don't know if that would alter my picks, but yeah, the yeah, the the flood coming through that first year in 21 was fun. But uh I think that was like a hundred-year flood is what the the locals called it. So we should be good for a while.

SPEAKER_01 29:26

Oh, so the year the finale was out there, y'all had like a flood a few months before?

SPEAKER_04 29:31

Yeah, yeah. So the the the we've we've basically have the range set up into two separate it's all runs on the same firing line, but there's like a a west half and an east half. And um Yeah, weather looks good. There's a there's a creek that runs right. So basically stage one through twelve are on the east half of the range, and then there's there's a a big drainage, like a a creek that can drain through the middle of the of the range from that that year just came in and flooded and just completely blocked us off from stages 13 through 20. And uh we ended up just having to repeat the same stages on day two uh for the spring match, which you know it worked out because then all of those stages that we couldn't shoot were all fresh and brand new for everybody that uh that the finale that year. So but it was uh it was a fun thing to show up to. Like, oh hey, uh we can't shoot the other half of this this whole match that we set up, so uh let's figure out what we're doing here.

SPEAKER_05 30:43

But so is that what you're doing this year? The doing 10 stages twice?

SPEAKER_04 30:48

Uh no, no, yeah. So we're gonna run uh we'll start on the uh east side of the range and uh day one will be uh stages 11 through 20, which is um a little bit uh slower match flow. That's why I prefer to run that side on uh on day one. And uh that way if we have a little bit longer day, it's better to have it on day one than day two. And then on um Sunday we'll run stages one through ten. So everybody will shoot the same 10 stages um both days, which I know you prefer.

SPEAKER_05 31:21

Uh yeah, I absolutely do prefer that. I did give it some misinformation. I was told you were doing stages one through ten twice. Oh no, no, no.

SPEAKER_00 31:28

Doing the research, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 31:30

No, no, no, no. We well well originally Derek and I's plan for the match this year is we were gonna try to shorten up the firing line uh and and squeeze 20 stages in that same general area, like where we're where we run up to stage 14, but we just weren't able to get our schedules to align to get out there and and build a bunch of new stages. So we just you know freshened up as much as we could for this year and uh and sticking with the you know the the big firing line. So hopefully next year we'll be able to go out there and get some new stages built and uh you know tighten up the the the length, the like the physical length of the match so that we can make match flow better. And hopefully if we do that, we could also get some more shooters out there too to you know still have good match flow and and uh be able to host more people because the demand for the match this year has been up quite a bit. We've been sold out for like a month now and a bunch of people hitting us up wanting to sign up late and driving me up the wall trying to get in.

SPEAKER_01 32:38

What do you think made the demand kind of go go up just a couple good years word of mouth, or did y'all do anything differently or I uh yeah, I think I think a couple good years word of mouth helps.

SPEAKER_04 32:48

And um, you know, last year the weather was just like gorgeous and everybody had a really, really good time. And um and then it's a qualifier this year too, so that always helps.

SPEAKER_00 32:59

Sure. So like I recall there were some really cool trophies for like a few years too.

SPEAKER_04 33:05

Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, we used to have we used to have swords. That was uh that was a federal thing that uh that they that they did, but we haven't been able to quite recreate that. But we've got some really cool hardware uh this year that uh Thunder Beast, you know, uh help helped with and we got uh got designed up and uh I think they uh turned out really good. Should be sweet. Not as much of a you know deadly weapon, but if you if you've really you know tried, I think anything can be. Possibly.

SPEAKER_05 33:41

I I think you know I I wish I had a gun, you know, ready to go, because now that like now that we're here, I I really want to go shoot your match again. But I think that this is now gonna be realistically the first time that I've not shot at least one, if not two of your matches since I started shooting.

SPEAKER_04 33:58

Yeah, it's okay. I I don't hold it against you. You won't want to take a break from me after at some point.

SPEAKER_01 34:04

Yeah, I've really been wanting to shoot it too for the last couple years. It just it's it seems like it's always the week after the collis match, and it's just like, man, yeah, that the back-to-backs are that's tough. Yeah, yeah. I would still like to get out there. I hadn't been out there since the finale in 2021.

SPEAKER_04 34:22

Yeah, it's it's a fun match, man. It's it's always leading up to him like, why are we doing this match that's seven hours away from home? And then we get out there and it's like see the mountains and the scenery and and everything that that place has to offer. Like, oh yeah, this is why. And then we have to keep doing it every year. But uh should be a good time. But uh let's uh let's see if we can take a look at some of our uh picks. So it looks like we have everybody in here, so I'm gonna filter out. We'll go with the pros and the semi-pros. And let's go. A to Z. Alright, so we got Dylan Bailey. Uh let's see, we'll look through some of the names. Nick Barnard.

SPEAKER_05 35:19

Yeah, Barnard.

SPEAKER_04 35:20

Always uh strong pick. Mike Bird.

SPEAKER_05 35:23

Or are we doing it? This is a snake draft.

SPEAKER_04 35:26

Yeah, yeah, we'll we'll snake draft, but we'll just take a look through who we've got signed up here so everybody can kind of have a feeling. You guys can try to come up with some uh some names that you like. Uh Rich Caples, it will not be there. He just texted me today, so don't pick him. I know you guys were planning on it. But uh Sam from Thunderbeast, he's been shooting good. Uh Kyle Ferguson, Trey Flemings, Drake Graves. Yeah, Jake's been shooting well.

SPEAKER_05 35:56

Jake's been burning it down.

SPEAKER_04 35:58

Yeah, John uh John and Delicati. Definitely one to look out for. Morgan King. Morgan King will be there, as far as I know. He signed up like early in everything, so that's that's like the earliest sign-up I've ever seen for him. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 36:15

He almost signed up Thursday night to Friday morning.

SPEAKER_04 36:18

Yeah, well, Tate Tate texted me pretty early on and said uh he had a he wanted to get him a sponsor slot for Impact. So uh let's see here. Josh Longnacker. If I skip over anybody's name, please uh don't hold it against me. But uh Josh, yeah, Josh Longhacer, he could definitely do really well. Let's see. Greg Nagy shooting production. Miles Neville, he's he's shot pretty well at uh Box Canyon earlier this year. Mr. Austin Orgain. Have you talked to Austin Clay?

SPEAKER_05 36:52

I think he got back from New Zealand today.

unknown 36:54

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 36:56

Hopefully he'll be there. But of course, if he is, he's definitely gonna be hard to hard to uh not pick. Yeah, we'll see. Yeah, yep. Yep, Steven Plunkett. I think he's he's uh Okie Precision come to shoot.

SPEAKER_05 37:14

And they've done some really cool, you know, prize table stuff this year. I don't know how many people have seen it, but they've been doing the logos of the matches on barrels and putting the chamber barrels on the prize table. It's been really cool.

SPEAKER_04 37:25

Yep, yep, yep. He's he's got uh he's got uh a couple of those uh coming up for the prize table at uh Punisher Positional, actually. Nice. Yep. So uh here's Mr. Jake Schur, definitely contender, certainly for top senior.

SPEAKER_00 37:43

Jeremy Sanders, I think he shoots at twisted barrel, some he's pretty solid.

SPEAKER_04 37:48

Yeah, yep, yep, yeah, I think you're right. Yep. John Thornton, one to look out for for sure. Dwight Toth, Billy Traxer's been shooting really good. He's uh Josh Longenacre's uh little protege. Okay. Then uh Drew Turner, he's uh another uh twisted barrel guy, if I remember right. Uh Corey Vogus will be there, always a solid, and uh Mr. Shane Ward. So at least that's what our uh those are our pros and semi-pros. Now, of course, we could always have a marksman or amateur pull out something crazy, but harder to harder to know, harder to pick those names if you don't know them. That is a fact. But anyway.

SPEAKER_01 38:32

Is Travis Cohen? Is he in it?

SPEAKER_04 38:34

Travis Cohen.

SPEAKER_01 38:36

I he I he was on a list, it seemed like I was doing a smidge of research earlier, and I just remember writing that name down. But oh there it is right there. Okay, there he is. I guess I thought it was alphabetical, so that must be.

SPEAKER_04 38:52

Okay. Yeah. All right, well good. That's very good. Yep, he's in there. So um, let's see. Clay, why don't you go first since you've been absent for so long? How many were we picking? Um let's see, how many do we have here?

SPEAKER_01 39:09

Let me see how many names I wrote down first.

SPEAKER_04 39:15

This is our classified shooters. So dang it. Like four. Yeah, well, there's 130 shooters signed up. So I'd I'd say we do I think I'd say we do four. Okay. Four is a good number.

SPEAKER_05 39:29

Well, I'm gonna be a uh a dirty trader. Um he he might he might still be on that that haunting high. Um you know, in Bushman's half blind. Um I'm I'm grabbing Morgan for this one.

SPEAKER_04 39:40

Morgan. Dang it. Well, team, team impact anyway. So uh you go ahead and do uh you do two. Let me get Morgan off the list here. Ask it. We'll just we'll just remember. Uh what's your next one?

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Did you say Bushman? He's not he's not going, is he? Uh I don't think so. Okay, all right. I thought he's um I'll I'll I'm gonna have to take uh organ then.

SPEAKER_04 40:12

Oh, well I think screw it, we'll just do it that way. All right.

SPEAKER_01 40:16

Oh, sorry, was it going to you?

SPEAKER_04 40:18

Uh no, I think oops. I think uh I think the way we usually do this for snake draft is whoever's on the end picks two.

SPEAKER_05 40:26

Yeah, but I was on the beginning of it, so Okay. So I picked two. I figured you pick now.

SPEAKER_04 40:32

Okay. Well that's that's fair then. Works out for me. I guess it's the same either way, or no matter what we do, huh? Um let's see. All right, so Morgan and Austin already off the table.

SPEAKER_06 40:46

I'm gonna go. I'm gonna go gauge. And I will go Zane. Actually, that's right.

SPEAKER_01 41:05

Helps me out. I would have I would have picked Zane, but I've picked him like four times this year, and the four times I've picked him has probably been his worst like four matches, so it's probably better for him that I don't. So uh in that case, uh I'm gonna take uh Shane Ward. Shane Ward.

SPEAKER_06 41:26

Wait, is it S H A Y-N? I think I think Y-N E.

SPEAKER_04 41:34

Wards.

SPEAKER_07 41:35

Wards.

SPEAKER_04 41:36

Wards. Wards off the the wins is usually what he does.

SPEAKER_05 41:47

I think uh Josh Longenacer and J.

SPEAKER_06 41:51

Graves.

unknown 42:03

Okay.

SPEAKER_06 42:04

Jeff?

SPEAKER_00 42:06

All right. Uh can you scroll back? Maybe just give a quick little scroll through. Let me see. Scroll through.

SPEAKER_04 42:17

If you see one, holler.

SPEAKER_01 42:18

Oh, John, and Delicati. Uh yeah, I'll I'll gamble on John. Hopefully he travels well.

SPEAKER_04 42:25

Give me John.

SPEAKER_06 42:27

Okay. John and Delicati. All right.

SPEAKER_04 42:37

I am gonna go ahead and steal my local guys that have shot this match several times.

SPEAKER_06 42:44

Nick Barnard and Jake Sher. Don't let me down, fellas.

SPEAKER_00 42:53

Alright. I'll uh I'll take Reagan. Seems like I've seen some pretty solid finishes.

SPEAKER_06 43:02

Uh I think it's A, but I think there's an H in there just too.

SPEAKER_04 43:09

A lot of extra letters for no good reason.

SPEAKER_01 43:13

Yeah, that's that's that's one I would definitely get wrong trying to spell it.

SPEAKER_02 43:16

Yeah, but Clay, who you got rounding out?

SPEAKER_05 43:21

Did uh Austin Bushman drop out? What's what's going on with him? He he's not signed up. Really? Yeah, yeah, surprisingly enough. He's trying to convince me earlier this week to uh pick him up at Elk City and fly him out there. Oh really?

SPEAKER_04 43:37

Yeah, he's not he's not on the list unless he's shown up and didn't tell him tell anybody about it.

SPEAKER_05 43:45

Um I'm gonna go Travis. Travis Cohen. All right. And then can you give me that scroll again? I keep grapping, you know, for my mouse trying to scroll and then nothing happens. Well that's

SPEAKER_04 44:00

That's four. That's four for everybody. I thought you were sorry. I thought we were doing five for some reason. My bad. We could do five. You guys want to do five? Four's four's good. I'm good with it. Yeah, that's fine. We'll we'll keep her at four. All right. Well, let's uh let's we'll have to see what happens. And uh it should be interesting. Let's go ahead and uh pause and uh get uh our next match tractor on. So we're we're discussing uh that everybody going to this match needs to find uh some poutine somewhere.

SPEAKER_05 44:40

They do. That is absolutely what they what they need to get after as soon as they roll into Canada. That if they can find some progies, you know, get some of that as well. Um guessing most people probably don't know what either one of those things are. So uh poutines uh like french fries, and it's got gravy and cheese curds, and then they typically have all sorts of toppings, whether it's you know, jalapenos or bacon or ham or whatever, you can literally you know customize them any way you want. But bacon, um, or sorry, cheese curds, gravy, french fries, it's awesome. Um, and then poutine's kind of like a uh like a little dumpling. It's got like potato, cheese, and some other filling, and you boil them and then you fry them. And they're they're pr both pretty big staples for for Canada land.

SPEAKER_04 45:28

There's a really weird band that I discovered recently called uh Angine Des Portrains. Wow. That's um that's me trying to say it in my best French, uh my best French accent.

SPEAKER_01 45:43

I wouldn't even know how to look that up right now.

SPEAKER_04 45:47

How did you stumble atop this? How did I stumble? A buddy of mine showed it. Here, let me uh let me share my screen so you guys can see what the hell kind of nonsense this uh this band is. So they they're really weird. But you don't say yeah, but uh they wear these these goofy outfits, but uh I don't know. For people that are music nerds, they uh they would find it. That ain't me. Quite intricate, quite interesting. I do anyway.

SPEAKER_01 46:22

But uh are you a music nerd, Clay?

SPEAKER_05 46:25

Uh nope. If I'm if I'm driving, like I'll pick you know a song and I'll just you know let Apple decide what plays next. Whatever genre, whatever song I think is gonna play is what's coming on.

SPEAKER_01 46:38

Yeah, I'm I'm just kind of whatever as well.

SPEAKER_04 46:42

Uh if anyone's interested in in checking them out, watch this video right here on YouTube and then go to the comments because they're hilarious. It's just like no way they wouldn't be hilarious just by the it's just it's it's really interesting because like the drummer's really good. I I used to play the drums, so I find it interesting. Maybe Nick Kadarzi would.

SPEAKER_01 47:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 47:07

Yeah, and so and then this the guitarist is playing this dual-neck guitar that's got a whole crap load of microtonals.

SPEAKER_01 47:14

Could you imagine like Clay dressing like that, shoot shooting? I mean, you you better win.

SPEAKER_04 47:19

Yeah, yeah. You know, if it would held any more targets, I would show up like that. Yeah, yeah. Uh, but anyway, they're uh fair enough. Yeah, I'm I'm with you. It's really interesting. And some uh and then you know, some Canadian uh culture.

SPEAKER_01 47:38

I'll I'll I'll give that a look later if I can remember.

SPEAKER_04 47:41

It's it's it's an interesting listen. There's Tyler. How you how you how you sounding this time? It's all good.

SPEAKER_03 47:50

It's all jacked up now, though.

SPEAKER_04 47:52

But hey, well, it sounds like you're coming through clean this time. Yeah, sorry about that, guys.

SPEAKER_03 47:58

I gotta get started.

SPEAKER_04 48:01

We were just talking about uh a Canadian band. Well, we were talking about some Canadian some Canadian culture things that people need to check out. Okay, what do you got? Yeah, Clay was saying that everybody coming up there from the States needs to find somewhere good uh to get some poutine and some pierogis. What do you got? What do you got nearby?

SPEAKER_03 48:22

Poutine. Well, actually, Costco is actually a pretty good poutine, honestly. Yeah. Um man, there's there's tons of food trucks that actually just bomb around too, just slaying poutine out the window. And uh yeah, I can't even really think pro geese. Man, I make those at home. No, there you go. Nothing better than homemade progies.

SPEAKER_05 48:44

I guess it's so annoying to make them. It's such a process. It's one of those things where you torture your whole family and you just everybody does it all day long so that you don't have to worry about it for another year.

SPEAKER_03 48:56

Yeah, kind of like making sausage. Yeah, yeah, it's about have a sausage party and get the whole family together. Perfect. Sounds like a good time, right, fellas?

SPEAKER_04 49:07

Yeah, yeah. All right. Well, um, so first of all, forgive my ignorance. Tell me what SAPRL stands for.

SPEAKER_03 49:19

Southern Alberta Precision Rifle League.

SPEAKER_04 49:21

There you go. All right. I don't feel so bad because you had to think about it for a second, too.

SPEAKER_03 49:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:27

All right. So uh so uh yeah, tell us uh tell us about uh your match coming up and uh what people can expect.

SPEAKER_03 49:35

Uh yeah, so uh cactus cups been around for seven years now. Uh PRS sanctioned for the last this will be our second year. Um we've changed locations actually too. So we're uh down towards the South Saskatchewan River, lots of big uh river valleys, lots of rocks, lots of elevation. Um what shooters can expect from this year's cactus cup is hopefully uh balance and a little bit of uh how would I put it?

SPEAKER_06 50:09

Difficulty.

SPEAKER_03 50:10

Um we're we're doing uh doing big small engagements are gonna be a big part of it this go-around. Yeah. So uh you gotta make sure that your gun's on and you're on. And like when I say small, it's not small. Like we're still talking four tenths, right? But the wind out there gets pretty, pretty hairy. We're all it's natural to be 10, 20 mile per hour out there consistently.

SPEAKER_05 50:35

So has there been a match at that location before?

SPEAKER_03 50:39

Uh yeah, in that general area, but we've actually shifted down a ways because how our firing line used to work was we used to close the road. Once you were in there, you were kind of locked in there till day's end because of the firing direction. But this year we by pushing it closer to the South Saskatchewan River, we can get farther distances so now we can have a more balanced force of fire and then keep that road access open as well. So now spectators can come and go, family can come and go. We don't have to shut down and open the gate to bring food in. It'll hopefully just flow a lot better.

SPEAKER_01 51:11

How's the how's the weather kind of looking for this weekend?

SPEAKER_03 51:16

Oh man, saffral curse this year. Holy. Every match that I put on has either been snowing, raining, or this this weekend's supposed to be thunderstorms uh coming and going. But it's it's like 40% chance. So just kind of gonna play it by your ass.

SPEAKER_05 51:34

That's 100%.

SPEAKER_03 51:36

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you kick a weekend, it's gonna turn to shit, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:42

Although funny enough, last weekend our forecast early on was I think 75-80% kind of storms, and it gradually went down, and we had a beautiful Saturday and just maybe a little bit of rain Sunday. So, does it is it possible it it changes up there? Gets a gets changes.

SPEAKER_03 52:00

So yeah, like we we've gotten snow and we're getting snow, rain, we're getting all four seasons in one day up here right now. That's actually ridiculous. So, yeah, it could definitely change. I'm not gonna really worry about it until probably Thursday. I'll start really sweating it. But again, like Sunday, it's just supposed to be like light rain. Saturday, we might get a little bit of more rain and then possible thunderstorms, but we'll see. Play it by ear, set up some tents, and if we have to, we'll change things accordingly if we gotta.

SPEAKER_04 52:30

Yeah. So for safety. Yeah, I always gotta just have a have have an idea, maybe not a at least an idea, if not a plan, when stuff goes sideways. But sounds like you're uh you're on in shape to have uh more sporty weather than I usually do at Box Canyon.

SPEAKER_03 52:49

Yeah, like and we we build the course of fire expecting the wind to show up. And if if the wind doesn't show up, then guys just gotta be on their A-game and not miss a shot. Yeah. Then everything, everything counts, right? Trigger pulls. And in our new location, too, actually, target acquisition is gonna be uh a tricky one too for some guys. So just because of the way that the targets are are laid out within the rocks. So we paint we paint all our targets gray for our pro series matches, and then our T our T posts are painted a different color, so that helps to differentiate by each stage. And then another way so that I don't have to use target placers is every stage in a different shape. So then one stage will be diamonds, one stage will be circles, truing bars, so on and so forth, so that it helps differentiate.

SPEAKER_05 53:46

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 53:48

Guys are asking for them. I'm like, all right, whatever. Are they really? Oh yeah, well they go down to the States and they see these square, these uh rectangles in different ways, and they're like, oh, we gotta shoot those. I'm like, sure. So whatever minutes guys are asking for them. Uh two-minute bars. Okay, yeah, sounds like that. Yeah, because the the big uh the big stressor for this this match is gonna be planning, uh stage planning before this before you get on there. Bipod height's gonna be a huge one, um, and just target acquisitions. So I just didn't want to really constrict guys with uh a tighter a tighter time.

SPEAKER_05 54:30

Do you have some like high angle stuff, or is it just like that you're on uneven terrain, so you really gotta work on the bipod? Both. Both.

SPEAKER_03 54:38

I I was I was proofing it, and there's actually a couple stages where I had to scrap a couple ideas. So there's just too much going on here. Yeah. But uh, because I I actually how I get my center fire practice in is I'll shoot my whole course of fire before the uh actual match, go through it and then tweak everything as I as I go. And yeah, there's there's definitely two stages where I was like, I can't do this. This is just nutty.

SPEAKER_05 55:01

This to me is the worst part about the podcast is you know, you hear about matches like this and it's too late to do anything about it. Like, you know, like if this if if this was done like a week ago or two weeks or three weeks, or like we built them up and then released them, I think we could get you know some more people going to matches that they might not ordinarily go to. The same thing happened on the Arizona match to me. It sounded awesome. You know, this one you got me excited. I'll do some furry bars to go shoot some time a lot of bipod.

SPEAKER_03 55:30

Yeah, it's it's only one stage. Only one stage.

SPEAKER_05 55:33

And yeah, it'll be good. The rest of that sounds sounds awesome. You know, it's stuff that you don't get to do very often. Yeah, I wish that I knew about it, you know, a month ago.

SPEAKER_03 55:43

Oh man, it's it'll hopefully be there next year just waiting for you, Clay. All right, because yeah, it's it it'll be a it'll be a good time. I don't want to give too much away. I there's we got some high round count stages too, just for like shits and giggles. Because I don't like making a mandatory mag change on a stage. If I want you to mag change, I'd rather make it a 12 or a 14 round and then make you make him change that mag.

SPEAKER_04 56:09

So yeah, you guys uh are limited to 10 rounds up there.

SPEAKER_06 56:15

Yeah, we can do 12.

SPEAKER_04 56:16

Oh, you can do a 12-round mag? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 56:19

Oh yeah. Yeah, we're good up here. That's good. Um, especially with Alberta too, or like the Texas of Canada right now.

SPEAKER_04 56:25

Oh good to well, I guess uh I maybe that that explained if you're the Texas of Canada, yeah. Uh you do you have cactuses up there? Oh yeah. So that's that is not that is not what I would have expected. But I would have lost that met.

SPEAKER_03 56:41

Oh, well that the the way that the reason it's called the cactus cup was back in 2017 when the original uh duo that started SAPRL, they hosted an event down like literally down by the river, and there was so much cactus it was actually became a safety concern. Oh, geez. So much. So now we can't actually host the match down there anymore. We have to go, we're up on the the top of the hills now, shooting down into that kind of stuff. But when you go down there to set up targets, it's it's dicey.

SPEAKER_04 57:10

So now tell me you've got some cactus targets too, right?

SPEAKER_03 57:15

No, I got sound scatches. They're flipping me off. That's all right.

SPEAKER_04 57:20

That that that makes up for it. That makes up for it. Yeah, maybe you need to get some get some cactus targets and then set them among cactuses next year. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 57:29

You get weird shape targets like that, and then guys start missing them, and they're like, oh, I want circles and squares and diamonds. I don't want any of these goofy shapes, right? Because I was gonna run snakes, I was gonna run snakes one year. I started shooting them out at my my range that I have up at my place, and I'm like, these are dirty. That's a nasty target.

SPEAKER_02 57:46

Yeah, I didn't even click on my whole life all of a sudden.

SPEAKER_03 57:50

Yeah. I don't I don't want guys that I don't want guys to hit targets out of luck. I want it to be yeah, skill.

SPEAKER_04 57:57

I like I like some funny shapes and stuff like that. If it's if it's just like you know, a fun stage. It's not like a this is not gonna be a deal breaker. All you have to do is not be an idiot and then you'll be fine, kind of a deal. But yeah, snakes might be rough.

SPEAKER_05 58:12

As the guy who has inside out T whales at the match coming up this weekend.

SPEAKER_04 58:18

Hey, it's not even it's not even at 400 yards, so it's fine. You'll be you'll be a hundred percent okay. I will be because I'm not gonna be there. It's no if your gun's shooting good, then all you you've got uh you've got a mill wide target that uh that's one inch tall. That's uh that's one inch as tall. It's no big deal.

SPEAKER_03 58:41

That sounded easy until you spend an inch.

SPEAKER_04 58:44

I think it's like two inches, all right. Trying to make me out to be the bad guy. But uh people I'd feel we always we every single year on that that goofy whole TYL, we have somebody tell me that, oh man, that was so much fun to shoot. Probably the one guy that cleans it, but but I'll take the positive reinforcement nonetheless. Um so uh looks like you've got a pretty uh a pretty good turnout signed up for the match, got 104 registered. How is that?

SPEAKER_03 59:22

Yeah, we've had a couple dip in so far. Yeah, got a drop two guys today. We were at about 106, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:28

How how is that for you uh historically for turnout?

SPEAKER_03 59:32

Pretty good. Pretty good. The biggest uh SAP roll ever had was I think around 110 one year. Um, but that was like right after COVID. Everything was kind of everybody had that itch to get back out there, and then yeah, so this is getting up there for sure.

SPEAKER_04 59:48

Heck yeah. Well, let me uh let me get my spreadsheet pulled up and uh we'll start talking about some picks.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:00

See uh all Canadians. Are you guys gonna know?

SPEAKER_04 1:00:02

No, you're gonna just I guess in theory, uh in theory, you got you should just crush us. Um because you because you know everybody.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:13

Just get all we gotta do is not have him on the show next week and we just block out his picks and nobody knows.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:19

Yeah, yeah. Well, I'll probably lose internet connection again.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:22

Yeah, don't jinx it. Yeah, well we'll uh let's see. Let me get here. We go.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:30

I assume most people are kind of flying in Canada, or are there a fair amount of local people, or how far away?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:39

Lots of guys will actually just drive it. Um we get guys all the way from Manitoba, DC, and they'll just come in and drive usually. Not not many, I don't think many are flying.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:51

Yeah, I guess they're probably pretty used to driving great distances if they do this there.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:57

Yeah. Yeah, because we have such a large spread in Canada because it's such a big landmass. Um we're all used to driving 12 hours for a match. Like I'll be at the MDT match here in two weeks after ours and driving. He just stop take a hotel. And yeah, I don't think I don't think many guys are flying.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:19

Can you guys uh read this at all? Yeah, okay. Well, uh not a ton of classified shooters at this one. We need to get uh get more guys uh signed up for PRS memberships up there in Canadia.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:38

Yeah, slowly it's it's happening. It's happening slowly.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:42

So we got our pros here. Brian Neiss, Chris uh Hoggin. I'm not sure how to say that. Nick Geb Nick Gebhart shooting open. That'd be a strong one. Noel Greasley, he's a good shooter, and Tyler Beckley shooting production.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:00

Oh kind of.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:00

But uh we've seen plenty of production shooters uh come out strong. Then uh here we go into not knowing anyone else. Jesse Jesse Gebhart.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:17

Yeah, yeah, the Gebhardts, this is actually gonna be their second year coming up. It's been pretty sweet uh seeing those guys making the making a trek up here.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:25

Yeah, how about our how about our uh our marksman shooters? Anything you can tell us about them?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:31

Uh well Billy Redpath actually won top marksman at KM just last weekend. Oh, there you go. So there's a guy to watch out for.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:42

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:44

Uh some good distance he's covering.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:47

Yeah, no. He's that dude's nuts. I don't know how if he's gonna be married by the end of this year, but he's doing like 20-something pro matches this year.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:55

So wow, that's you're dealing with a record, I guess.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:00

Oh yeah. Um, well, let's let me see. How many are we picking? Uh well, what do you guys think? You want to do three or four? One. One if I get to pick first. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:16

I'm good with I'm good with three or four. Whatever. Three? Okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:21

All right. Well, traditionally we let the match director go first. That might be a great advantage on this one. It might be a good time to get that traditional.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:31

I feel like I got it. Um, are you sure you want me to go first still?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:36

It depends on who you pick. I'll let you know in a second.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:41

If we're going left or right right now, I really don't like the order. Um I'm hating the order a lot.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:47

Yeah, yeah. Well, we could go alphabetical right. If we go alphabetical, then you know, we can start here.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:58

Yeah, we gotta we just gotta get some more guys coming up to Canada to shoot these matches, man. They're awesome. Yeah, yeah. Um but yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:06

Alberta's really pretty. You know, it's I mean, it's one of my favorite provinces. It's just one of the things.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:17

Fortunately, I've never been cool too. Can you name like three other provinces off the bat like? I can name all of them if you want me to. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:24

No, no, that's fine. I believe you. Let's not say we did. I've worked I've worked in like seven of them. Okay. Um, well, let's uh let's just let's give Jeff a first pick since he's uh he's the the winner of uh a Cam.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:42

That's fair. I'll take that one then. Yeah. All right.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:44

Well I'll I'll take Noel. Noel? Yeah. Uh where was he? You sly dog.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:53

I knew that's who you were gonna pick, too. That's what everybody was gonna go for. Yeah. There's some underdogs though.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:00

Yeah, I shot with Noel probably, I think, 2023 out of Cameo, and yeah, he was immediately one of those that just like struck my eye, and I started watching. I was like, okay, this this guy's gonna be good if he wants to be. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:13

God dang it. I don't know who this is.

unknown 1:05:16

I don't know.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:17

Where's Tanner at? Where's where's Ryan McClain at? Like, where's where's our guys?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:24

I don't know where Noel is and how to spell his name. Grease NOW. Oh Grease.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:32

Okay. God dang it. Where's Ken when we need him?

SPEAKER_03 1:05:44

Yeah, like some some other hints for you too. Like uh Darren Whitehead's a solid production shooter too. He won production um all over the body.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:52

I know that name, yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:54

Um Corson Piper just won. Which one?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:58

Uh short act.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:03

Yeah, yeah. So Whitehead was there, he got top production. Um, Beckley's a solid production shooter. Jeff Jeff Scoby is a solid open shooter as well. Chris Hoyen. I'm just throwing his names out there, guys. You just take your pick.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:16

Yeah. I'll pick last. You can um, which okay. In that case, I'm gonna go with Brian Nees.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:28

Brian Nees backed out today.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:29

Ah, well, I wasn't done typing. I wasn't done typing.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:33

Uh I wish you had gone ahead and picked that one because I don't know how you guys are gonna do it, but whenever we do it in my draft, if somebody that was picked ends up dropping out, everybody loses their pick from that slot. So we could have just neutralized Noel right off the bat. Yeah, that's uh that's not a big thing. I don't know if that I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:52

All right. Well, I I went ahead and stole Nick Gabhart then because I wasn't done done done.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:57

Did you do me a favor and sword throws my throat for me?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:00

Yeah, yeah. So next, these guys are done. Uh God bless. Where is anything?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:12

I mean, I'm gonna go with Tyler because I I I don't know enough of the guys, production or not, we're going with it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:07:19

Yep. Yep. Oh, God. Yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:25

I gotta get I gotta get my freaking gotta get my l lines back.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:30

This is gotta be like the hardest draft ever, eh? It's pretty hard. It's pretty hard. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:35

This is all Kinsley. Everybody's probably tuned out by now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:40

Alright. Uh there you go, Tyler. You're up. Okay. I'm gonna go with You get two. Oh. Two? Oh, wait, hang on.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:50

Clay, you get two. Because you're on the end. Yep. Yeah, but I wasn't the last pick, so it's gonna be uh Tyler who gets two. Yeah, Tyler gets two. You guys, you guys are the experts.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:02

I'm gonna go Jeff Scoby and Chase Beckley.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:08

Scoby.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:09

I was waiting for him to throw out like Rusty.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:12

I'll take in Rusty Omer. He just called and said he's coming. Chase Beckley? Is that what you said?

SPEAKER_04 1:08:18

Yes, sir. Probably spelled that close enough. All right. Um Jeff? Yep. It was one of the things. You need me to sort again?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:30

Yeah, sure. I thought there was yeah, go pro, I guess.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:33

Pro CinemaPro, Marchman.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:36

I thought there was one other name I remember recognizing though. Oh, we mentioned Red Path. Maybe I should gamble and go Red Path.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:46

No, Darren, I'll take Whitehead. Let's let's do. Uh Darren White.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:53

Yeah.

unknown 1:08:53

I'll take it.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:56

Because someone else took Chase back. Yeah, he's gone. All right.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:59

God dang it. I gotta bring everybody back in so I don't screw up the order of everything over here.

SPEAKER_06 1:09:06

Alright. Darren. Off the off the board. Okay. Now it's me. Oh god.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:20

As you can see, we're trying to grow the sport up here. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:23

Well, you know what? Hopefully, uh, hopefully uh after this uh this this match we get some more guys up there. Uh let's see.

SPEAKER_06 1:09:35

Jesse. I'm going with the other Gebhart. Just because it's a name that I recognize. All right.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:46

Nate Wiggins. Nate Wiggins. Do you see him on the screen? There he is. Yeah. Perfect.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:52

Oh, he's shooting tack. I didn't even realize that. I thought he would be shooting it with a cool.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:55

Well. I mean, I haven't put it in yet. What are the rules? But you did say it. I mean, a card late is a card plate. Yeah, there you go. Here, here's some filtered filtered names to look at.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:10

There was look here. You take red take red hat.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:14

Chris Hofyan, he's a pro. Gotta be solid. Right here. There you go.

SPEAKER_06 1:10:18

Okay. I don't know if that's how you say his name, but. Oh, god dang it.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:26

I would have turned this podcast off dozen dozens of minutes ago. Soon as all of this crap started. It's it's up to Ken to edit.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:37

It's not our problem.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:38

Yeah, I'm I'm hoping only that now that people are entertained by my complete incompetence.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:47

This is the PRS comedy hour now.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:49

Yeah. Yeah. Alright. Uh Jeff? Tyler?

SPEAKER_02 1:10:55

I don't know this turn it is.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:57

I'm gonna wait until someone tells me it's my turn this time. It would be Light my sleeper. All right.

SPEAKER_06 1:11:03

All in all, let me scroll.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:05

Scroll to the right, Beamer. I didn't see your name. Oh, wait, or is it my turn? I have two.

SPEAKER_06 1:11:13

It's all right, beamer. Just roll.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:17

Jeff, you go and then I'll go, and then Tyler can bring us home. We'll end this this shit show at three picks. Alright. I'm gonna take Red Path.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:27

What was it, Billy?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:29

Uh I thought he was already picked.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:32

I don't think he was.

SPEAKER_06 1:11:35

I thought I could have sworn I heard. Well, maybe I'm just confused for hearing that name. Where is it? There he is. Alright. And then, okay, I'll go.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:50

And uh need to see who is left. I'm just gonna. So he's off. Tyler, Tyler's picked, isn't he?

SPEAKER_01 1:12:00

Yeah, I think both Beckley's were done.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:03

Uh is Nathan McDonald picked?

SPEAKER_06 1:12:08

I don't think he's been picked yet. We're gonna go with that. All right. Tyler, bring us home. For the love of God. I'll go with uh Darren Nagle. Darren Nagle. Where's I shoot the guy often. I can put a lot of pressure on him now.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:42

There you go. Perfect. Pressure uh makes diamonds, right? That's right. Awesome.

SPEAKER_05 1:12:49

Oh gosh. Ken would not be impressed with your excessness right now.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:54

I uh I don't I don't care. Ken Ken saddled this uh this burden on a lame horse, and uh this is what he gets. Yeah. Speaking of the lame horses, Jeff. No.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:15

I did. I probably like I almost started avoiding people because it was the obvious conversation starters. I had at least 80 people come up, well, how many houses? So it's like I get it, but man, it it was getting old just talking about it. Yeah, yeah, I bet.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:35

Well, uh Tyler, we hope uh we hope the match is uh gonna go extremely well for you. And uh everybody uh has fun and you don't have a community. Yeah, yeah. I hope you don't have any target failures.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:51

Oh, don't put that on me, dear. It's a hope. It's a hope. I'm sorry, I'm knocking on the we got we got a we got a crap ton of AR500 T posts out there.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:00

All right, yeah, you should be good then. Oh yeah. All right, well, um I think that uh I think we'll wrap it up here. Uh thank you guys for uh coming in and chatting with us, and we'll see you next time.