What Serious Shooters Look For In A Scope

In this episode, we sit down with Marcus Olson to discuss the growth of precision rifle shooting around the world, the role of the International Precision Rifle Federation (IPRF), and what it takes to build world-class optics.

Marcus shares insights from his work with the IPRF, helping grow precision rifle competition internationally, and explains why organizations like the IPRF are critical to the future of the sport in many countries.

We also take a deep dive into Zero Compromise Optic (ZCO), covering:

• How ZCO was founded
• The philosophy behind "Zero Compromise"
• Touring the manufacturing facility in Austria
• Scope durability and return-to-zero testing
• Optical clarity and low-light performance
• Competition vs hunting optics
• What separates premium optics from budget options
• Why elite shooters trust their equipment
• The future of precision rifle competition worldwide

Whether you're a competitive shooter, hunter, optics enthusiast, or simply interested in the growth of shooting sports across the globe, this conversation offers a unique look inside one of the industry's most respected brands.

#PRS #PrecisionRifle #ZeroCompromise #ZCO #LongRangeShooting #IPRF #PrecisionRifleSeries #Optics #Hunting #CompetitionShooting

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Stand by.

unknown 0:02

Shoot it. Stand by.

SPEAKER_01 0:09

Welcome to another PRS podcast here with my good friend Marcus Olson. Um man, Marcus, why don't you give an introduction to yourself and then we'll talk about how uh how long we've been friends and all the things we've done together.

SPEAKER_02 0:25

Um well, as Ken said, uh Marcus Olson, I work as a what some would consider a sales director with Sura Compromise Optic, and uh I cover everything that is not North America because it's as many of you know, Sura Compromise is partially owned by a North American gentleman residing in Orofino, Idaho, and he covers his own market, and I take care of a lot of other markets.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

The rest of the world. That would be. It's uh a little disingenuous to try to fill that role.

unknown 1:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09

Yeah. Well, I mean, I can, you know, say some things that would sound German, but I wouldn't get many sales done.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Um so you've been a shooter for a long time, right? Uh let's let's let's start there. Let's start there with some of the uh background. You've you've you've been shooting for a long time and uh uh talk about some of your experience there.

SPEAKER_02 1:31

Uh yeah. I mean I started competitive air rifle shooting when I was as old as you are when you start with air rifle shooting, like what, six, seven, something like that. Uh been hunting for in my family for generations, and that I picked up that naturally at a very young age. Uh younger than I would like to openly speak about for certain alleged reasons. Sure. Um but uh got into shooting started getting pretty into uh fox calling when I was like 18, 19, something like that. Okay. And uh dropped every one that would get inside of you know 200, 150, something like that. Sure. Uh but those f uh eventually, you know, you shoot as many as you can that get into those distances, and then it's like man, that one's at 350, it's a little too far away. Better learn how to shoot better. And uh went to the local 300 meter range, started from there, and then went abroad, uh worked cattle in Australia with my my ex-girlfriend, my now wife.

SPEAKER_01 2:40

That joke is you know he referred to your now wife as your ex-girlfriend?

SPEAKER_02 2:44

Yeah, well that it's it's true. Like she's my now wife. She's my ex-girlfriend.

SPEAKER_01 2:48

You're not wrong.

SPEAKER_02 2:48

I'm not wrong.

SPEAKER_01 2:49

I uh maybe I'll maybe I'll start referring to Mitzi as that to see how she she likes it. Maybe I'll introduce her as that, as my ex-girlfriend.

SPEAKER_02 2:56

This is my ex-girlfriend.

SPEAKER_01 2:57

And I'm my ex-fiance.

SPEAKER_02 2:59

Yeah, I'll yeah, that'll probably go great. No, and and anyway, so I went down to Australia with uh with Anna, my wife, and we worked cattle there for a while, and there was a lot of uh pest control um different types of animals that you need to get rid of to optimize uh you know the amount of gracing you can get on the herd.

SPEAKER_03 3:24

Cool.

SPEAKER_02 3:25

And uh um started shooting long range there and I shot my first comp actual competition, uh, which was a thousand yard bench fresh bench fresh match.

SPEAKER_03 3:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 3:36

In Australia. And uh yeah. And then I got back home, got into more like field style matches. This is 14 years ago, 15 years ago or something. Okay, so 2011. 2011, 12, something like that. Yeah, something like that. And then um got into what is now called uh precision rifle. Okay. Okay. And um it's um a little addicting.

SPEAKER_01 4:00

Yeah. So you're in Sweden. Um what is what is the precision rifle scene like in Sweden? Like uh as it is today. And like I I guess how how long did it take to actually develop?

SPEAKER_02 4:14

Uh so this is like we started uh there was what would be considered precision rifle at the time, as you remember, the the the pre-game changer era of things. Oh my gosh. There's a pre and a and a post. Uh well yeah. The the the style of shooting changed dramastically afterwards.

SPEAKER_00 4:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:33

But before there was more of, as you know, the like the tactical matches as they were referred to. Uh and then we picked up precision rifle with in its current format around 2000, I would say 15 or something.

SPEAKER_00 4:47

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 4:48

1516, we picked that up and started, and then we at the same time I started uh well there was the only the one match and then which my buddy hosted, and I was like, man, I want to shoot more of these. But there weren't any. And I thought, well, if I host a match, maybe others will also host matches. And uh if you build it, they will come. Yeah, and I became a match director, so I hosted matches for about five, five or six years. And in the meantime, I started working towards the National Federation of getting precision rifle recognized as a national sport so that we could get uh firearms licenses on uh a sporting license a sport shooting license on the rifles and not be restricted by the hunting rifle restrictions.

SPEAKER_03 5:27

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 5:29

Yeah, and that took about seven or eight years of driving around to meetings and talking with people who thought scopes on rifles were dangerous. And uh and uh during that process I was also one of the guys who founded the International Precision Rifle Federation, which was a necessity to get a precision rifle author uh recognized as a standalone sport in Sweden.

SPEAKER_03 5:56

Right, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:56

And it's they both came hand in hand.

SPEAKER_01 5:59

Right. Yeah, and the you know, I that's one of the questions that I'm asked pretty regularly. Uh actually not so much anymore, but the you know, 23 and 24 when we um you know when we first owned uh the PRS and and we're getting um you know getting our feet underneath us and all that. That was a question I was asked all the time. Like, well, don't you consider the IPRF competition, or you know, do you you know, do you do you view the IPRF as a threat? And at the time I didn't really have a good answer. Um, but I had met you and I didn't consider you a threat, considered you more of a friend.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

The guy the guy who you met semi-drunk in Vegas who just told you a lot of uncomfortable truths and then realized, oh shit, this is the guy who owns the PRS.

SPEAKER_01 6:43

Well, and and I think I I think we're really I mean you you you you you told me a lot of stuff, right? And and from hearing from somebody that I mean what you i the more we got to know each other, I think we're cut from the same cloth and like we could be brothers, you know, uh a couple years apart. And like, um, and I I grew very comfortable with you, but it wasn't until I traveled internationally a couple times and I'm like it the precision, the sport of precision rifle competitions, and that's you know, free of IPRF or or or the PRS or any of that, right? Like in a lot of countries uh isn't possible without the IPRF. Right? Like it's not uh you need a you need a governing body with an elected board, nonprofit, all of that, you know, all of that sort of structure uh behind um a sanctioning body for it to be validated in other countries, right? And that's yeah, yeah. And that's the power of the IPRF, right? And and so it's it's of the um and I I'll say both. Like it's of the precision rifle series and the NRL's best interest to support the hell out of the IPRF. Because without it, in most countries, we can't do what we want to do, right? Or you can't do it without you know super heavy restrictions, right? Like you might be, well, it's uh 556 NATO only is what you're gonna you know what you're gonna shoot with, or you can only do this at military ranges, or you know, whatever whatever the restrictions are in every country. But um, yeah, I mean, from that regards, uh, you know, we we have a very close relationship, right?

SPEAKER_02 8:28

Yeah, I would say so. I would I would know the only thing I would change there is that in certain countries you cannot shoot on anything but military ranges, and the only way to get access to them is by having the sport nationally recognized under a national uh federation, and that to get that, it's like what comes first, the the chicken or the egg, and like you can't have a national federation without having an international, and how do you have a na international without a national? So it's like right. We kind of went with it. It's yeah, you one yeah, so uh most of the countries actually just run. So we have this, you know, the these people maybe know the the world championships, which is a way of legitimizing the the organization and itself to get everyone under in one place once a year, like every two years for Center Fire, every two years for Rimfire. And um just to you know meet and exchange ideas, keep you know, everyone up to date with how you know where the sport is going, and also a good way of uh getting you know government officials and and uh national sports organizations seeing that this is not just some odd little thing that's going on in a country uh with some guys on scoped rifles that they've never seen this that style of shooting before. It's it's quite big internationally. And yeah, for for example, as in Colorado, we had a a representative from the elected government in that country, not just a sports federation. And he showed up looking a little bit, you know, not like your typical shooter, and but you know, who am I to judge? I went up, shook the entire team's hand, you know. It's like I was really happy to meet him. I was casual as I always am with people I know. Uh I didn't, it wasn't until a couple of days they told me, I was like, oh, that's the like the minister of sports in that country. Like, oh yeah, gee, I might go up and reintroduce myself a little bit here. Yeah, maybe. For them, it was a huge thing that he wanted, yeah, be a bit more professional. And for them, it was huge because they could not shoot field matches before the IPRF. They would they were stuck on square ranges and the short yardage that you had there. Yeah. But now they're allowed out into the field.

SPEAKER_01 10:32

Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of countries that look at what we do as like militia training, right? And and from a country's perspective, you don't I mean you you don't want your constituents practicing militia, right? No. Good to have a good marksmanship program in your country. I mean, the US and we take this for granted, but we we value that type of thing, you know? Yeah and other countries, it's different.

SPEAKER_02 10:59

This is what we still struggle. I mean, sometimes it feels like we're um slowly crawling towards something, and then when we reach the something, we realized it's uh it's a massive canyon that we just have to take a big leap of faith over and hope we got the wind on our back and that we reach the other side, which is having the the sport recognized and authorized. But there has been occasions where we have not succeeded, but it is we have succeeded more times than we have failed.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

And yeah, yeah. So I I don't think we actually mentioned what is your role with the IPRF.

SPEAKER_02 11:35

I well, I'm the elected president. Yeah. You're the guy. Uh I'm the guy. I was one of the founders in when we started in 2019. I did not want to be the original president. Uh when we that was the original president was not elected, it was picked by us. And we were a bunch of people in there, and the first president there was uh Scott Satterley as president, we had Rob Ramson as a VP and uh a few other individuals. Uh and then when the first elections came around, it was uh by all the the countries it was a unanimous decision that uh it was uh Mr. Marcus Olsen elected president of the IPRF.

SPEAKER_03 12:20

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:22

I'm happier in that role. Uh I mean back uh back when you were elected in though. Uh what year was that?

SPEAKER_02 12:30

2022. So I'm this is this will be my it's it's comes in terms of four years. So this will be there will be an election at the after this world championship.

SPEAKER_01 12:40

A lot has changed in your world in four years. When you were first elected in that role, you worked for a different company. You weren't you weren't with Zero Compromise. Uh you were married, but you didn't have you didn't have a child, right?

SPEAKER_02 12:52

Yeah, no, it's a lot of things have happened. I I mean I started working indirectly with Zero Compromise already at the beginning of 2020 when I worked for a firearms distribution company in Sweden. Yeah. And we have Sero Compromise as distribution at the time. And uh like I've I've I've started this whole import-export kind of thing. I mean, for those who know me, I'm I'm a I went to trade school as a welder and a machinist.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

I thought you were a forklift operator.

SPEAKER_02 13:21

I am forklift certified. I will never forget that. And that is a a certificate I will bear with me with people. They can't take that away from you. No, they can never forget that.

SPEAKER_00 13:29

They can't take it away.

SPEAKER_02 13:30

I am forklift certified. Um but I started a small business importing, exporting, you know, kind of making things that was needed for the sport, importing things that the shooters needed. Uh got a pretty decent contact network, and by the end of like 2018, 2019, 2020, I was picked up by a distribution company. Uh, I met them at a trade show. They hired me. I worked in that uh field for five years. And then well, during those five years, I had Zero Compromise distribution uh through two different employers. And uh then I was uh hired by uh Robert, the CEO of Zero Compromise. And um yeah. Awesome. Awesome. That was the that was the professional story, how I came to work with Zico.

SPEAKER_01 14:22

Well, let's let's obviously this is I wanted to ask a bunch of questions about Zico and and uh your role there and all that after introduction tier, but good it's a good segue. What so when did Zero Compromise actually um uh when was it actually founded?

SPEAKER_02 14:38

2018, I would say. I mean, there was formally founded in 2018. Okay. Obviously there was work going on behind the scenes before that, but the actual launch and registration and everything was 2018.

SPEAKER_01 14:50

Okay. Yeah, and it's uh it's a little unique, right? Um Robert uh Arwald, the the CEO, um, has a has a uh long career in sport optics, we'll say, right?

SPEAKER_02 15:02

Yeah, definitely, definitely a long career in sport optics.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Yep, yep. And he's on the he's in Austria.

SPEAKER_02 15:09

Yeah, I mean the company is we have all the the manufacturing uh uh we have the manufacturing facility and most of the assembly done in Austria. We do have the the assembly and service facility for North America in uh Oropina, Idaho. So it's it's uh since it's a bit of a partnership there, one of the founders uh uh is uh Jeff Huber. Um and uh he also along with some of the other engineers in the company, they have a long-standing background in the optics industry and a lot of experience. So he runs his own assembly and service facility in uh in uh Idaho. But for the rest of the world, we assemble and I do everything in-house in Austria.

SPEAKER_03 15:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:51

So it's it's a a bunch of people with a lot of experience just got together and figured like like let's do this. That's the best.

SPEAKER_01 16:01

Yeah. Yeah. I mean it it it there's what so for leadership and engineering and all that, like how many total years of of optics experience do you do you guess? I mean, it's it's a probably probably over a hundred years, right?

SPEAKER_02 16:15

Of of I mean, there's there's some guys in there whose names you've never heard of who has been working in the optics industry for their entire lives and they're approaching retirement.

SPEAKER_01 16:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:27

Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah, and there's there's there's names that I could mention that some would recognize from their working at other companies for a long time and things like that. But there's there's so many people within the manufacturing side of it that have a lifetime of experience. Yeah, when this company started out, they actively like sought out employment with us because they believed in believed in in the guys who started the company.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

Yeah. Yeah, and I and that's one of the things that I wanted to bring up. You know, I I mean zero copy zero compromise isn't um necessarily new to me, or none of this is new to me, and I disclose that for our viewers. Like um, I had the opportunity to come over last year. It actually worked out, it was perfect timing. I was in um Italy for the uh European Pro Series Championship, the PRS European Pro Series Championship that was that was held there. And then uh that was like Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then it was like the following Wednesday, Thursday, I think it was. Um you guys hosted an open house uh in Austria at the plant. So it worked out that I was, you know, what, maybe an eight-hour drive away or something like that. And like, yeah, no, this is perfect. Like I'll stay for a few extra days. Uh came up to Austria. It was my first time, uh, first time ever being uh being there. Um got to got to see a lot of friends. That was the surprising part. Like the open house had a lot of people that um I had shot with or I'd worked with and um you know with other partners and stuff like that, and that was awesome. I mean, like Diane from Mile High was there, Alice from AccuC International, um, and then a whole bunch of shooters that you know that are I would call friends at you know, IPRF World Championship that been here, shot biking trail with. Um so it was awesome to to see everybody come together for the uh for the open house. Now, um we did a plant tour. Uh it was from coming from an engineering manufacturing background, it was pretty awesome to see the uh I'd say the level of automation and uh structure and manufacturing. You know, I you guys had I don't know how many uh you had a palletized system that fed 10 CNCs, something like that.

SPEAKER_02 18:50

I'm not gonna say a number because I'm gonna be wrong.

SPEAKER_01 18:52

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I I'm already there's a few. Yeah. Um but a but a palletized system where um behind uh behind a uh fenced in area, like you'd have um you know, a shuttle run over, uh, you know, an elevator go up and grab a pallet that's got uh like a tombstone on it with raw material already set up, and it would just take that and run it down the line, load it into a machine and go. And it, I mean, like it from and I'm sure they told us in the um in the tour, but like that it looked like those those 10 CNC machines or however many were like had a week's worth of material that they could just continually run and run and run and run and you know, and and never never run out of material, never run out of something to do, uh, which is probably uh uh uh you know what you guys need. I mean, uh you and I talk regularly, and I mean the backlog of of scopes to manufacture there is is quite long, right?

SPEAKER_02 19:53

I mean, we do have a backlog, and and and some people might ask us like, well, how can you have 10 pallet fed C and C machines and have a backlog? And and and I mean the the truth is that they don't those machines don't they don't only make scopes. Uh there's a there's a sister company uh inside like inside of that machine shop that makes parts for hydropowers, uh plants that have you know, high-speed trains, other things like that. So they don't only make scope cubes. Yeah, aerospace. It's it's a whole it's it's a very high-end machine shop and all that comes with it. And the scopes is a that was apparent. Very clean. Very, yeah. It it's a nice, it's a nice place. It's uh as I said, I come I went to school to become a well-drunner machinist, and that is probably a lot cleaner than most places I've ever worked.

SPEAKER_03 20:41

Oh yeah. Yeah. No, you can't.

SPEAKER_02 20:43

And uh and we're not talking about assembly now. We're talking about like when we're like milling out or you know, putting, you know, make into tubes.

SPEAKER_01 20:51

And and that was that was kind of I didn't know what to expect. You know, and I walked in, I'm like, well, this is like a machine, you know, and and honestly, uh, I've been in a lot of machine shops in in the Wisconsin area here. You know, I used to work in um the machine tool industry, and it felt like any type of machine shop that you would see here in southeastern Wisconsin that made high-end components, right? I mean, you had all the fixtures everywhere, you had gauging, I mean, processes, a lot of automation built in. You're like, okay. But, you know, I see some raw scope tubes, you know, and some raw components uh and aluminum, but like there's a lot more to this. And it was pretty cool that it was pretty cool to see the you know, the isolated part of the operation, right, which was the scope assembly. And so you go into a different area, uh, completely climate controlled. Um lighting it the lighting actually was what kind of surprised me. It was mostly dark, right? And then everybody's got their own little shop lights at their desk, but these things are are hand assembled, right?

SPEAKER_02 21:58

Yeah. No, it's uh it's uh people have mouths like, oh uh because they see all these pictures of I mean, there's some manufacturers that have that. It depends on what you're making, but and I guess the process as well. I I haven't been to that many optics manufacturing places. Uh I've been to way more uh weapons manufacturing plants and and ammunition plants, but they're it's not it's not even the same thing. But yeah you see pictures and videos from places where they have like this super bright kind of a uh uh emergency room or like you know a surgery room kind of ordeal going on and it's all bright and clean and obviously it's clean, but yeah, it's also like uh quite stressful on the ice to have such a bright environment all day and having you know just enough, you know, you everything around you is you can focus on your little workbench, you assemble your scope. There's a guy that I mean that's you saw how it's it's done. Uh and uh I'm not gonna go into details because then some guy more than me is you know, I'm gonna get an email on next Monday and it's like, oh, why did you say you do this? Because that's not how it's done. I was like, Well, I'm not the engineer, I'm the coffee-drinking sales guy who travels around and talks about scopes. Yeah. Um and shoot the uh the odd competition here and there these days. Yeah, yeah. Uh but um it was impressive.

SPEAKER_01 23:14

I mean, you there was some subassemblies that happened that were you know, like one or two people doing subassembly, and then there was um uh you know, a number of number of folks doing like the main assembly, putting the subassemblies in, doing things, but then there was one guy that was QC.

SPEAKER_02 23:30

Right, like everyone he he's the guy with the that I was talking about, like a lifetime of experience. He builds them as well, but his QC is I was first time I went in there and then I was QCing a scope that I you know you go through the entire process. I didn't build one myself because that was it's it takes a long time for someone who is not used to build a scope to build a scope, and I was just I went through the entire process with them of building it, but I didn't build it myself by hand.

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Yeah. Thank goodness. Thank goodness that scope's not out there in a wild. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 24:03

I if I would have made it, it would have been probably just made it into the into the junk. It takes a good long time to teach, like to train an assembly guy for for the scopes. It's the uh I I'm not again not gonna name numbers or days, but it's longer than most people think before you're like completely effective an assembly. But anyway, the QC guy, he's he as I said, he he builds, he finalizes, does the QC, and uh obviously you do the uh the impact shift. Uh you know, you beat the shit out of the scope on a on a a rubber mat on the table, which is firm, it's not like something soft and squishy. And um I was just doing QC by myself, and I hit it, hit it on that table. It's like no no no. Harder. Hit it. Hit it. Yeah. I'm like, yeah, I'm I'm I'm hitting it harder than I ever would dropping the rifle. Like, no, no, no, harder. Like, okay, and this is uh this is what a scope that we're gonna send out for for a trial with a unit. And I was in charge of that thing, so I wanted to see like you know the whole process and then be able to speak to the customer about it. And I hit it again. It's like no, no, no, no, no, harder. And we went on like that for like five times. And it's like I started getting pissed off. It's like, why don't you just show me how hard you want it to be hit? And he's just like whopped that thing on the table, and it was like it's still like they were still like solid as could be. Like the reticle didn't move, nothing moved.

SPEAKER_01 25:28

Well, and that's and that's what that's what that final check is, right? Like yeah, uh, you put it through uh is it a collimator or is it like uh no, it's uh you have a collimator in there, yeah. Yep, so you put it through that, and you you you see where zero is, and then you whap it on the table a couple times, probably in both directions, right?

SPEAKER_02 25:47

Uh in all directions, you know, both uh horizontally and vertically back and forth, yeah. And then you have a a tolerance, which is a number of uh within that reticol the subtentions that it's allowed to move, but usually that is uh I mean allowed to move, meaning it's less than you would actually ever see or notice.

SPEAKER_01 26:06

Yeah, because I mean it's tolerance on everything, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:09

Yeah, it's tolerance isn't everything. Everything moves. This question is just is it measurable and will you see it? And we I could not through our inspection equipment see anything move.

SPEAKER_01 26:19

Yeah, and that was what was impressive. I mean, I watched a guy whacking scopes for probably a half hour and then you know put it back in the machine, you know, and and view and zoom in and do his thing, and like, oh, it's right back to zero, which is uh it's crazy. I've I I've actually seen other scope manufacturers do that, and I I I I've been present for it, and they they uh everybody does this, right? I mean, it's just it's a it's a measure of its durability and the and and the ability for it to go back. And um I mean it makes you very uncomfortable to see somebody with it.

SPEAKER_02 26:53

Oh it's uh I would if I would have dropped my rifle like that on the scope, on the on the uh objective during a match, I would have just like, I'm done. This is like the rifle, something else is gonna something else is gonna break. Yeah. Yeah. And I have dropped the scope like that with on my rifle. And uh yeah, um, it retains zero. Uh the scope looked like shit. The rifle looked like shit. I was surprised I was even able to cycle the bolt because it took a hard hit. But I went to the range and yeah, it was the same scale. Still zero still is that crazy.

SPEAKER_01 27:37

That is, I mean, it's a testament of a lot of these rifle systems. And I think actually I honestly I think most rifle systems probably are really durable.

SPEAKER_02 27:45

Uh oh, oh yeah, oh for sure. Like the things we have today. I mean, the mashed rifles we build, I mean, they're so freaking durable.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

We even I'd say, even uh even if you look at, you know, uh, and and I know you're in Sweden, so it's not, you know, maybe this analogy, you're you're pretty world smart, so maybe the analogy will still hit home.

SPEAKER_02 28:04

But like, you know, if you go to the city, I'll take that as a compliment.

SPEAKER_01 28:06

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're pretty well traveled. Uh we'll talk about that in a minute, too. But um, even if you go to Cabela's, you buy a five or six hundred hour rifle, you know, which is gonna be like a Savage Axis or something like that, right? Or a Ruger American. And then, you know, you put a three by nine on there, that's a few hundred hours, like that rifle system can honestly take quite a bit of abuse, right? But I think, yeah, and but I think the you know, as long as you have good rings and stuff like that on it, right? Like if you use cheap rings, like you're probably gonna, you know, there's gonna be failure points that that you'll find quick. But um, but I think what's crazy is like growing up, at least here in the United States, um, you always obviously treated, you know, firearms safely, right? So there was always that, but I think um, you know, you were never gonna touch the turrets. Like once that thing is zeroed, you put the caps on and you were super careful with it. Like you, you, you know, like don't don't touch the scope too much. Don't like don't like don't test the screws if they're tight. Like if it's if it's zeroed, like just be super careful with that thing and it'll con you know continually hit zero. Um, but in reality, like if if you you know the scope brings are probably the the the the Achilles heel on a lot of things because people will put on a cheap die cast set or something like that, that let you know, less than fifty dollars or something. But um, but if you had decent components, like you don't have to worry about any of that, right? Like, especially if your target is a deer, right? Like, you know, sub 100 yards, like who cares that that thing, if you're zero shifted a couple tenths in either the direction or a full MOA, like it doesn't matter. No, you're not gonna notice it.

SPEAKER_02 29:51

It's still a minute of deer.

SPEAKER_01 29:53

Yeah, oh yeah, 100%, right? But um, but it is like a testament, like the the quality checks and everything that um zero compromise and others do, like, man, like we we can hold we can hold zero with a lot of abuse, right? You should be able to get off an airplane with that baggage handler having thrown your rifle around in a soft case or hard case or whatever soft inside that you don't have to worry about it, you know.

SPEAKER_02 30:18

No, no. And and and I've seen that uh not only with our scopes, but if you look at any of the top-tier brands, you can if you have a complete, a good built rifle system with a reputable action manufacturer, good rings. I mean, I as you said the rings I think is the the Achilles heel. You really need to pay attention to what you mount your scope in. And a lot of people blame other parts of the rifle system, but it's actually the ring style failure first. It's that little link between the rifle and the scope. Yep. Uh that is the most important. But there's been so many times I've traveled stateside shooting matches, and I show up and I've seen how they toss that rifle case around. You can they're baggers baggage throwers for a reason. They're not baggage handlers. And it shows up, and that that pellet case looks like it's been through hell and back. Take it out. I mean, it's still it's foam on the inside, but it's still shock. Yeah. Take it out on the other side of the world, shoot it, and it's like as close as you could expect having a massive temperature difference, 20-hour flight, you know, being thrown around, and you show there and it's you know, it's fine. Yeah, there's nothing exactly.

SPEAKER_01 31:35

Yeah, I'd be interested, yeah. I don't know if we can get that statistic, but with the world championship coming up here uh in a few months here in in Texas and everybody traveling from out of town, like, or out of state, out of country, all of it, right? Like out of continent. Separate continent. Yeah, exactly. Separate continents. Like how how um how much did things change? I bet it I I bet the folks who have to make an adjustment are the minority, you know, than than the folks, you know.

SPEAKER_02 32:07

I think the biggest change you'll see is taking things apart when you travel. I never take anything apart. I'll I'll put everything in the case, and depending on, you know, how much weight and everything, some people take off their scope and they put it in their carry-on and take off their muscle brake, and you know, those things are the things that will, you know, throw it off a little bit. But you know, as you if you would just keep everything as you from home, and I don't see why it would. Yeah, it would be hard to do. And I think that's one of the things that I've changed over the years is that everything returns to where it was a lot more reliably than it used to, especially on the scope side. As you said, you didn't touch your turrets because that wasn't like if you did, you weren't sure that I mean I remember like growing up, I was a big loophole guy. I still like I still uh I still you know loophole was very close close to my heart. And um I had uh th as you said, a three to nine. I had 1.1 to 4 and uh uh four oh what was it uh uh six to six to eighteen, I think I had as well. Sure. And uh there were all none of them had like clicks, it was just the the uh quarter MOA and you put like a coin up there. Yeah, and you and you turned it back, but you never really got it really back because there wasn't clicks. And then you got into the whole this is I mean, I'm not talking about the the recent stuff, I'm talking twenty, thirty years ago. Yeah. Uh they were like glossy black tubes. Yeah. I mean I talked to Brad Wright about it, about what scopes I had, and he's like, that's some old stuff. Like really old, like from when my my like when my dad was young. Yeah. And um you had a period going into like modern scopes, you had the clicks and everything, but they were still not as reliable. And I think a lot of people look back and it's like, oh, they were you know, like they were good quality, but they were good quality for the time, but there's there's been a lot of improvements in in materials and and how the how the turrets are built, what the how you the whole thing, like it's there's been so much improvements in the terms of reliability on optics that these days you can go out and pick up, like I'm just gonna throw it out there because I I think it's a good entry-level scope, like a Mark IV loophole. It's not expensive for what it is.

SPEAKER_01 34:23

No, but it's a ton of value in that scope.

SPEAKER_02 34:26

It is so much value, and it is and compared to anything you could have gotten 10 years ago for the same price, like it is so reliable. Like it's so reliable.

SPEAKER_01 34:35

And having first focal point scopes, you know, around a thousand dollars now. I mean, that was you know, first focal point ten years ago, like twice that. I don't know. If it was less than if it was like less than sixteen, eighteen hundred hours, like you can't trust it. But now, I mean, now there's some.

SPEAKER_02 34:56

There's something wrong with this. Someone's kind of ripped me off. Right. Right. And and that was the case in a lot of in a lot of, you know. Yeah. It was it wasn't, it's it's come a long way. And I I famously quoting or a quote by someone is you know, a rising tide lifts all boats.

SPEAKER_00 35:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:14

As someone we both know so once said.

SPEAKER_00 35:16

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:18

And uh I think that is good, but that that's true when it comes to to all manufacturing. Because the more competition there is on the market, the more you have to really push yourself to stand out and being good. You know, you you know, being right, you know, 60% of the time it works every time. That's it's not good enough.

SPEAKER_01 35:36

Yeah, yeah. So let's let's talk a little bit about that, right? Yeah, the good segue there. Um, what I mean for somebody that's never handled a zero compromise, um, you know, or somebody that that might, you know, that's listening to this and like, man, I like I've always you know looked at zero compromise, but never really handled one. Like, what what are some of the things they can expect? Like what are some of the um you're the sales guy. I mean, you give us the high points of of of what to expect with zero compromise and and and why you think it's best.

SPEAKER_02 36:10

I mean, it's it's like this whole thing. I I I liked how I th as a guy working in the company, I think the the names here compromise is kind of funny because everything when it comes to optics is a compromise. It's just a triangle and you and you pull more towards field of view, and you're gonna lose some of that, and you pull more of that, and it's you're never gonna get everything. But the more time passes, the more you can get of like the whole thing. But if you go to the extreme in one end, you're gonna lose on another. And uh we for us the the the you have to explain that like what what we don't compromise on is the optical clarity and the mechanical durability. We we don't have or we we will never claim to have the widest field of view, but we will some have some of the clear the best glass out there, yeah. Like when it comes to the detail, edge-to-edge clarity, that that whole thing, mechanical durability. And but what I'm especially proud of is actually the the customer service side of things. And whenever someone's you know messed up their rifle, I I I uh remember a case here recently from a this was a professional user. I'm not saying that, you know, some of the civilian guys are not professionals, but you know. Um and then they had they've been out working and their front lens got cracked. And uh, you know, they had it. We s we always ship out a a shipping label. This is at least I'm talking for for Austria.

SPEAKER_00 37:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:37

Uh US is also phenomenal on the customer service side. You can call in there, talk to them, they'll take care of you no matter what. And um we'll send out a a shipping label. So you didn't you don't, you know, we'll take care of the shipping back to us. We'll as soon as it hits our door, like within a day or two, it's at the desk with possible maybe that QC guy as you that you saw.

unknown 38:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:03

And he's gonna start taking it apart, identifying what the you know, obviously you've told him what the problem is. Yeah. He'll start inspecting everything around the problem. Has something else occurred? You will get a they'll go through the entire scope.

SPEAKER_00 38:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:15

Uh replace the parts that are that that are bit like you noticed are damaged, and are there other parts that were damaged in the same accident? And it will be done in a day or two. And usually I would say in Europe you would have your scope back in a week, maximum two. Yeah, yeah. So that's like where I feel there's a difference. Uh there's the customer service is is supreme. That's one of the things where I really felt like going into the company is that I we I will never I would never work for a company that doesn't take care of its customers, like in in such an expedited way. And if you if you're no, if you send in your scope or a product, anything like if you if you buy a car and the alternator breaks and you have to return it to your dealership, and they're like, when do you get it back? Six to nine months or something? It's like, will I get a replacement? No, go to Hertz and get a rental. Like you're not you're never gonna buy that brand again. Yeah, no. But if you if the guy, like, you know, just leave it with us, go, you know, go over to McDonald's or whatever. I mean, I'd love my triple cheeseburgers. Um and um you know this for a fact. Um and um you just come back in an hour and we'll have it replaced. Are you ever gonna buy another brand?

SPEAKER_01 39:31

No, no, yeah. I mean, customer service is everything in the in a uh scope industry, right?

SPEAKER_02 39:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:38

Yeah. And and and that's where we're at as well. Like we wanna we wanna be able to take care of our customers so they always have priority. Like it's not, it's always gonna be a workstation ready to take care if there's anything that has happened. And yeah, I mean, some people say, like, you know, like I I listen to guys uh say, like, oh, it's this brand has never failed. There's no like I'm not saying sales from saying that's there's guys out there shooting like oh this XYZ brand has they've never failed. They never the a scope from them have never failed. Like everything that I even a hammer breaks eventually. Right. Yeah, and it's just a matter of how you fix it. And how quickly you fix it.

SPEAKER_01 40:21

Right, yeah, and if it's right uh fix right too. I I think I think when people would actually see inside a scope, and you know, the a lot of it is more simple than than you would think. Yeah and then there are some really complex items inside there, right? And to think the amount of abuse that we put it under, um I'm surprised you don't see stuff fail more often, you know, but um but yeah, I mean they they're they're they're they're engineered to be uh at least they're compromised. It's one of the few that I've seen inside of, like engineered to be very, very durable systems, you know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:56

Like we are yeah, we have some unique features on the inside, which I'm not gonna go into details around. Um but like the amount of rotations you can do back and forth and how quickly you can turn, like it's faster than you could ever do with a hand. It's not gonna skip a step, it's not gonna break, it's there's stuff going on in there that is fairly fairly unique on on the durability side.

SPEAKER_03 41:25

So we we have uh we had a uh customer again uh which we um approached and uh asked them how everything was going.

SPEAKER_02 41:38

And uh they bought purchased a 5 to 27 for a 50 cal uh bolt action rifle. Oh and uh yeah, and they were dead still dead happy with it, and uh yeah, you know, they're still going strong, and it's like do you like have you noticed anything? It's like no, it still works fine, tracks perfectly, we shoot regularly out to you know a mile, a mile and a half. It's you know it's this is one of the you know it's it's been on there for a while. And it's like how many how many rounds have you put through it? They're like, man, we don't know. Like we stopped keeping track. Like if you rough estimate and they're like 10,000 plus and uh we actually asked them to take that. It's a 50, like they're not shooting like subs, it's full, full force, like 700 plus grains, like 10,000 plus rounds. And we asked for him to take it off and send it back so we can just, you know, out of curiosity, because I mean who the fuck has money to blow 10,000 rounds of 50 cal through it.

SPEAKER_01 42:40

And they didn't have to exactly that that that's not yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:46

We towed we took it back, inspected it, just put everything back together, and it's like as good as when you got it. Because you you don't know until you you know, um I mean we had to look at it because we've never had a scope back that had seen 10,000 rounds of 50.

SPEAKER_00 43:02

Right, right.

SPEAKER_02 43:04

And we have uh in Europe, we have with some units we have them the 527 sitting on semi-automatic 50 platforms as well that have seen a similar amount of rounds. And that's even more brutal on the system.

SPEAKER_01 43:15

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Semi-auto, you're not just getting recoiled back or you can recoil if then you know from a big barret and you send that whole thing going into battery like shlok.

SPEAKER_03 43:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:27

Yeah. So it's it's yeah, it's the du I would say the dura the durability is that. And then and if anything happens, it's just you know the express level of service.

SPEAKER_01 43:38

Yeah. Um I'm gonna ask a couple questions here and hopefully you hopefully you can answer 'em. Um, I know like privately we talk and you know, and I I I keep I keep things to myself, you know, quite a bit. But um on a website, if I'm looking for product, there's competition which has Joseph Sixth, it has Austin Orgain. Um but if I poke around, Kale Harman's on here too. Um so it shows competition, hunting, and accessories. Yeah. And that's basically the three three main focuses that you guys have, right? And then if I if I look under competition, uh you got the two to ten, four to twenty, five, five twenty-seven, eight forty. Um what I don't see here, uh, that a lot of uh manufacturers have too, right, is um like military stuff, right? Um now I get it, you you're not gonna you know, some some governments or you know, military operations aren't gonna be like, well, show me a military specific page, but um a lot of these are are used in in duty, aren't they?

SPEAKER_02 44:50

Yeah. I mean we do we're especially we're not a a massive manufacturer per se, compared to a lot of like if you compare to Night Force, uh they're they're they're huge. And um and loophole as well, they're huge. We're we're not on the on the large scale uh contracts per se. So we're what we are popular among a lot of uh special police units, uh personal security, uh stuff like that, uh presidential guards, um, you know, uh special mission units, that whole thing, that thing. Um especially around Europe, we're seeing a lot of that in other countries as well. Um I mean uh there's you know we're out there for sure. You can see it. You see it on the the international sniper comps. Uh if you start looking at the pictures from USASOC uh of things like that, you'll see that little CCO logo around around the ocular uh here and there. Um we saw it with uh I think it was seventh group who was down in uh Latin America doing a sniper competition and you'd see they were running their their uh their rifle for the cadat competition had an 840 on it. Yeah. Yeah. 840 and a Hawkins mount, actually.

SPEAKER_01 46:11

From from my perspective, like I that's awesome, right? And and looking at your website, like it's it's very competition forward, right? You know, these products are are are built for you know for competition, but also used in these other applications, right? And I think there's uh I I think there is a shift in sort of the mentality around uh precision rifle components that um you know if it's built for competition, it'll also work in military. And I think that's that's a switch from what it historically has been, right? Like I think there's a mentality where it's like, well, if it's built for the military, like I should be able to use it in competition. But I uh honestly, and and this is probably um I am biased when I say this, but I think um I think we probably put our our equipment through just as challenging environments and situations, or even more so than than a lot of military.

SPEAKER_02 47:12

I mean it it definitely depends on if you're you're look how you're looking at it. I mean, there's I mean, I have no military background. I've done some marksmanship training with with units uh over the years. I've been because I mean I've been competing for internationally for over 10 years, and I've been requested to visit and you know introduce precision rifle and see how they can apply that in their work. Yep. And uh I wouldn't say that we put our equipment through the same some of the stuff they're doing. I mean, we're not gonna sit in the back of a a truck, you know, going for 15 hours over a mountain and sweating our asses off and they drive go like a don't. Oh, sorry, that was different, different our movement. Right. But you sorry, you get it. Uh yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 47:54

Or helicopter, helicopter, stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 47:57

But when it comes to repeatability, like shot after shot after shot, that's a different thing. Because you're not going to find a lot of active duty guys shooting the amount that we do.

SPEAKER_00 48:07

Right.

SPEAKER_02 48:07

Like you can just listen, talk to. I remember that I was listening some time ago. I don't get as much time listening to podcasts anymore, especially if they're not on Spotify, Ken Wheeler. I work.

SPEAKER_01 48:19

I but thank you for bringing that up. We are working on that. Uh all of the podcasts, including this show and the PRS show, are gonna end up uh hitting all the platforms here. Um, all of it. It'll be all of it.

SPEAKER_02 48:35

Hang time.

SPEAKER_01 48:38

Uh well, it might take a few weeks for this thing to end up.

SPEAKER_02 48:41

Yeah, but I'm talking about when you release it on on YouTube and then you know, eight weeks later it might show up on Spotify. Anyway, I was listening to a uh podcast. I think it was Phil Beley who was on there, and they were talking about his uh uh his past career as a as a Marine Scout sniper and the amount of rounds they they put down range as training, and it was like it was on a yearly basis, it was about like a one-day match or a full year or something like that. It was it was at the same level. If you and I would go to a range, you know, do a little training in one day, that would be about the same amount of rounds that those guys put down in one year. I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_01 49:21

I'm I do not know if that's the case these days, but at the time every unit's every unit's probably gonna be different too, right?

SPEAKER_02 49:27

Yeah, it's gonna be different, but that kind of sets a little bit of a perspective is like they shoot 150, 200 rounds a year through it. And you have guys like Kale Harmon, and I don't know, he probably shoots 10,000 rounds a year or more. Yeah, exactly. And like through the just through the precision rifle guns. I mean, it's doing all kinds of work.

SPEAKER_01 49:45

But with um, you know, and a guy like Kale, uh and I'm uh maybe I'm speaking out of my ass, I don't know, but I think his expectations for accuracy probably are more than any other military, you know, requirements out there, right? I mean he he's expecting one hole you know in the and the be able to see it and and at any range, etc. Right?

SPEAKER_02 50:09

Yeah, and I no I think an interesting conversation with him actually about that. And he we showed up uh we were at Altus about a year ago and we're I was shooting his rifle, uh six GT, and it was shooting phenomenally. I mean and then we're talking about what kind of accuracy are you getting, and he said, like, oh, it's like you know, half minute, something like that, like or like one third. Yeah. And I was like, what do you mean? I was like, yeah, but realistically, over a 20-round group, that's what you're getting. Anyone who says they have a 20-round group consistently, yeah, that's quarter MOA, it's talking out of their ass. And I'm like, man, the man's got a point. It's all about that consistency, and like, you know, you're not gonna be punching 20 rounds inside of one hole. I mean, if you did, congratulations, you should sh sign up for a world record, you know, go to the Ben Trist Hall of Fame. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:05

Uh but the realistically, like and to do that in a bunch of different positions and stuff too. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 51:12

I mean, he was the guy's a machine for sure, but uh the whole as a whole system, the expectations we have over the X amount of rounds we're shooting are are very high. And as you said, you know I think also one of the things is like when people used to say it's like, oh, it's military grade or built for the military, I think that kind of watered out a little bit when their standards didn't, you know, the industry kept leaping past what was considered military grade. I'm not sure if it ever was good or if it was just us growing up that thinking it's like, oh, they have the greatest stuff. But yeah. It's just made by the lowest bidder to meet the standards. Sure. Uh so I you don't see as a lot of as many manufacturers these days marketed with being military grade. Sure. Because it's and it's better. Most things today are better.

SPEAKER_01 52:09

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I I I love that, you know, again, looking at your website, like it's very competition forward, right? Um, you know, and I uh for obvious reasons I I like that. But um so you have competition, two uh 210, 420, 527, 8 to 40, and then on the hunting side, uh two different scopes. So the 420H and the ZC Hunter. Um the 420H is new this year, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 52:39

Yeah, we uh kind of dropped it at CHAC Show. Uh it was just about done, so it was pardon. Um it was a little bit of a uh a hasty release, so to say, we're like, we're done. Uh we're gonna show it at Chacho. So we were just about in time to be able to make the graphics for it and put it up on the walls. You have to do that quite some time in advance. So it wasn't like the week before we're like, oh shit, it's done, let's put it up there. It's like yeah, it's not like that, but when you have to like have your graphics in a couple of months in advance, that's a different story. Yeah. Uh we released that one, yeah. And uh, I think we should be able to get them out the door here this month. And we're now talking, we're on the 7th of April recording. So I think this first one should be able to go out to to dealers this month or beginning of May. But I'm you never know. It's it's gonna be in that window.

SPEAKER_01 53:38

Yeah. What was the which I I I think the the four to twenty is like it's perfect for for a hunting system, right? Like four is a good power that up close, you know, if you if you had to take a short range shot, like yeah, you still have plenty of field of view and you know, all the things. Um 20 power is plenty for for long range, um, you know, for an ethical shot anyway. Um, but what's what's the what's the you know, if if you know I'm uh a hunter and I have zero compromise on all my um you know competition rigs, and I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna build a hunting rifle, uh and I wanna I wanna put a put one of these on or I'm considering putting one of these on there. What's the what's the major differences from the other uh 420?

SPEAKER_02 54:29

So I'm not gonna go into numbers because I don't have them in front of me. I should know these specifics on the top of my head, but it's about you know in the 15% lighter mark. Um so obviously the 420 Hunter is lighter, but they also the saddle or in the center center, like we've removed the dialable windage, it's under a cap now. So the entire center section of the optic is smaller. The entire the ocular side, it's not diamond the diameter is not smaller, but the housing outside it's not going to be as uh it's not gonna be able to snag onto things. You it's more you get it into your backpack more easy. So look putting them next to each other as as you did on the video there with the PRS when you visited a CHAT show, you can really tell the difference. And for me, it's not so much just about the weight. I mean, that sure weight is nice, but it's just that getting it down and being a little bit more compact, it goes a long way for packability. And I mean, I've been hunting with the 420 hunter, or the normal 420 for the past five years. And it's uh it's great. And people's like, oh, why should why should I get a 420 when I can get a 527? Like, well, it's I mean, it doesn't really matter that much in terms of you know the optical part, because but the thing is the 420 is so much smaller. It fits on the honey rifle in a different way.

SPEAKER_01 55:49

The form factor, and it's it's um I mean a major difference between uh the 420 and the 527 is is at length, right? Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:59

And then you go up to the 840 and it's like a it's a battleship. Yeah, yeah. Uh so it there's there's significant like size differences between them and the 4200 just slims down the normal 420 as much as we could while keeping like that as you said, we won't sacrifice any type of mechanical durability. And we did as much as we could with you know staying within the tolerances of like the we're comfortable with this, we're not gonna see any bad surprises in six or eight years down the road.

SPEAKER_01 56:34

Sure. Could could somebody say on a budget they could they could absolutely shoot uh a 420 hunter in competition, couldn't it? I mean even obviously the sportsman division is perfect, because yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:48

Uh it's a single turn turret, so you're gonna be up to like 10 and a half mils, ten and a half eleven. Okay. Uh so it's a single turn turret. Uh that's the only downside to it. I think it was time.

SPEAKER_01 57:00

Yeah, I'm I'm looking now, but yeah, and I'm I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_02 57:04

It's uh the time zone differences, and I don't have one in front of me. Uh as I said, they're not delivered yet, so I don't even have mine.

SPEAKER_01 57:12

Um you do get 11 mils of elevation, which is honestly perfect, right?

SPEAKER_02 57:19

Like you don't very, very unprofessional not knowing that in the top of my head. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 57:23

Yeah. Uh yeah, it's kind of a unique turret. You go, you have a half mil backwards and then you get a full 11 from there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 57:30

Uh so it that's that's the thing. It's based off a uh 12 mil click spacing turret design. And uh so you'll get pretty far out. But I've seen I I I I was surprised when we RO'd uh me and my colleague Andy Conager, we RO'd the PRS finale last year. And there was a fair few shooting sportsman division with uh with R 420 under more than I would thought.

SPEAKER_01 57:55

Sorry? Anthony White too, he's uh Wisconsin shooter did pretty well last year in sportsman shooting a zero compromise, which kind of surprised me. I mean, he he went down in in barrel diameter or profile, and he's like, I I really want to shoot a Zico. So like I did everything I could to make that that scope work, you know. It's and it's heavier, it's probably one of the heaviest um you know small form factor scopes out there, but um yeah, I mean it's you again, you gotta make a compromise somewhere, right? Like that triangle. So like in sportsman division, you know, it's like, well, I can give up a little bit on barrel, but I'm gonna get a lot more back in optic.

SPEAKER_02 58:36

You know, yeah. No, I mean you can only the important thing is seeing. Like if you can't see what's going on downrange, that that's uh that's why people are going for, you know, this like really good optical clarity is a big thing. Like you gotta be able to see in in difficult conditions. If you can't see where the bullet splash where it splashed on the plate, if you go into uh, you know, out in the bushes in the berm, like you gotta be able to see, and there's a big difference. If you like if you go up in optical clarity, it's gonna get you some points.

SPEAKER_01 59:10

Yeah. Yeah, and I'll uh and it's not 12 o'clock in the afternoon, one o'clock in the afternoon where that really makes a difference. Because it no lighting lighting changes throughout the day, right? And um uh so a quick story hunting last year. Um we use thermals to identify where animals are. Uh we don't have thermal rifle scopes on. I think that is what we have. No, no, no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Excuse me. I I I I have uh pulsar, uh, you know, it's a bino, two eye, two eyepieces, whatever. Uh thermal. And like I absolutely love hunting deer with them because like we go out, um, we go out before daylight, and like you can scan, like I think it was last year. I mean, we walked out there, and I'm like, okay, we usually sit on this hillside, and we have another hillside of like 400, 500 yards. That's that's fairly wooded, but there's little pockets where you can shoot into. And um, we've had a lot of success shooting these areas. And I I I sit down with Thermal and I look, and there's a guy sitting like 50 yards from where we typically shoot him. I'm like, well, today's yeah, today's hunting is gonna suck. Like that, like that guy's gonna spoil everything for us. And we actually we didn't see much. Um, but I'll say this this year, uh, very end of the day, and I'm not gonna name whose whose scope I was using. It's um, you know, one that I another brand. Another brand, yeah, I was hunting with. And it was it probably sun probably had set. We were in that twilight area, and I know, like I could almost see it naked eye, there's a deer at 250 yards. And I pull thermal out, bam, it's right there. You know, and I'm literally at this point, I'm like, thermal, rifle scope. Thermal, rifle scope. And I'm like, I know it's right there. I can see it clear as day with thermal. I could not see this deer. And it's, you know, brown against the brown backdrop, all the all the things we're like.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:12

It's like really difficult conditions.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:14

Probably the worst conditions I've ever I've ever seen, right? And it wasn't until the deer like kind of turned just a little bit, and I could see a white patch, and I'm like, okay, now I see it through the rifle scope, and like, do not move. Like I'm trained on this, on this deer now. But I mean, that's that's when people should be testing their their equipment out, right? Like, you know, and you don't have to have a hunting license necessarily take a rifle scope out and and just sit a dark, you know, or at twilight, and like, how much can you actually see? You know, and maybe maybe that's what you need to, maybe that's how people need to test, right? Or take a scope and go first thing in the morning, you know, when you know a lot of a lot of matches start at 8 a.m. You know, or as soon as as soon as the lights up, especially like like gravestone this year, as soon as the uh as soon as there was enough light to shoot, we started shooting because the days are short in January. You know, so like that optical clarity is a huge, uh, a huge component of your success when you're talking crappy lighting conditions. You know.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:16

For sure. And I mean it's not just like I said, optical clarity, and that's one thing people like get caught up in it's like, oh, it has X amount of light transmission. But if you have you know what I mean, like sh it it's a thing, but like it's a it's a measurement, but if you you can't like if you can't get the contrasts between a two shades of gray or brown against a ishy like background, it's all the same color, and like how are you going to see it? And that's the thing, you see early mornings, it's it's a difference. Like we were listening to it this at the finale as well, because it was interesting sitting there ROing, you learn so much, and I've always told people like this is just RO, you'll learn a ton. And listening to the the chit chat in the early mornings between the guys, and you could tell guys shooting certain brands of scopes, uh, they were like talking about details of where they would hit and everything, and these are all like you know, top-level guys, yeah. And you had heard guys shooting other brands, maybe in the same price category. Uh I'm not saying like someone was shooting a cheaper scope and someone's shooting more expensive, we're still talking about the PRS finale. And some people were picking up detail with certain brands that others were not able to see. And the scopes might cost within a few hundred dollars of each other, but they couldn't get that con the difference in contrast between Target and the like the dirt backdrop. You got that uh like up on the hill up to the one o'clock up there, it was really hard to see. Yeah, some guys I would see it. I was looking through some really sweet Swarovski NL peers. So I mean I saw everything. I was if anyone's like, I gotta get I've gotta buy one of these, and I came home and I looked at the cost of them.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:02

It's like ah the the NL peers are like on another planet. It's unreal.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:09

It's so unreal. I was like, yeah, it was no, I it wasn't, it's not fair. If it's real, the clarity is unreal. It's freaking unreal.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:16

But I was looking there and I could sorry. It's it's a bird watching mine on too, which is crazy.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:23

It was it was great. And I could see you like it's you're sitting still on a tripod and you're like sitting there watching, and you could see the trace go in and you just see that little speck of dirt move. And you know that it takes a whole lot of rifle scope to be able to see that. Oh yeah, to be able to see that. And some guys did. Uh I'm not saying we were the only, you know, obviously a lot of serious compromise key shooters saw it, but there's yeah, other brands out there who are extremely good on the optical side as well.

unknown 1:04:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:53

They saw it, but then you saw others who you I mean, it's obviously depends on the shooter's eyes as well, but you could you can definitely tell. And you could learn in during what conditions certain optics would perform and others wouldn't. It was very interesting.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:06

Yeah, I've had that conversation with uh Clay Blacketter, who he's got younger eyes than I do, uh shoots a lot more than I do. Obviously he's a you know top-level shooter, but I've I've had that conversation with him, and he's like, yeah, yeah, what you can see, um, you know, even on lower what you would assume would be a uh a more value scope, he's like, yeah, some of those like you can you can see bullet impacts quite well, you know. Um, but it's all the design and clarity and and all that, you know. I'm not gonna name names or anything like that. I got to do that.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:40

I mean every everyone everyone knows Clay shoot a tangent and they're phenomenal have phenomenal layoffs.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:46

Well, but I've but I you know and I and nobody it don't take this as an open invite, everybody that's listening, if they've made it this far. Like, don't go bug clay and be like, what do I need to buy? But yeah, he shoots a tangent. Um but I've heard him speak very, very very highly of of other brands that kind of surprise me, you know, and like um for what you see, you know, but it's not what you're asking of a scope isn't just what you see out of it. You know, you're you're looking for you'll yeah, there's a lot of other uh qualities in a scope that you know you gotta find what's what's best for you and um and your budget and all that.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:21

But no for sure. I mean it it's it's a whole big thing. And I remember us talking about this the other week as well. And um you don't necessarily need a $5,000 rifle scope to get into precision rifle. I mean I I would no one I mean I've worked for a company that makes them so I would be very I'm very happy if you do buy them. But there's been like a trend of you see it on the internet and Facebook groups and I would play and it's like oh it's become such an elitist sport you need a $10,000 system to shoot and you're not competitive otherwise and you know the whole thing. And and I found it and he's like you need these you know specialized dashers and you know hand loaded ammo and then and uh and then you look at it and I I just love this because you see you you look at Bushman he's been shooting the same night force since God knows how long. So that's that was a great investment for him. Yeah he I mean he he paid for it you know and I mean he's as as far as I know it's the same scope and that that investment has paid for itself. Yeah he is loading his ammo on a same old lee press which I I still have one sitting I do everything on a Dylan 750 now because I don't have the time or or uh or uh you know I have one of those to do it I have one of those old lead presses too that I I I saw and we're talking to a guy who is a two time world champion still loading on that lee press and golden bullet winner golden bullet winner like the whole thing yeah he was shooting the same foundation stock for a long time yeah yeah and and then I mean you'd sure foundation foundations they're not extremely pricey but they're not cheap. You could get away with cheaper and still be very close I would say and agree yeah uh and then you look at for example Morgan King our recent golden bullet winner uh shooting a loophole Mark V and has been doing for ages. Yeah but I mean he's probably been on that scope for six years. Yeah exactly and then he as far as I'm aware shot factory ammunition yeah uh Eagle Eye?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:35

Yeah is that it's yeah I think it's Eagle Eye Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:38

Yeah I'm pretty sure it was Eagle Eye and his it's he doesn't load his own ammo. I'm not sure if it's custom loaded but as as far as I'm aware it's fight it's considered factory ammunition. Yeah and uh I mean you don't what uh to your point what you read online versus what you actually need like I mean you can you can win world championships loading on a Leapress you can win the golden bullet by and not shoot a $5,000 scope. I mean so theoretically you could go and win matches if you buy uh let's say the new Tika Ace Target with a 26 inch inch barrel and 6'5 Creedmore uh and dimension there Morgan shoots 6'5 Creedmore slab some brass weights to the side of it that you got from your local shop and put a Mark IV on there and statistically you should be able to win a match with that. Yeah yeah yeah I mean you go out and practice the money you save there spend on on practice right yeah and it's just for me it's it's just like depressing because I I I won my first national championship in Sweden shooting a tikka in 6555 loading my ammo on a lee press and all this fancy stuff like that with like amp annealer with the amp mate and everything it's just like it's it's nice things to have it's not really it's not gonna win you it's not gonna win you matches. Sure it might give you a point here and there but shooting more wins matches. Shooting more wins matches and and being you know it's just you can see like trends in the sport when you I see this because I'm more involved um you see it as well you're also involved internationally but once the talk and the trend of talk the conversation goes towards this is so expensive to get going you see less people getting into it because they're convinced it's so fucking expensive to get into it that they're not even going to try. They can't afford it but there's two thousand dollar rifles out there that will get you going.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:49

I mean Doug Koenig has got a um a Ruger RPR yeah it's a custom shop RPR um but I mean that's not that's not out of people's price point. I mean it's a $20 rifle isn't a $2,900 $2700 uh let's let's take a look at it. We have a computer right in front of us Ruger RPR custom shop.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:11

Like the here's the difference between you and me. I cannot have a podcast going on and talking to someone while being on the computer because I'll you know break attention and then I'm gone.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:19

And then yeah then you're done with it. Yep. Um 2629 suggested retail. So that kind of tells me you probably can get it for $21200 you know if you know the right person.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:30

Yeah um you know I I'm gonna I'm gonna take a look at I have a a dealer website that I can take a look at sometimes there's uh good pricing there that I like to see but I mean he he's he's finished very well at matches well yeah uh Matt All Line you know he yeah Matt All Line shot a Savage for a long time in fact um he was in a match with that thing or was it just factory division or just factory division he took second at the pro series finale in in Idaho with with a Savage second out of 250 of the world's best shooters you know um so it it it's it's that kind of tells it comes down to like how much time are you willing to invest I mean and and I think going up to the world champions a lot of people expect to achieve greatness without putting in the effort it's like going to the gym and expecting you're gonna bench 400 pounds and it's your first six months in there.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:30

Just because you bought the best gym shoes and the best gym exactly exactly you have those little wrist wraps and everything and go get the world wrap to be able to do this.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:38

And I think Morgan brought up a very good point when in his speech at the finale as well is like people don't see the sacrifices not just from the individual but for the entire family of that individual to achieve those things.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:50

Yeah. Yep and that's what that's what it takes right like it doesn't it takes a family.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:55

Yeah yeah it's like well obviously if you're you know bachelor like you're not it doesn't take a family because you don't have one but if you have a family the entire family has to be behind you. Yeah there's uh there's zero chance I would ever trade what I have now for bachelor life or whatever um maybe Missy would trade it for me you know what I mean if she'd just take the kids push me out you know I'd be living at the shop but um I'm not long term sustainable but no it's it's just the amount of time it takes to reach that level and I remember when I was shooting uh at I've had two really good years 2019 and 2022 and 2019 you were you were putting a work in I was shooting like eight ten thousand rounds a year yeah like I have a a shelf up here that kind of you know reminds me of my past achievements it's better to have old achievements than none as some people would say but there you will see like certain years and 2019 there's a lot of you know first sitting up there and then you have a few podiums in the years between and 2022 was the world championship and uh I mean I won the nationals that year. I placed 14th in the worlds and everything but it it took such a toll on yours on on yourself and on the families and everything. And it's not something it's very hard to keep on going for a long time like that.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:17

Seriously yeah yeah and I man I every time I go to a match I I I think like man this like I want to I want to do this a lot more you know and it and honestly the family family stuff that is more important um you know just isn't gonna allow for it you know like I'm I'm coaching baseball now and and and William and um you know I have a better chance of of being able to devote myself to him and his baseball team and and you know making sure he has the best experience and has the best um you know abilities to to be able to to play the game and um well like I every time I go to a match I'm torn I'm like man I really want to pour myself into this and like go for it. You know? But it's it's just not possible. But if William tomorrow which we know we shot a rim fire match we've shot a couple now together um I have a center fire rifle coming for him that he doesn't know about yet but uh if if he's like dad I really want to go for this like oh yeah it's on now like we're we're going to the range son you know uh if he if he decided to do that you know and it didn't interfere with other commitments that he had you know I think it's important for uh for people to commit to things especially children to commit to to something uh which he he very much committed to baseball and you know and he commits to it outside of just practices and games and stuff too like he he he does the workouts in in the garage and you know we play catch all the time and all that type of thing too but I think um I think if he were to commit to to precision rifle which would be awesome uh man like he and I would be it we would totally pour ourselves into it. You know I kind of get that free pass to do it too because like hey I'll spend time with my son you know it's it's for my child I'm not doing it for myself. Yeah 100% yeah a hundred percent yeah that's that's the way it would be but no man is it's pretty cool it is man I hope I hope that you get the same opportunity. How old is your son? Uh he'll be three this summer and uh daughter is eight months now eight months yeah yeah that is a time flies it it really does it's a crazy time to live through you know like it's just it's just nonstop uh like zone defense is what we like to call it and that's a basketball term where you're just kind of like you know kind of handling things keeping keeping the kids safe you know it's not necessarily one-on-one but I think it's it's it's a learning experience that a lot of people I think embrace as well when it comes to like pursuing sports while also having a family and I've found it that I I appreciate it more and enjoy it more now I'm not like shooting as well I'm not getting the trophies anymore like I'm happy if I'm a top 10 at a match these days or fucking top 20 which isn't naturally like it's not a bad placement.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:10

It's not a bad it's just not what I'm used to but sitting down I I wish I would have done this like before I had kids sitting down and being very realistic is you know what my expectations were and how much effort I was putting towards it was I giving myself the enough effort and opportunity to actually achieve what I thought I was going to achieve. And most of the cases apart from those few years I was not doing that. But I was still living with the belief that I could do it without putting in giving myself that that time and then I would just you know go home from a match be pissed off about fourth place be super ungrateful because I thought I was going to win but realistically I hadn't been shooting for fucking three months. How was I gonna win? Yeah and just being so honest with your own time performance and how much effort you put into something and still you know you gotta know yourself and and what you're capable of and I think that comes you have to learn that uh as a parent you know otherwise you're gonna break down for sure yeah yeah yeah and I I I'll be honest uh having realistic expectations of myself like I have more fun shooting and there's a lot less pressure on me. Yeah you know when I go up to a stage now it's like I don't I when the clock goes beep like I don't whatever I'm just gonna execute whatever I can you know sometimes that that's gonna be better than what you did in the past because you don't have that stress to it and I I found this when I shot twisted barrel about a year and a half ago and I hadn't shot for four or five months kid was a year old I mean I was just like you know I'm just gonna go over here hang out with Greg have a good time I didn't weigh my powder I just loaded everything onto Dylan like progressively like nothing I was like screw it it's gonna be good and I tied for 10th or something eleven. Yeah really couldn't believe it. Yeah but I was just I was focusing on one stage at a time and not like just taking it easy and shooting to the best of my ability the timer didn't matter I was just like I'm just gonna get the impact I'm just gonna take my time just going to do as good as I can that's gonna be enough yeah yeah yeah really it's expectation setting and yeah yeah it makes it makes a huge difference. It is it makes the sport a lot more fun and I think that's when you they talk about the whole you remember this conversation as well when people say like oh the burnout rate of a PRS shooter is three years. Yeah. Realistically that's maybe true for some people but then um then again I still shoot with people I shot with 10 years ago. It's just uh some burn out because they don't set realistic expectations on where they're they're gonna see like that steep learning curve and they're like oh in one year I'm gonna win national matches. They don't yeah they keep pursuing that national championship title for two more years. And but they didn't shoot those 10, 15 thousand rounds a year and went to 20 matches. So realistically they're not going to and then they become disappointed and quit right instead of just shooting for the fun of it and then enjoying progress. Yep yep we all know the shooters on both sides of that you know yeah so yeah but let's not get too deep into that we've already talked for an hour and 20 minutes. We left zero compromise a long time ago.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:42

We did we did well I it was a good segue but man Marcus I appreciate uh our conversations thank you for coming out of the show today and and and and honestly I mean this is it's like a lot of our conversations you know that we have so it uh thank you I appreciate that man and I appreciate your friendship uh and I appreciate the partnership between the PRS and Zero Compromise as well man thank you likewise thank you all right we'll talk soon