Speaker 1: As a guide and hunter, I've spent thousands of days
Speaker 1: in the field. This show is about translating my hard
Speaker 1: won experiences into tips and tactics they'll get you closer
Speaker 1: to your ultimate goal success in the field. I'm Remy Warren.
Speaker 1: This is cutting the distance. Welcome back, everybody. I'm really
Speaker 1: excited for this week. We're gonna this is our third
Speaker 1: installment and kind of the last of the Summer Prep series,
Speaker 1: and what this has been is just getting you ready
Speaker 1: for the hunting season and things you can do this summer.
Speaker 1: This week, we're gonna be busting out our bows and
Speaker 1: getting into some practice that I really think makes the
Speaker 1: most sense when it comes to hunting. If I think
Speaker 1: back of over my summers, you know, while everybody else
Speaker 1: is out at the lake and doing other things. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I do those things as well, but really my summer
Speaker 1: is spent shooting my bow and really honing my skills
Speaker 1: for that archery season coming up. And so what I
Speaker 1: want to do is is kind of give you some tips.
Speaker 1: I've got a list of things like the types of
Speaker 1: shots and the types of practice that I do that
Speaker 1: I that I really do believe is a lot different
Speaker 1: than maybe some of the other practice tips you've heard,
Speaker 1: and this is things that I do that I know
Speaker 1: for a fact makes me better when I go into
Speaker 1: the field. Some of these tips are they're all just
Speaker 1: very hunt specific, and so I'm excited to get into those.
Speaker 1: But before we do that, let's go down to Old
Speaker 1: Mexico on Accused Deer Hunt with a Bow and Arrow.
Speaker 1: I thought it'd be kind of fun today to just
Speaker 1: recap a story and a little bit of behind the
Speaker 1: scenes of maybe something that some of you have seen.
Speaker 1: I know a lot of you've watched them Eat Eater
Speaker 1: television show, whether it's on Netflix or you you know,
Speaker 1: back when it was on the Sportsman's Channel or what
Speaker 1: have you, wherever you watch it. But I thought, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's kind of fun to tell a little bit of
Speaker 1: behind the scenes stuff because in a hunt that's filmed,
Speaker 1: you you only see a certain percentage of it. And
Speaker 1: while it definitely follows like the narrative of exactly what happened,
Speaker 1: there's always a few things is like if someone if
Speaker 1: I was telling that hunting story, that you may not
Speaker 1: capture in that in that TV show. So quite a
Speaker 1: few years back, Steve and I went down to Mexico.
Speaker 1: They were filming The Meat Eater and we did a
Speaker 1: couple like a kind of a two part episode, so
Speaker 1: one that gets talked about a lot, the Eating the
Speaker 1: Coyote episode, but before that we did Cou's Dear Steve
Speaker 1: hunted with his rifle and then I went out with
Speaker 1: my bow, and then we did the Coyote and have
Speaker 1: Alina kind of after that, but on the same trip,
Speaker 1: So two different episodes but really the same trip. And
Speaker 1: it wasn't real long trip, so we didn't have a
Speaker 1: lot of time. But I just decided I love hunting
Speaker 1: with my bow. I mean, at heart, I'm up a
Speaker 1: bow hunt. I would consider myself a bow hunter. Yes,
Speaker 1: I hunt with everything. I enjoy rifle hunting. I've actually
Speaker 1: got a new muzzleloader that I'm gonna be hunting with
Speaker 1: this year. It's actually an old muzzleloader, but new to me.
Speaker 1: It's a percussion cap muzzleloader. And I mean, honestly, shotgun,
Speaker 1: bow whatever, it doesn't matter. I just love to hunt.
Speaker 1: But my true passion is when I've got my bow
Speaker 1: in hand and I'm out hunting. In archery season, There's
Speaker 1: been so many times where I even take my bow
Speaker 1: to a general rifle hunt might be general rifle season,
Speaker 1: but hey, I'm gonna still keep hunting with my bow
Speaker 1: because I love the pursuit with the bow. And that's
Speaker 1: how this Mexico hunt was. You could use a rifle.
Speaker 1: Hunting cous deer during the rut is a great opportunity
Speaker 1: to get a great buck with a rifle. But I
Speaker 1: just thought, yeah, it's January, this is awesome. I'm in Mexico,
Speaker 1: and of course I'm gonna hunt with my bow. So
Speaker 1: we started out hunting. Steve was going off and hunting
Speaker 1: on his own, and I think actually Janice was filming Steve,
Speaker 1: if I rememberly, and then a friend of mine and
Speaker 1: good worked with met here for a long time, Dan
Speaker 1: Dodie was filming me. So we went out on our own,
Speaker 1: and we really only had about three days to hunt
Speaker 1: cou's deer because the other was going to be spent
Speaker 1: hunting coyotes and have Alina, And if you know anything
Speaker 1: about cous deer hunting, three days with a bow is
Speaker 1: not a lot of time to get it done. I
Speaker 1: wasn't looking for any particular size of buck. I just
Speaker 1: wanted to get a buck with my bow and bring
Speaker 1: home some meat and yeah, have a good time. So
Speaker 1: the first couple of days we got into some deer.
Speaker 1: I was trying a bunch of different tactics rattling, but
Speaker 1: mostly spot and stock. So I glass in the morning.
Speaker 1: If I didn't see anything I like, then I'd go
Speaker 1: into some thicker stuff try rattling. For some reason. You know,
Speaker 1: I actually had one buck running and while rattling, I
Speaker 1: think on day two, but they weren't super responsive to
Speaker 1: the calling. And I'm not patient enough really to sit
Speaker 1: all day in like travel areas, so I would just
Speaker 1: kind of do it in case I got close and
Speaker 1: didn't think I could get in or whatever. It was
Speaker 1: just kind of another tactic that I was using, but
Speaker 1: primarily spot in stock. I did spot a couple of
Speaker 1: nice bucks that I tried stocking, but being the rut,
Speaker 1: they just by the time I got to where they were,
Speaker 1: they were already gone. They'd moved off. It wasn't really
Speaker 1: looking good for me. I didn't really have any solid opportunities.
Speaker 1: And then the fact of adding in a bow hunt
Speaker 1: on top of hunting CU's deer, which is difficult, and
Speaker 1: then adding somebody that's filming, and so you know, we're
Speaker 1: hiking around this a new area, never been None of
Speaker 1: us have been to this particular portion of where we
Speaker 1: were hunting, on this particular place. I think Steve had
Speaker 1: been here one time before, hunting buffalo a couple of
Speaker 1: years earlier, if I remember right. So, you know, just
Speaker 1: kind of really exploring. Now it's the last day to
Speaker 1: hunt Cou's deer and I spot this really good buck
Speaker 1: across the canyons or like, sweet, let's get over there,
Speaker 1: let's try to get that buck. We get in there,
Speaker 1: and he's like ends up chasing this dough and I'm
Speaker 1: trying to like cut him off because he was in
Speaker 1: a spot bedded where I thought, okay, it'll be great
Speaker 1: to stop, but the dough got up. Of course, he
Speaker 1: gets up, and now the whole plans ruined. At about
Speaker 1: two yards out, I see him drop down this canyon.
Speaker 1: We rush up, get into position, and he's just kind
Speaker 1: of like chasing that dough by it a hundred miles
Speaker 1: an hour. I try to stop him. I actually got
Speaker 1: to full draw, but he just never stopped, never gave
Speaker 1: me a shot. He was pretty close. I wouldn't have
Speaker 1: had time to range, just would have had to guess
Speaker 1: the range but I thought, dang, that's my opportunity. It's
Speaker 1: now almost the end of day. I'm like, well, probably
Speaker 1: not gonna get a buck, but I'm just gonna hunt
Speaker 1: til the very bitter end. So we dropped down into
Speaker 1: this wash and I spot this coat of mondy. I
Speaker 1: think some people call him quadies or as well. We
Speaker 1: call him coat of Mondy. Some people call him desert
Speaker 1: monkeys as well. It's like a raccoon lemur looking animal,
Speaker 1: very strange animal. When I first started hunting cou'se deer
Speaker 1: down in Arizona, my buddy John and I would always
Speaker 1: joke about the code of money's like reading your thoughts
Speaker 1: and then translate it. We just have like this whole
Speaker 1: stick that we would do about how they would read
Speaker 1: your minds. And they're like these weird animals that would
Speaker 1: read your mind and then scare away the deer and whatever.
Speaker 1: So we'd have to wear tinfoil hats in the mountains
Speaker 1: and it was just like this big running joke that
Speaker 1: we had. It probably does not translate well at all
Speaker 1: to this podcast, but they hold a special place in
Speaker 1: my heart. And it's funny because the first cou'se deer
Speaker 1: buck I got with my bow. In Arizona. We were
Speaker 1: sitting there glass and we've been hunting for like a
Speaker 1: week or more, and I was glassing down in the
Speaker 1: canyon and I spotted this coat of money and I'm like, dude,
Speaker 1: look at these codies here and there like sweet. So
Speaker 1: we glass them up and they walk really they're like
Speaker 1: they're like the size of a raccoon, and they've got
Speaker 1: like they walk with their tails straight up in the
Speaker 1: air and it's like this long cat like ringed tail.
Speaker 1: Soon super cool animal. So they're walking in the bottom.
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, cool, that was awesome. I feel like
Speaker 1: that's good luck. So later that morning, like literally after that,
Speaker 1: I decided I'm gonna go up this ridge. Look down.
Speaker 1: As I'm walking up the ridge, I spot a buck.
Speaker 1: I go. I get into position above the cliff and
Speaker 1: shoot my first cues buck with my bow. Had just
Speaker 1: seen a code of money, and so on this particular
Speaker 1: day in Mexico, I see this code of money. I'm like, guys,
Speaker 1: this is good luck because every time I see one
Speaker 1: of these I end up getting on accused here and
Speaker 1: they're like, well, so we're trying to film these things
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden the code of Money like
Speaker 1: kind of sees us and starts moving off. And there
Speaker 1: was like I don't even know what you call it,
Speaker 1: a pack, a herd, a group, a flock, whatever, there was.
Speaker 1: I had never seen so many of these things in
Speaker 1: my life. There was a massive group. I don't know
Speaker 1: how many of there were. They just like we're going
Speaker 1: across this kind of cliff face and this wash everywhere.
Speaker 1: Maybe thirty of them. I don't know if that's even possible.
Speaker 1: Maybe it just seemed like there was that many. We
Speaker 1: really wanted to get some good video of them. So
Speaker 1: they went around this washing. We're kind of like in
Speaker 1: this wash, chasing these codies, and it's like almost the
Speaker 1: end of the day, and I'm like, man, this would
Speaker 1: be so cool to get some like good videos and pictures.
Speaker 1: And we go up this wash and we end up
Speaker 1: they just like disappear, like these are some mystical creatures,
Speaker 1: even more mystical than the cues deer buck. And so
Speaker 1: we're like, okay, you know, we're looking around, we don't
Speaker 1: see him. We're like, well, it's almost the end of
Speaker 1: the day, starting to get dark. We've got, you know,
Speaker 1: a little bit of light left, but probably not going
Speaker 1: to see a deer, but whatever, We're just gonna walk
Speaker 1: up this wash and hit the ridge and then work
Speaker 1: our way back to camp in the dark. So we're
Speaker 1: walking up the wash and we hit this spot. It's like,
Speaker 1: really weird, is desert everywhere, but there's this like patch
Speaker 1: of I'm pretty sure they were oaks or almost like
Speaker 1: cotton woods. I can't remember what kind of tree. They were,
Speaker 1: like a like a bigger tree but dead in this wash.
Speaker 1: I'm like, huh, maybe there's some water here or something.
Speaker 1: It seems like maybe there's more seasonal water, like year
Speaker 1: round water, not just run off. We kind of like
Speaker 1: creep around the corner and this is like a tight
Speaker 1: wash where it's almost like cliffs and rock on either
Speaker 1: side and like smooth bottom, so you almost have to
Speaker 1: like rock climb up a few places to get up.
Speaker 1: There's a few places where I'd like hands someone in
Speaker 1: my bow, do like a rock climb move like a
Speaker 1: three step rock climb move, reach back, grab my bow,
Speaker 1: that whole thing like it was. It was fairly technical
Speaker 1: getting up this, but we figured we could get up
Speaker 1: and then get up on the ridge somewhere and go
Speaker 1: out and there's a spot with these trees, and I'm
Speaker 1: I'm looking and it's just something doesn't look right, and
Speaker 1: it's really thick, and we're in the bottom and out
Speaker 1: on the hillside walks this cous deer. I'm like, dude, guys, buck,
Speaker 1: Like I just knew it was a buck. And I
Speaker 1: put up my bind nose and sure enough, it's just
Speaker 1: this little it's a little spike. But it's the last day,
Speaker 1: last evening. I'm like, oh man, this is awesome. But
Speaker 1: the trouble is there is a ton of brush, just
Speaker 1: like sticks from this tree. So we were down like
Speaker 1: what would be the base of the tree, the trees
Speaker 1: out a little ways, maybe halfway between myself and the deer,
Speaker 1: and then the deer's up on the hill, so it's
Speaker 1: a pretty steep uphill shot. I've got branches and everything
Speaker 1: in the way, and the lighting is like, now weird
Speaker 1: because it's starting to get dark and and this deer
Speaker 1: is starting to move. I'm like, all right, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: make this shot. We've got time. The deer's really not
Speaker 1: aware that we're there, trying to get the camera on
Speaker 1: it but not be seen. I range and I'm ranging
Speaker 1: what I've started doing, is I try to get a
Speaker 1: range between like past the tree to the hill where
Speaker 1: the deers and I get it. It's like forty something yards,
Speaker 1: and now I'm ranging the tree and the trees like
Speaker 1: twenty yards, and then there's another tree behind that. There
Speaker 1: was like thirty yards, So it's like these two trees
Speaker 1: about ten yards apart, and then the buck's back on
Speaker 1: the hill behind it, and it is just a jungle
Speaker 1: of twigs and sticks and everything. So what I do
Speaker 1: is I draw back and I'm put my pin on
Speaker 1: the deer. At the time, I think I had like
Speaker 1: a seven pin spot hog size seven deadly pins or
Speaker 1: something like that, if I remember right. And so I'm
Speaker 1: using my forty yard pin. I think by this point
Speaker 1: in the buck is like forty two yards or something.
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, put that forty yard pin right center
Speaker 1: of the lungs and figure to get like a two
Speaker 1: inch drop. And then I'm like, okay, I gotta make
Speaker 1: this exact. So I creep up a little bit closer,
Speaker 1: you know, without being seen. I'm like exactly forty yards
Speaker 1: from that buck. And then I've got the twenty yard
Speaker 1: tree and then the thirty yard tree, and then that
Speaker 1: bucks ten yards passed it. So I draw back and
Speaker 1: I've got my multiple pins and I'm just angling my
Speaker 1: like kind of moving at full draw and leaning and
Speaker 1: ducking and just getting the exact right angle where my
Speaker 1: twenty yard pin on top is branch free, my thirty
Speaker 1: yard pin is branch free. And then I've got my
Speaker 1: pin on the deer, and I line all those things up,
Speaker 1: released the arrow and it's twat buck runs off and
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, that looked good. So we give it
Speaker 1: a few seconds, but I'm like, it was hard to
Speaker 1: see where it hit because it was lower light, but
Speaker 1: I just knew that based on the way that I threaded,
Speaker 1: the needle should be right in there. We end up
Speaker 1: going up finding the arrow and the way the buck
Speaker 1: ran right over the ridge, but it looked like he
Speaker 1: just fell right there. I find the arrow, grabbed the arrow,
Speaker 1: and we just walked to where we last saw the bucket.
Speaker 1: Sure enough, he's laying there, maybe fifteen yards passed where
Speaker 1: I shot perfect heart shot last evening, buck was down.
Speaker 1: When I think about archery practice for me, I'm honestly
Speaker 1: I'm not concerned with hitting dots on a target. What
Speaker 1: I am concerned with is just making a perfect shot
Speaker 1: in the field. And I shoot a bow for bow hunting,
Speaker 1: like I don't really I'm not really concerned about target archery.
Speaker 1: I'm not really concerned about whatever else. Like my entire setup,
Speaker 1: my entire When I pick up a bow, the thought
Speaker 1: in my head is this is for hunting. This is
Speaker 1: what I hunt with, and I'm going to make a
Speaker 1: really good shot on whatever I'm talking I want to
Speaker 1: make a clean, ethical kill. I'm going to be more
Speaker 1: successful that way. And I would think that most bow
Speaker 1: hunts is difficult, as bow hunting is, it comes down
Speaker 1: to that shot. I learned really early on that the
Speaker 1: difference between being an extremely effective and efficient and successful
Speaker 1: bow hunter is what you do with those shots that
Speaker 1: you're presented. And I mean, one of my best seasons,
Speaker 1: I think I went nine animals, nine arrows. It was
Speaker 1: like perfect, And I've had seasons to where it's the opposite,
Speaker 1: where I switched bows out of bow I didn't really
Speaker 1: like and it seemed like I would get an opportunity
Speaker 1: and somehow mess it up and it was the most struggling,
Speaker 1: worst feeling, terrible season. And what it comes down to
Speaker 1: is just having that like the guys that are consistent
Speaker 1: archery hunters, guys that are really good with their bow,
Speaker 1: are guys that can take those shots offered in the
Speaker 1: field and make a perfect shot. And the thing about
Speaker 1: that is in field shots are often very unideal. When
Speaker 1: you're practicing in your backyard, it's one thing you're training yourself.
Speaker 1: You're getting that muscle memory, you're shooting at those dots,
Speaker 1: and you're becoming proficient doing that, But that doesn't always
Speaker 1: translate to what you're gonna encounter when you draw back
Speaker 1: on that one opportunity you're going to get that season
Speaker 1: on a meal, they're on an elk onam, maybe you've
Speaker 1: got a sheep, dag antelope, whatever it is. So what
Speaker 1: I do is I like to practice things that really
Speaker 1: translate and create muscle memory for scenarios and situations that
Speaker 1: I'm going to encounter in the field while I'm hunting.
Speaker 1: I will say I shoot my bow quite often. I
Speaker 1: believe that arch like practicing with your boat, is very
Speaker 1: important a key to being successful. But I also believe
Speaker 1: that when it comes down to in the moment, I
Speaker 1: probably personally, if I was to judge myself, excel at
Speaker 1: shooting at a live target or a deer in the
Speaker 1: field as opposed to just shooting at a block in
Speaker 1: the backyard. And I might seem strange, but it's because
Speaker 1: the way that I practice is building that muscle memory
Speaker 1: for those tricky shots, those tricky scenarios. And so I
Speaker 1: want to break down the type of shots that you
Speaker 1: can do at home right now, whether you've got a
Speaker 1: long range, of short range, whatever. I kind of dissected
Speaker 1: my practice and translate that to scenarios in the field,
Speaker 1: so you can build that muscle memory so when it
Speaker 1: happens during a hunt, it's something you've done a hundred times.
Speaker 1: And that's the whole key to practice. That's why this
Speaker 1: summer prep series is so important, is because when you
Speaker 1: developed the right muscle memory, when you encounter a scenario
Speaker 1: that might only happen one it's a stock on a
Speaker 1: deer that goes off and you're gonna get your shot,
Speaker 1: and then you draw back and it's the first time
Speaker 1: you've ever taken a shot like that. It's a lot
Speaker 1: it's going on. But if you draw back and you know, hey,
Speaker 1: all summer, I've done this, I've got the muscle memory.
Speaker 1: I can just execute this flawlessly and don't have to
Speaker 1: think about it. I don't get that paralysis by analysis.
Speaker 1: I just go through the motion of making the good shot.
Speaker 1: You're gonna be a lot more successful. So I've outlined
Speaker 1: a whole list of things here, and I'm just gonna
Speaker 1: go through the list and give you specific tips on
Speaker 1: ways to practice. So I've titled each of these shots
Speaker 1: the first shot. We're gonna call the longhold. Now this happens,
Speaker 1: I mean this happened to me literally yesterday, where I
Speaker 1: was actually bear hunting. I drew back at a time
Speaker 1: when the bear wasn't looking. Then he went into a
Speaker 1: position that didn't offer shot, but I did not have
Speaker 1: time to let down, so I just had to keep holding, holding,
Speaker 1: and waiting for that opportunity shot. As I'm holding, I
Speaker 1: gotta make sure I'm not moving. I gotta also be
Speaker 1: able to put that pin in the right spot, not
Speaker 1: get tired, not get shaky, and still execute a good,
Speaker 1: perfect shot. So this is something that I practice consistently
Speaker 1: throughout the summer. And what that is is it's just
Speaker 1: mimicking those scenarios where you're drawing at the right time,
Speaker 1: but you may have to wait for a shot. It
Speaker 1: happens so often, and I'm very surprised at how many
Speaker 1: few hunters really hammer this home and practice this. So
Speaker 1: I have a couple different like when I'm shooting, I
Speaker 1: almost play games in my mind of different ways that
Speaker 1: I do this to keep it interesting. I mean, if
Speaker 1: you haven't figured it out by now, I kind of
Speaker 1: have a form of a d D where I just
Speaker 1: gotta make it interesting. I've got to keep moving and
Speaker 1: challenging and do that stuff. So the Longhold shot is
Speaker 1: something that I do a lot. And you can start
Speaker 1: out like this, maybe pick a time thirty seconds to whatever.
Speaker 1: You get your phone, you set the timer, you draw back,
Speaker 1: and you just hold, hold, hold and holding a way
Speaker 1: where you're pretty much holding on the target, and then
Speaker 1: the timer goes off and take your time and make
Speaker 1: a good shot. It's really good to set a baseline
Speaker 1: so you can see where you're getting, how you're progressing,
Speaker 1: because over time you're gonna be able to expand those
Speaker 1: times longer and longer and longer. By the end of
Speaker 1: the summer, you'll be able to be held at full
Speaker 1: draw for quite a while and still execute a great shot.
Speaker 1: So what you want to do. Start out, shoot just
Speaker 1: say five arrows, four arrows, whatever. Shoot a group. Doesn't
Speaker 1: even matter how far your range is. You could do
Speaker 1: this at twenty yards or closer. Maybe you just back
Speaker 1: your practice, you only got ten yards whatever. Wherever you
Speaker 1: practice doesn't really make a difference. But shoot a group
Speaker 1: just normal, call that your baseline. You go, Okay, this
Speaker 1: is the type of group I'm shooting at this distance.
Speaker 1: Now shoot a group with that hold or thirty second
Speaker 1: hold or whatever you're gonna start with, and then compare
Speaker 1: the two. What you're trying to get is you're trying
Speaker 1: to get your long hold shots to be very similar
Speaker 1: or the same as your baseline shots. So as time progresses,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe do that day you'll do three to
Speaker 1: five rounds at that hold. You want to make it
Speaker 1: where it's fairly difficult, where you aren't just perfect. So
Speaker 1: I like to start out, you know, for me personally,
Speaker 1: I do a lot of minute holds, and then as
Speaker 1: the summer progresses, I've done even longer than that. It
Speaker 1: obviously depends on your draw weight and other things. I've
Speaker 1: got a bow that's fairly heavy draw weight right now,
Speaker 1: and I've realized that my holds are not as good,
Speaker 1: is not as steady, and I can't hold as well
Speaker 1: as long. So I've been practicing this a lot more
Speaker 1: to build that strength and muscle memory for when that happens,
Speaker 1: because I've I've realized when you are in a scenario
Speaker 1: where you have to hold the bow back, that tension
Speaker 1: and muscle fatigue does build up. And what that causes.
Speaker 1: It causes a panicked shot or a rushed shot. When
Speaker 1: you get a slight opportunity, it may not be opportune.
Speaker 1: So you're in the field, you're drawn back, and if
Speaker 1: you haven't practiced this a lot, what's gonna happen is
Speaker 1: you're gonna start shaking, You're gonna start to get tired,
Speaker 1: and your brain is gonna say, I can't let down.
Speaker 1: I have to shoot. And animals gonna give you a
Speaker 1: slight shot or something, and you're gonna rush that shot.
Speaker 1: When you rush the shot, you're probably gonna mess up.
Speaker 1: You're gonna jerk your arm, you're gonna you're gonna do
Speaker 1: something that really is not what needs to be done
Speaker 1: in that moment. But practicing it now is gonna overcome
Speaker 1: that difficulty. It's gonna tell yourself look, I've done this
Speaker 1: a thousand times. I'm just gonna hold and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: make that smooth, perfect shot like I did all summer long.
Speaker 1: And so that one is key, Like add that to
Speaker 1: your practice. The next one we're gonna call the light
Speaker 1: and dark. So a few years ago I really noticed
Speaker 1: I like to shoot my boat at various times throughout
Speaker 1: the day. You know, I know a lot of people
Speaker 1: like they might shoot before work or after work, and
Speaker 1: it's kind of always the same sunlight wherever they're shooting.
Speaker 1: So one time I was out in my backyard and
Speaker 1: I was I think it was early morning. I was
Speaker 1: shooting kind of towards the sun shooting, and I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: I really suck at shooting and then shooting and it's
Speaker 1: just like not good groups, not really happy. And then
Speaker 1: later on in the day I shot again, I'm like
Speaker 1: tight groups, everything's great. I'm I could not figure out why.
Speaker 1: I was like, man, maybe it's just the morning. I'm
Speaker 1: not really dialed up or what. And I started to
Speaker 1: think about it and look at it. And in the
Speaker 1: middle of the day, what I was doing is the
Speaker 1: target was in the sunlight, and I would shoot underneath
Speaker 1: the eve of the house and my sight was in
Speaker 1: the sun. And then as I stepped back a little
Speaker 1: bit further, you know, I got into more shade, and
Speaker 1: my groups weren't as good. And then I went further
Speaker 1: back and then I was shooting really good again, Like
Speaker 1: this is making no sense, and I started to really
Speaker 1: analyze it, and what was happening was this particular sight.
Speaker 1: In the evening, the site got brighter, and as the
Speaker 1: sight got brighter, the pin was a little bit bigger,
Speaker 1: and it was almost like I didn't have is fine
Speaker 1: night aiming point. It was like tricking my brain as
Speaker 1: to what I was seeing and how I was aiming,
Speaker 1: and it kind of messed it up a little bit.
Speaker 1: I ended up taking the fiber optics out and just
Speaker 1: dulling it down for the evenings, in the mornings and
Speaker 1: in the shade. But it also really made me realize
Speaker 1: how much light factors into the way that you see
Speaker 1: your pin, the way that you see the target, way
Speaker 1: that you see an animal. Now translate that back into
Speaker 1: thinking about shots that I encounter in the field. Many
Speaker 1: of the shots that I encounter, it's like you're stalking
Speaker 1: in on the deer. The deer's bedded under a tree,
Speaker 1: you're in the sun, or you're in the shade the
Speaker 1: bucks in the light, or you're going in on an
Speaker 1: elk in the timber and there's just light going through
Speaker 1: the trees and multiple different ways. I prefer to try
Speaker 1: to stay in the shades the animals can't see me,
Speaker 1: but there's even those times where you're in something real dark,
Speaker 1: hiding and the deer's out, and that difference in light
Speaker 1: really affects the way that your eye sees the pin
Speaker 1: and you perceive distance and you aim at the target.
Speaker 1: And I realized that the difference in light was causing
Speaker 1: me to shoot different. I'm not talking like for me,
Speaker 1: it was different than the groups that I was used to.
Speaker 1: And so what I started doing was practicing in different
Speaker 1: times of light, like looking towards the sun with the
Speaker 1: sun at my back, with the sun on the site,
Speaker 1: and really understanding how to shoot an adjust for that.
Speaker 1: And once you start doing that, you're going to realize
Speaker 1: that it does make a difference in many ways, or
Speaker 1: maybe for a lot of people. I think one way
Speaker 1: that really combats that is being able to shoot with
Speaker 1: both eyes open. If you don't currently shoot with both
Speaker 1: eyes open, what happens with the varying light. It affects
Speaker 1: the way that your I focuses on the pin and
Speaker 1: not necessarily focusing on the target, and it changes the
Speaker 1: way that you normally shoot. So by practicing shooting in
Speaker 1: different lights and different types of light, maybe take that
Speaker 1: target and go set it in a dark hole where
Speaker 1: you can't really see what you're shooting at as well,
Speaker 1: you can't make out the definit shion as much, and
Speaker 1: getting used to focusing on that. Then do the opposite
Speaker 1: where you're in the shade and the targets in the light,
Speaker 1: because it adjust the way that your eye picks up
Speaker 1: things at different depths and allows you to kind of
Speaker 1: concentrate and work out the kinks of that focus. And
Speaker 1: that's just a huge thing that I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people don't think about. So one of the main
Speaker 1: factors to doing that is making sure you're shooting with
Speaker 1: both eyes open. And then another factor is, you know,
Speaker 1: just practicing and understanding what kind of differences that light
Speaker 1: actually does make. Number three here is going to be
Speaker 1: our obstruction shot, and that is pretty much the shot
Speaker 1: that I was talking about in the story. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of factors going on the angle, the light, and
Speaker 1: then the obstruction. I've been doing some of these, like
Speaker 1: little how twos on my Instagram stories, and this one
Speaker 1: a lot of people really like resonate with, because I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people don't necessarily kind of comprehend
Speaker 1: it in this way. You really want to be careful
Speaker 1: of obstructions when you're shooting, and you need to practice
Speaker 1: with some forms of obstruction. What I mean by obstruction
Speaker 1: is something that obstructs either your flight path of your
Speaker 1: arrow or your line of sight, and those two are
Speaker 1: not necessarily the same thing. So if you think about
Speaker 1: in that story where the CU's deer was forty yards away,
Speaker 1: I had a tree that was thirty yards away and
Speaker 1: a tree that was twenty yards away. My arrow is
Speaker 1: constantly falling essentially from the time it leaves my boat.
Speaker 1: It's making an arc, but it's like where it hits
Speaker 1: at twenty yards is higher than where it hits at
Speaker 1: forty yards. So the obstructions that I need to worry about,
Speaker 1: at least the ones in between myself and the target
Speaker 1: are the ones that are in the flight path of
Speaker 1: the arrow, not in the flight path of my line
Speaker 1: of sight. In that particular shot, on that CU's dear,
Speaker 1: I actually think that there was a in my line
Speaker 1: of sight, a stick right on his vitals. But I
Speaker 1: was aiming for that point putting my forty yard pin
Speaker 1: right on that stick. But I knew that stick was
Speaker 1: twenty yards away, and so looking at my other pins,
Speaker 1: I could see the gap at which the arrow was falling.
Speaker 1: When I actually practice these kind of shots, I've done
Speaker 1: this in my backyard by just even taking something like
Speaker 1: I actually used to do it with a trash can,
Speaker 1: and I'd like put some stuff in the trash can,
Speaker 1: like yard branches or whatever, even just use the like
Speaker 1: the trash can itself and kind of like put the
Speaker 1: trash can twenty yards, walk out to forty yards and
Speaker 1: have like the can maybe where the vitals are, but
Speaker 1: use my forty yard pin, which would be almost like
Speaker 1: center punching that like right on the can where I'd
Speaker 1: see the target in the background, and then have the
Speaker 1: arrow shoot over the can into the target. But what
Speaker 1: that did was it just really allowed me to say, Okay,
Speaker 1: that arrows above where I'm shooting. Now, how do I
Speaker 1: compensate for that? If you have a multiple pin site,
Speaker 1: the easiest ways at full draw see if your pins
Speaker 1: are on any kind of obstruction between you and the target.
Speaker 1: If they are, that's where the arrow is going to
Speaker 1: be at that yardage it's going to hit. I have
Speaker 1: seen it smoved to kind of a single pin site
Speaker 1: or slider site. Is actually I've got a double pin.
Speaker 1: It's a spot hog fast, steady xl UM. I get
Speaker 1: asked a lot what site I'm using, So that's the one.
Speaker 1: But the thing that I don't like about this. I
Speaker 1: love a lot of things about that site, but what
Speaker 1: I don't like is having those pins above my my
Speaker 1: primary pin to show me if I'm going to hit
Speaker 1: any obstructions in the way. So what I've had to
Speaker 1: do is I've had to build out this mental kind
Speaker 1: of picture of the flight path of my arrow. And
Speaker 1: the way that I do that is I go to
Speaker 1: a certain yardage and I'll say, like, I'll go twenty
Speaker 1: yards and I'll set my twenty yard pin, and then
Speaker 1: I'll shoot an arrow at the target at twenty and
Speaker 1: I'll take two steps back, shoot another arrow, step back
Speaker 1: a couple of steps, shoot another arrow, shoot another row
Speaker 1: out to you know, thirty whatever yards, just so we
Speaker 1: don't get low enough to where the arrow is hitting
Speaker 1: the dirt when you look at it. Now, it's kind
Speaker 1: of hard to build this as a verbal picture. But
Speaker 1: now you're looking your target. You should use the same
Speaker 1: pin on the same target, but as you've stepped back,
Speaker 1: you've changed the distance. Now what you should see is
Speaker 1: your arrows should be in a line vertically, but they
Speaker 1: should be like further down, and it will show you
Speaker 1: the drop in your arrow from that twenty yard to
Speaker 1: that thirty yard as out of every couple of yards,
Speaker 1: like exactly how much your arrow is dropping, and then
Speaker 1: building that out. You do that enough, you can start
Speaker 1: to build this mental picture of how your arrow is
Speaker 1: falling and how much room you need above and below.
Speaker 1: And what that helps you do is it helps you
Speaker 1: build out Now. I also, because I have two pins
Speaker 1: on the slider, I can kind of see that gap
Speaker 1: and I can like stack my pins to see visually
Speaker 1: whether it's hitting any obstructions or not. What stacking the
Speaker 1: pins means is like, say I've got my top pins
Speaker 1: set for forty yards, and I know my next pin
Speaker 1: down is going to be fifty yards, so that's a
Speaker 1: ten yard gap. So what I could do is if
Speaker 1: the obstructions twenty yards, so I know that it's approximately
Speaker 1: ten yards between my first and second pin, So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna set my second pin where the target is and
Speaker 1: that will give me, Okay, that's where it's gonna be
Speaker 1: ten yards this way of it, and then I'll move
Speaker 1: the bottom pin again to where the top pin is
Speaker 1: at and see if there's any obstructions in that. It's
Speaker 1: a lot to do, it's a lot to think about,
Speaker 1: but you can do that while practicing, so you really
Speaker 1: can get a picture of how far your arrow is flying,
Speaker 1: where it's dropping, and just understanding that trajectory. There's a
Speaker 1: lot to it. But when you do it enough and
Speaker 1: really understand how your arrow is flying, it lends itself
Speaker 1: to list next type of shot that I'm gonna talk about,
Speaker 1: which would be just like off pin shooting or gap shooting.
Speaker 1: And this is something that I practice a lot where
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what kind of site you have, whether
Speaker 1: you've got a fixed pin site, a multipin site, whatever.
Speaker 1: Let's say you've got a fixed pin site, you've got
Speaker 1: multiple pins, you've got a forty yard pin. Practice shooting
Speaker 1: at those yardages that's in between your pins where you
Speaker 1: don't have something to aim. So what the best way
Speaker 1: to do that is just like pick a spot, imagine
Speaker 1: a pin where it should be in between your two
Speaker 1: missing pins, and shoot for that. It's really like how
Speaker 1: many times you're out hunting you get to a yardage
Speaker 1: and it's not an exact yardage that you have a
Speaker 1: pin for. Maybe you've got a single pin or a
Speaker 1: slider site like I have. You get in, you set
Speaker 1: your pin, and the animal walks out three or four
Speaker 1: or five steps and you don't have time to readjust right.
Speaker 1: So just shooting at the target, practicing where your pin
Speaker 1: does not represent the value that you're shooting at. So
Speaker 1: that's understanding that trajectory, but doing a lot of practice
Speaker 1: shooting off the pins or shooting in the gap between
Speaker 1: the pins, shooting maybe adjusting your holdover and really knowing
Speaker 1: that trajectory and holdover and practicing those kind of shots.
Speaker 1: I do that a lot. I'll shoot my twenty let's
Speaker 1: say twenty yard pin at twenty yards, then you walk
Speaker 1: out to I don't know, twenty four yards, twenty five yards,
Speaker 1: thirty yards without using them. Now, if you're a single pin,
Speaker 1: you wouldn't have a thirty yard pin. Maybe you just
Speaker 1: got the first one, and then just knowing the hold
Speaker 1: over shooting and trying to hit that same arrow that
Speaker 1: you shot with the correct pin at that yardage. I
Speaker 1: hope this is all making sense. It makes sense to
Speaker 1: me because I do it a lot, but I know
Speaker 1: that it can be a lot. This is probably a
Speaker 1: lot easier to understand if you shoot your bow a lot.
Speaker 1: So if you're new to bow hunting, just keep these
Speaker 1: things in your mind when you're practicing. It doesn't always
Speaker 1: have to be shooting a spot on a target with
Speaker 1: the pin that is associated with on flat ground, because
Speaker 1: that kind of practice is really good for doing that.
Speaker 1: When you get in and stock in on an animal,
Speaker 1: A lot of times that does not translate. It's these
Speaker 1: these things where you've got to make a quick reaction,
Speaker 1: a quick move, a quick adjustment. I have shot quite
Speaker 1: a few animals with my bow. To say the least
Speaker 1: of those animals I have shot with my bow, very
Speaker 1: few of them were very ideal situations. I don't know
Speaker 1: if other people encounter ideal situations, and I don't. I
Speaker 1: just don't really know, but I doubt it. I think
Speaker 1: that what happens is you get in and there's some
Speaker 1: sort of cluster f that goes on. The animal moves out,
Speaker 1: there's an obstruction, the lighting is weird. There's just a
Speaker 1: million things, a million factors. And so out of the
Speaker 1: things that I have shot with my bow, I would
Speaker 1: say maybe one percent of them are that ideal, like
Speaker 1: walk out, everything is perfect, take the shot. It just
Speaker 1: does not really happen like that is often, and by
Speaker 1: being able to practice these inopportune times, you're able to
Speaker 1: capitalize on those real life scenarios. Let's go to number four.
Speaker 1: I call this the limited or the one time shot.
Speaker 1: When you're hunting, you get one shot most of the time.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've got stories, but my guys are called
Speaker 1: in an elk they've missed, and then like hold the
Speaker 1: elk there and they've got more shots off. But that's
Speaker 1: not always. That doesn't happen like that, So you get
Speaker 1: one shot. Maybe you don't have a lot of time
Speaker 1: to shoot through the summer. You can shoot a little
Speaker 1: bit on the weekends. You don't need a lot of time.
Speaker 1: You need to have a bow that you're familiar with
Speaker 1: and then just making that one shot count. So maybe
Speaker 1: take a week during the summer and say, hey, when
Speaker 1: I practice I'm just shooting one shot. If you've got
Speaker 1: a three D target, that's awesome. If you've got whatever,
Speaker 1: but pick a random yardage. Maybe you just go however
Speaker 1: your maximum distances on your phone, get a random number generator,
Speaker 1: put that in maybe between twenty and sixty yards or whatever,
Speaker 1: and go stand at that yardage and make a perfect shot,
Speaker 1: one shot and then call it a day, because that's
Speaker 1: just really gonna train you to put emphasis on that
Speaker 1: one shot. You don't get to shoot a group, you
Speaker 1: don't get a redo, you don't get a mulligan. That
Speaker 1: first shot has to be the best shot you've ever made.
Speaker 1: And practicing that and getting that mentality is huge. So
Speaker 1: during the summer there's times where you know, maybe every
Speaker 1: other day or whatever, I'm just gonna go out and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna shoot one arrow and I'm gonna make that
Speaker 1: one arrow a perfect shot. And if I make a
Speaker 1: bad shot, I'm gonna kick myself about it, beat myself up,
Speaker 1: and I don't get a redo until tomorrow. And that's um,
Speaker 1: that's a really good way to practice and get your
Speaker 1: head right for when that shot does come down. Number five,
Speaker 1: we've got this angle shot. Now there's a lot of
Speaker 1: people listening, they're probably tree stand hunters. If you're a
Speaker 1: Western hunter, most of the shots you're gonna make. And
Speaker 1: I've talked about this actually on the very first podcast,
Speaker 1: podcast number one, which is almost a year ago. And
Speaker 1: I don't expect everyone to listen to everything. So but
Speaker 1: if you get time to go back to that one,
Speaker 1: uh do it. Shooting downhill is tricky. I think it's
Speaker 1: one of the more difficult shots that you can take,
Speaker 1: and it's probably the most likely shot that most people
Speaker 1: are gonna take. So if you can go out somewhere
Speaker 1: where you've got a steep decline. If you don't have
Speaker 1: that maybe I don't know, put up a tree stand
Speaker 1: in your backyard if possible. If you're gonna be shooting
Speaker 1: from a tree stand a lot, practice the way that
Speaker 1: you're gonna be hunting. The same goes for if you're
Speaker 1: maybe your anal up hunting. You're gonna be in a
Speaker 1: ground blind. Put a chair in your backyard with the
Speaker 1: blind up or just the chair, and practice shooting like
Speaker 1: you're going a hunt. I remember the first time I
Speaker 1: got a ground blind, sat in a chair and thought,
Speaker 1: I never shot like this. This is gonna be interesting.
Speaker 1: I ended up just pushing the chair aside and shooting
Speaker 1: from my knees, and then the next year decided just
Speaker 1: practice shooting from a chair in a ground blind. Not
Speaker 1: that it's more difficult, but it's just something you don't practice.
Speaker 1: Your body is in a different position, and you want
Speaker 1: to practice how you're gonna be hunting. That downhill shot
Speaker 1: is one that you will encounter, and there is a
Speaker 1: level of difficulty to it because a lot of factors,
Speaker 1: especially in the mountains when the hills going one way.
Speaker 1: Gravity is pulling your bow in your body a certain way,
Speaker 1: and the air it's pulling the arrows straight down, and
Speaker 1: the line of sight might be further than the actual yardage,
Speaker 1: but the winds affecting it. There's a lot of factors
Speaker 1: that go into it. It's something you need to practice.
Speaker 1: I am fortunate I have live in a two story house,
Speaker 1: so I shoot from my balcony constantly. I don't know
Speaker 1: if that's possible for a lot of people. I've even
Speaker 1: like suggested, you know, getting like even just a step
Speaker 1: ladder and just that act of you know, make sure
Speaker 1: you're safe, don't do anything stupid. I don't want to
Speaker 1: hear that you fell and hurt yourself, broke your arm
Speaker 1: because you fell out of a tree in your backyard,
Speaker 1: or you rolled off your roof shooting your bow obviously
Speaker 1: use some common sense, but getting to those kind of
Speaker 1: angles is is super important. Great practice Number six, you know,
Speaker 1: shooting at a target that's realistic the hunting. I think
Speaker 1: three D target practice is awesome. If you don't have
Speaker 1: a three D target. What a three D target is
Speaker 1: you should know, but it's um like an animal shape target.
Speaker 1: They range in price from sixty dollars to six dollars.
Speaker 1: You know, find something that works for your budget. Me
Speaker 1: and friends always go in on these things, like get
Speaker 1: a couple of targets, will take them out camping, will
Speaker 1: take them out wherever. That's the best. Like if you're
Speaker 1: going to plan a summer camping trip, bring a three
Speaker 1: D target, get some buddies and go out and set
Speaker 1: it in real life scenarios, especially in kind of terrain
Speaker 1: that you hunt a lot, or maybe bring it out camping,
Speaker 1: set up like a tree, stands target whatever out in
Speaker 1: the field. Practice is awesome. And if you can't do that,
Speaker 1: I know that's hard to do. There's like archery leagues
Speaker 1: there's so many summer events with COVID. Yeah, it's probably
Speaker 1: put it like a damper on some of this stuff,
Speaker 1: you know. I know, um it was a Mountain Archery Fest,
Speaker 1: Total Archery Challenge. There's a lot of those, like awesome
Speaker 1: ones that take place in ski resorts and have cool
Speaker 1: shots and great targets that you don't get to shoot
Speaker 1: out a lot at home. But even just like local
Speaker 1: three D leagues, if that's a possibility where you live,
Speaker 1: I know I've done those a lot throughout the summer,
Speaker 1: even just like weekend tournaments, like it's not you don't
Speaker 1: have to compete against anybody but yourself. One of the
Speaker 1: ways that I like to shoot is instead of keeping
Speaker 1: like the normal score, because I really don't believe that
Speaker 1: the kill zone on those three D targets is correctly placed,
Speaker 1: especially for the angle that you're shooting at. So what
Speaker 1: I do. Actually, a good friend of mine, David Wise,
Speaker 1: he showed me this game. I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: other people do it or what, but the way that
Speaker 1: we shoot is at a three D it's like a kill,
Speaker 1: a wound or miss. So if you make a shot
Speaker 1: like and it's decided by the group yes, that's a
Speaker 1: kill shot. That's where you'd want to place the shot
Speaker 1: for the angle and this animal, you know, it's it
Speaker 1: doesn't matter where the tenoring is on this three D target.
Speaker 1: If it's a kill, like a good kill, that's a point.
Speaker 1: If it's a wound, that's a negative point, and if
Speaker 1: it's a miss, it's a zero. So it's kind of
Speaker 1: like real life where a kill shot is the best,
Speaker 1: a wound is the worst. You can even make a
Speaker 1: wound shot negative two or whatever. Put more weight on Hey,
Speaker 1: if you make a bad shot and a and a
Speaker 1: miss is like that sucks, but it didn't wound the
Speaker 1: animal and it didn't gain you a point, so it's
Speaker 1: a zero. And that's a fun way to play with
Speaker 1: that kind of hunting mindset of not necessarily trying to
Speaker 1: pick a point on a target that gets you a
Speaker 1: certain score, but pick a point on the target that
Speaker 1: would be an actual kill shot for the angle and
Speaker 1: the scenario that you would be hunting. And so you know,
Speaker 1: it might be a little bit higher and in the
Speaker 1: s older if it's quartering to you and you're shooting
Speaker 1: down or the same, like maybe further back if it's
Speaker 1: quartering away so just doing that with that hunting mindset,
Speaker 1: great practice, great practice. I don't know why I repeated
Speaker 1: that twice, but yeah, it is great practice. I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna buzz through a couple of me and I probably
Speaker 1: could have done a podcast and maybe I will do
Speaker 1: like a single podcast and all these kind of things individually.
Speaker 1: But another one that's huge. If you've got a late
Speaker 1: season hunt, practice now with your jacket on, because that
Speaker 1: bulky clothing makes a big difference when it comes to drawing,
Speaker 1: smooth aiming. Make sure that stuff doesn't hit your string.
Speaker 1: One thing that I've found when I'm hunting, I would
Speaker 1: use a face mask, and when I practice, I wouldn't.
Speaker 1: So when I draw back and nothing felt right. So
Speaker 1: when I would like wear a face mask for a stock,
Speaker 1: pull it down and then shoot. So one thing that
Speaker 1: I do is if I'm going to hunt with face mask,
Speaker 1: practice in the backyard. Shooting with a face mask. It
Speaker 1: changes the way the string touches your face, your anchor points.
Speaker 1: So just make sure that you get everything how you're
Speaker 1: gonna hunt, and that's key. The next one I have here,
Speaker 1: I call it the squat shot. This is the shot
Speaker 1: that I think is the most difficult. I've just identified
Speaker 1: it by like the times that I've missed. I've probably
Speaker 1: been shooting like this, and it's a standard hunting scenario.
Speaker 1: You creep up, you've got the animal out there, however
Speaker 1: far you've got it where you can draw out of sight.
Speaker 1: I never like to be insight when I draw, so
Speaker 1: I'm I'm down low, I draw back, then I raise
Speaker 1: up and shoot. I get my bow, settle the anchor,
Speaker 1: and then I raise up and shoot. But there's those
Speaker 1: times where, like if, especially if you're shooting from above,
Speaker 1: which happens to be the way that most stocks plan out,
Speaker 1: You're gonna like skyline yourself or whatever. So you're just
Speaker 1: maybe shooting just above the cover that you're behind, and
Speaker 1: you're in this weird like chair pose, half squat. You're
Speaker 1: fairly unbalanced and it causes you to rush or I
Speaker 1: don't know what it is, like the act of not
Speaker 1: being balanced very well, maybe not practicing it a lot.
Speaker 1: I've really focused in on that and said, look, this
Speaker 1: is how I'm like, why did I miss that shot? Well,
Speaker 1: here's a key thing that I've noticed over time, and
Speaker 1: now that's a shot that I practice regularly and even
Speaker 1: during practice, I noticed, Hey, my groups aren't as good
Speaker 1: when I shoot like that, So that's one for me personally.
Speaker 1: I just it's something that I kept encountering in the
Speaker 1: field and didn't even recognize until maybe I missed a
Speaker 1: couple of animals with a shot like that and thought, dang,
Speaker 1: that sucks. And now that's something I've added into my practice.
Speaker 1: I don't remember what number were on, but we'll just
Speaker 1: call it nine and you guys can correct me later.
Speaker 1: We're gonna go with like the long bomb for as
Speaker 1: long as I can remember. Well ever, since I had
Speaker 1: a modern compound bow, I'd like to just step it
Speaker 1: back and and push how far you can shoot. And
Speaker 1: that doesn't necessarily mean that's where I'm hunting from. What
Speaker 1: it does do is it allows me to focus on technique.
Speaker 1: And I kind of feel like, if I'm shooting at
Speaker 1: seventy hundred yards whatever, ninety yards, my pins generally go
Speaker 1: as far as a hundred anymore because I have a
Speaker 1: pretty low anchor. But if I'm shooting at those further
Speaker 1: distances more regularly, and I'm fortunate that I have a
Speaker 1: long range to practice at, if I can make a
Speaker 1: good shot at that yardage, when I get up to
Speaker 1: twenty yards, it feels close. It feels easy. It's a
Speaker 1: mental thing of just saying like, dude, this is close, donner.
Speaker 1: But it also you don't want to get too overconfidence
Speaker 1: say oh, it's so close, and just kind of rushed
Speaker 1: the shot. I've noticed that sometimes in the past, when
Speaker 1: I did a lot along practice, those close shots ended
Speaker 1: up being the more difficult shots because you would just
Speaker 1: your brain would just say it's easy, it's over and
Speaker 1: put it on hair and it's done. No, you still
Speaker 1: have to focus in and make every shot the same.
Speaker 1: So that's the key is mixing in the long shots,
Speaker 1: but then taking what you learn at that long distance
Speaker 1: and translating that into that close distance to make the
Speaker 1: most precise shot possible. But it gives your mind that
Speaker 1: feeling of I can do this, and that's really good.
Speaker 1: The one thing that I will say about this is
Speaker 1: I have noticed that over the years people have been
Speaker 1: shooting further and they get confident at shooting at those
Speaker 1: further distances. Then what happens is in the hunt they
Speaker 1: stalk in and they get to that max distance, they're
Speaker 1: afraid to stalk in closer because they think they're gonna
Speaker 1: mess it up, and they decided to take a shot
Speaker 1: from that further distance, and oftentimes that shot does not
Speaker 1: work out because at those further distances there's a lot
Speaker 1: that can go wrong. What I've been doing for many
Speaker 1: years now is whatever my maximum distances, I don't really care.
Speaker 1: I say in my head, I'm going to shoot from
Speaker 1: less than forty yards, and by doing that, most of
Speaker 1: my shots are thirty yards or less, and that's spot
Speaker 1: and stock whatever. If you're gonna stop at sixty yards,
Speaker 1: that's as close as you're ever gonna get. If you
Speaker 1: got to sixty, you can probably get to thirty or forty,
Speaker 1: and you should because I've realized at that thirty yard range,
Speaker 1: very little goes wrong. I mean, maybe you might blow it,
Speaker 1: but you know that could happen either way. You could
Speaker 1: blow it taking that further shot. I would rather blow
Speaker 1: it getting close than blow it taking a further shot.
Speaker 1: And because once I started doing that, my success rate
Speaker 1: and my like perfect shots went up. It's just having
Speaker 1: that mindset of it doesn't matter how far I can shoot.
Speaker 1: This is how far I am going to shoot, and
Speaker 1: I'm going to get to this close yardage on a cariboo.
Speaker 1: A few years ago, it was sleeping. I was snuck
Speaker 1: in on this cariboo. It was like forty yards and
Speaker 1: I thought to myself, it's sleeping. If it gets up
Speaker 1: and I'm in the wide open and sees me, it
Speaker 1: might run. So I'm gonna get to thirty yards. And
Speaker 1: I got to thirty yards and I thought, okay, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna get to twenty yards because if something goes wrong,
Speaker 1: I want to make sure that I make the shot.
Speaker 1: And then I drew back. Maybe it was too close
Speaker 1: because it might have heard me and ran, but it
Speaker 1: was close enough where on the move I actually made
Speaker 1: a perfect shot and it fell over ten steps later
Speaker 1: and expired. And it was because nothing was close enough,
Speaker 1: you know, just getting in and getting into that range
Speaker 1: that I know, hey, I'm already this close. I might
Speaker 1: as well get a little bit closer. Now. There are
Speaker 1: those times where you can't push it, but there are
Speaker 1: those times where you can, and I suggest you do.
Speaker 1: I got two more. These are going to be the
Speaker 1: last two. Wind is huge. There's very few days where
Speaker 1: I haven't got in on an animal. It's not some
Speaker 1: kind of wind. You want the wind in your face,
Speaker 1: but cross winds are big in the Mountain West. Luckily
Speaker 1: I live where it's windy all the time. If it's
Speaker 1: a windy day, I hear people like, Oh, it's too windy,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna practice. That's when you should practice. I've
Speaker 1: done many different techniques over the years. The one that
Speaker 1: I find the most efficient now and I've tried in
Speaker 1: the past, and it just is the most consistent is
Speaker 1: using my level to adjust for the wind. So and
Speaker 1: I's just like, well, what's that means? So if it's windy,
Speaker 1: what I'll do is all lean my bow. If it's
Speaker 1: blowing left to right, I'm gonna lean the top limb
Speaker 1: of my bow with the wind. What that's gonna do
Speaker 1: is it's gonna kick my pin over into the wind,
Speaker 1: so I can hold on the bull's eye, and it's
Speaker 1: gonna put my point of impact further to the right.
Speaker 1: So I'll use the level bubble as a gauge of
Speaker 1: how far I'm canting the bow. And right now, you
Speaker 1: can practice those wind shots even without wind because you
Speaker 1: can pick a spot on the target. You can can't
Speaker 1: the bow go full extreme where the bubble and your
Speaker 1: levels like all the way off on one side, and
Speaker 1: then like balance it out to where it's kind of
Speaker 1: incentered with the line and measure that distance of how
Speaker 1: far your point of impact is from your first shot
Speaker 1: to now how far right did it go? When you
Speaker 1: can't did your bow and then you can hold that
Speaker 1: same point of impact, but your arrow is gonna fly
Speaker 1: either further right or further left, and the wind's gonna
Speaker 1: push it back to your point of impact. So that
Speaker 1: is like really important to understand that. Now the last
Speaker 1: one that I'm gonna say, and this is very very
Speaker 1: important I understand during the summer, you know, you're going
Speaker 1: between three d s and all this other stuff, and
Speaker 1: it's great to shoot. And as a guide, I've had
Speaker 1: people show up and they're like, which broadhead should I use?
Speaker 1: And I'm looking at them, going like the ones that
Speaker 1: you shot with your bowl all summer and they're like, no,
Speaker 1: I haven't shot in your broadheads yet. I've just been
Speaker 1: shooting field tips. Start now, get a target. You can
Speaker 1: shoot broadheads at the Rheinhardt makes like this ball thing
Speaker 1: that I have and I've shot thousands of eras into
Speaker 1: with the thing. The block targets you can shoot broadheads into.
Speaker 1: Get some target you can shoot your broadheads into You
Speaker 1: need to shoot your broadheads. You want to be practicing
Speaker 1: all suwhere with your broadheads. If your broadheads and your
Speaker 1: field tips, your bow is not perfectly tuned up, but
Speaker 1: your broadheads fly good in your field tips are a
Speaker 1: little bit off. Sacrifice that little bit off during you
Speaker 1: know the times that you go shoot the three D whatever,
Speaker 1: But have your bow dialed and know where your bows
Speaker 1: at with those broadheads. That's what you're gonna be hunting with.
Speaker 1: It all comes down to the setup that you're gonna
Speaker 1: be using when you're hunting, and you want to make
Speaker 1: sure that you know where those broadheads fly it all
Speaker 1: the ranges. Your bow should be sighted in for what
Speaker 1: you're hunting with, not necessarily what you're just gonna be
Speaker 1: messing around with in the backyard. You don't have to
Speaker 1: shoot him every day, but make sure that your bow
Speaker 1: and you have shot your broad heads throughout the summer.
Speaker 1: And if you do all those many things I don't
Speaker 1: even remember how many of our long list, you're gonna
Speaker 1: be a lot better when it comes time to draw
Speaker 1: back on an animal and make a perfect shot. Like
Speaker 1: I said, you could go out in the backyard and
Speaker 1: flat ground and just shoot at the dots on your
Speaker 1: block target all summer long, and when that elk steps out,
Speaker 1: be completely unprepared. You could shoot a thousand arrows and
Speaker 1: be completely unprepared. And a guy that shot way less
Speaker 1: than you but did these things. When that animal steps out,
Speaker 1: when things are not really right, when everything is not
Speaker 1: lining up, but he's presented that split second shot that
Speaker 1: has some of these factors in there, that person is
Speaker 1: going to make a better shot. And that's what it
Speaker 1: comes down to, is practicing the way that you're going
Speaker 1: to hunt. I really like to actually keep these podcasts
Speaker 1: a little bit shorter because I think that it's easier
Speaker 1: to just listen to and quick listen. This one went
Speaker 1: longer than I normally want, but I got the freedom
Speaker 1: to do it, and I probably should have broken this
Speaker 1: down into two podcasts, but I don't know. That's fine.
Speaker 1: I think people will enjoy it. I believe that there's
Speaker 1: a lot of tips, and there's a lot of other
Speaker 1: things I could have talked about. But I will start
Speaker 1: putting some of this throughout the summer, like more visual
Speaker 1: aid on my Instagram at Ramy Warren. You can find
Speaker 1: me there, and I say that to you because next
Speaker 1: week I want to do a Q and A, so
Speaker 1: I'm probably gonna record that Q and A tomorrow. Um,
Speaker 1: So if you hear this today, I've got a lot
Speaker 1: of questions in the last couple weeks anyways. But if
Speaker 1: you think about it and you've got some questions, some
Speaker 1: burning questions, especially after hearing this one, any of the
Speaker 1: summer prep stuff, any stuff coming up for hunting, I
Speaker 1: want to answer those questions. I've said it a million times,
Speaker 1: not a million, but a lot that I try to
Speaker 1: tailor it to those, like the feedback that I get
Speaker 1: from you guys. So shoot a question. Um, I'll probably
Speaker 1: pull from my Instagram just because I'm gonna be doing it.
Speaker 1: I've got some stuff going on this weekend and won't
Speaker 1: record next week, So do it today if you got
Speaker 1: it while you're there. Yesterday I posted a video like
Speaker 1: how to turkey Hunting. This is kind of along the
Speaker 1: lines of this. It's tailored really toward people just getting
Speaker 1: into hunting. I know you're like, really, doesn't turkey hunt
Speaker 1: that much? But I think it's it's fun. It was
Speaker 1: like COVID and some other stuff, and I got to
Speaker 1: get out and go turkey hunting and create this video.
Speaker 1: I think you'll enjoy it, so give that a watch.
Speaker 1: It'll be on my i G t V or my YouTube.
Speaker 1: I did that video for this the hunter call the
Speaker 1: While that's actually a video game, and they act asked
Speaker 1: me to kind of make how twos for real life
Speaker 1: hunting because they found that a lot of their players
Speaker 1: are very interested in hunting, but don't hunt. They only
Speaker 1: hunt on the game. So if you're listening to this podcast,
Speaker 1: you probably hunt or very interested in hunting and or
Speaker 1: trying to learn and figure it out. So I'm trying
Speaker 1: to create more how to type videos for that thing.
Speaker 1: But the other cool thing is I'm actually a character
Speaker 1: in a video game now. So if you like the
Speaker 1: tips that I'm giving on cutting the distance, you want
Speaker 1: more tips, but you want to in an entertaining, like
Speaker 1: interactive way. I'm like a two D character that pops
Speaker 1: up as a tutorial on the game. If you're interested
Speaker 1: in that, I've got a link on my bio right
Speaker 1: now while you're there if you're gonna shoot me a
Speaker 1: message for the Q and a check that out For
Speaker 1: people that listen and follow my stuff, it's like less
Speaker 1: than half price so that was a deal that I
Speaker 1: worked out with them. Is like, I'd rather extend everything
Speaker 1: to the people that support me. So if that's something
Speaker 1: that you're interested in, please check it out. I'm pretty
Speaker 1: I'm pretty excited about it. It's just like some cool news,
Speaker 1: some good stuff in this time that I think is
Speaker 1: pretty cool. Like that's something that I never thought would happen.
Speaker 1: Somebody asked me to be a character in a video game,
Speaker 1: but it has happened, and that's pretty awesome. I'm pretty
Speaker 1: stoked on it. So if you want to check that
Speaker 1: out and until next week, shoot me your questions, shoot
Speaker 1: your targets and aims small miss small, see you guys,
Speaker 1: or just now you know what I'm gonna I'm gonna read.
Speaker 1: Keep that in your mind, but also practice like you hunt.
Speaker 1: Oh that's good. That's good.