Jocko Podcast - 278: The Wins Don't Always Come Easy and You Don't Always Win. With Bow Hunter, John Dudley

Episode Date: April 21, 2021

0:00:00 - Opening0:03:40 - John Dudley. Bow Hunting and Life.1:54:49 - Final thoughts.2:51:44 - How to stay on THE PATH.3:19:28 - Closing Gratitude.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

This is Jocko podcast number 278 with Echo Charles and me, Jocco Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. It's a little cold outside, but it doesn't matter. Nothing else matters right now except doing my job right, this job. I take another step as gently as I can, as quietly as I can. This is where it all matters. I can't let them hear me.

They do. They'll be gone. I won't get my shot. I see my buddy freeze. He sees them. My buddy slowly looks back at me and gives me a nod. It's go time. I prepare my weapon. By now, I know this weapon. Well, I've shot thousands of rounds through it in the last year for this moment. Ever since I was a little kid, it's been this way. Stalking through the woods, closing the distance, trying to see without being seen. Adult life was much of the same, sneaking around in the woods or in the desert or in the city or in the jungle. I take a few more steps and find some cover by a tree. This will keep me hidden. My buddy gives me a hand signal.

He's giving me the range. I initiate the procedures and is full, but it's empty. My heart is beating, but it's steady. It all comes down to this moment. I'm alive. That may have sounded like a combat scenario, but it wasn't. It was a description of a more recent pursuit of mine, bow hunting. And the buddy I reference is a real person, a real person who's an incredible archer, an amazing hunter.

one of the best coaches I have ever worked with in any discipline and most important a friend that is always ready to help not just me but an entire community of people the world renowned founder of knock on archery John Dudley dudley dud what's up man thanks for coming on you to finish that story but that was awesome It was like fire right Yeah and especially this season where we were on a lot of bowls And that happened that little that little thing played out

Time and time and time again And I ended up not getting any shots off but man It was freaking fun All right man Let's go There's a lot of people that really don't know much about you And let's go back to the beginning because I have heard piece together stories of your life,

and there's a lot of good ones, man. It's always surprising that you're here. You weren't arrested. You're not prison. You're not dead. You know, there's a lot of different avenues you could have headed down. Dang, right. Yeah.

Just a horrible... I don't deserve my wife or my son because all the time I'm just like karma. Like, he's that real patient snobes. sniper and at some point, like, I don't think he's made any fires yet. If he has, they've been off so much. I haven't heard him come by, but like, I'm still waiting just to get sniped because I deserve it if it happened. All right, so where were you born? Fort Bragg. Because your dad was in the army. Yep, yep. And is that where you, did you spend any time in Fort Bragg? Do you remember

spending any time in Fort Bragg? I don't remember it. No, I don't remember it because it was, I was, it was 76 and then I think by 77 we were in the Mississippi Delta. Was he still in the Army? No, I think he just got out. And then what was what did he do once he got out of the Army? He was a he was pretty much like Bill Murray. He was a groundskeeper for a golf course while he went to college, you know, after getting out of Nam, you know, came back and brought to college. He was like it. He was like a hundred percent. He was freaking scoping out gophers and wait, this is Caddyshack Bill Murray. Yeah, oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah, I remember, like, being with him in that golf cart cruising around, and he went to, and this is stuff I haven't even talked to him about. This is just from memory from that long ago, but I'm sure he went to Delta State in Cleveland, Mississippi. My mom worked for Baxter Healthcare, and that's why I think we were there.

And so my dad went to college for psychology, and, you know, and, you know, and, you know, and And, you know, I remember plugging, learning to plug holes on the golf greens and smoking that first ball washer with the golf cart when I was, I don't even know how old I was. I just know, like, you know, my dad being like, bring that golf cart over here. And it was in reverse. And I just stomped on it and just drove over the ball washer. That's the first time karma made a little. That's the first time karma started to go. Wait a second.

I need to be tracking on this dude. Yeah. I mean, I wonder what my dad would think, like, you know, damn, is that? a sign because like that would have been a that would have been a real easy one to get to get over yeah because it just I was I was a tornado for a while where's where'd you do like the bulk of your like when you were in let's say like six seventh eighth when you start actually you know figuring out the world and all that what where are you then um it would have been Illinois we we were in the delta until I was seven, I think, and then my mom got transferred up to Northern Illinois to work for Baxter.

And that's kind of where I grew up. And when I came up there, honestly, I was a little bit rebellious. I'm not really sure why. I just, I don't know, it was just what I was into. Like I was a skater. And honestly, there was, I enjoy skating. I enjoyed, like, freaking ninja movies. and so I'm like I built ramps and you know and people and I was just like a punk in northern Illinois that you know when when everything was like skater die and there's you know all these like anti-skate things that was me so yeah at school you know there there was definitely a little bit of I don't know hate towards skating then and I wasn't like I had no drag I was just wanting to like pierce my ears like play with fireworks, you know, blow stuff up. And this is how old? Built. Eight to 13 was just like, you know, my first construction job I said was building ramps. I mean, I had ramps all over the place.

My sister freaking hated them. How good at skating were you? I would say I was just below intermediate. How many hours a day were you skating? Like a lot. Yeah, I had half pipes and quarter pipes and stuff. What's up with the stellar level of just below intermediate? Because the only instruction I had was watching the search for animal chin freaking every day.

like in a big box of cereal and then go out and just try to get after it. So what, at what point or what was it that made you start doing athletics, sports? You teeing me up for this? So I think when I was, yeah. Is there some weird still? Yeah, because my dad was, I always knew my dad was a super athlete. You know, he was my uncle and, you know, my mom always told me how athletic my dad was. And not to mention he was just good at, you know, anything, like honestly, even a skateboard.

He's just like, what's that? And I, you know, I'm learning to skate on this half pipe. And he's just like, oh, let me check it out. And then you just do it. Meanwhile, you're just over your driving into ball watchers. Exactly. But, no, I had, like I said, I liked fireworks and like, you know, blowing stuff up. and, you know, one thing led to another and freaking burn my house down at 10 years old or 11, maybe 11.

You mean literally? Yeah, yeah, everything except for what was in my dad's car while he was at work and what was in my mom's car while she was, I think, in Puerto Rico on a business trip. How old were you? I think I was like 11 or 12. How did it happen? Playing with fire. Freaking lit some stuff on my bed on fire. and then, like, put it out, called my dad.

And my dad, you know, he's like, do you get it out? I said, yeah, I got it out. And he goes, is there smoke in the house? I go, oh, yeah, there's freaking tons of smoke. And he's like, open up all the windows. He said, you know, he's like, I hate the smell of smoke. You know, get that shit out of there. So I opened up everything.

And he's like, go open up the windows and everything. Come back and tell me what's going on. So I came back to the phone. I'm like, open up everything. It's smoking, but smoke's going out. So he talked to me for a little bit. And then he said, well, go check on it. Go back down and check on it.

And I went down. And when I went down, it was like engulfed because I just gave it oxygen. You know, I didn't. Like, if I would have just, like, taken that blanket and, like, you know, if he would have just said, go throw that blanket out in the yard, like, game over. But, you know, I put it out and then freaking fueled, like, open the front door, open the window and just freaking gave that thing. What were you burning?

Like, like match sticks? were you burning like what? I think I was just playing flame thrower with a lighter and some aqua net that my sister had. And so it, so the whole house burns down. Oh, yeah. Everything. Yeah, everything. And so it was, I mean, I don't really know what kind of conversation my parents had because they never, they kind of asked what happened or something, you know.

but they never like made me feel horrible about it. And then they just let you, I mean, you must have felt like freaking horrible though. Oh, still do. I mean, I laugh about it now, but yeah,

like I think about, you know, because like all my dad's, you know, all my dad's military stuff, like every picture he had from, you know, as a child,

you know, like everything we had, every single thing. I remember it was in the winter so everything like, froze like after they put it out and I remember digging through it with my dad you know we were like digging through the thing like a couple days later just trying to see what you can find and I remember we like we were digging and found this like closet that was in right inside our front door and it

had like fallen through and the like the glass doors were there and I remember my dad you know shucking the glass doors open and he had a pair of these like lacrosse winter boots and they looked brand new and I'll never forget how excited. He's just like, my boots, man. He freaking grabbed him. He's just like, my boots are okay. And I remember like, that was it. Like, other than what he had in the trunk of his car and what he wore it that day, like, that was it. So then we, you know, started rebuilding. Naturally, I was a skater. And not to mention 10 years old, I was five foot, 130 pounds.

So I was like short and fat, you know, short and chubby. And so, you know, short and chubby, skater, you know, wasn't an athlete. So then, you know, my dad could tell I was, I was bummed out, you know. And so he kept telling me, like, you need to go just go do something.

You know, just, you know, go get active, hang out with your friends. Like, you know, he wasn't want me to, like, sit around and get depressed about it. So they talked me in going out to like a school dance or something. You know, this is whatever fifth grade or something. I remember going and they said like, hey, this song's dedicated to John Dudley. And it was burning down the house.

Someone had one of the kids. Some jaco over there sent that one my way. That's unfortunately, that's exactly what. That's exactly my mode. when I was a kid to be a little freaking savage. Yeah. That's amazing to let your parents recognize that you felt enough guilt on your own without having to just turn the screws on your brain

to make you feel even worse about it. Yeah, I don't know if I could have done it. Like I don't know what the conversation was. They've never brought it up. And there's been times where we've talked about the fire. You know, it's kind of how it's referred to. but they've never gone into detail. Like my dad's never said like, yeah, man, I knew if I freaking threw that shit on you,

you know, it'd crack you or whatever. But what happened was, you know, and, you know, maybe this is just my dad's psychology, but what happened was after that dance, my dad knew, like, we need to get this guy out of this town. So we moved about 45 minutes away. And without him ever telling, like saying any, thing to me, I knew when I moved, like, I need, I need to freaking make it right with my dad. So that's when I went and started, I'm just like, you know, he's, I know he's always wanted

me to be an athlete. So like, I need to get my shit together and start getting into sports. And this is how old, how old do you? I think I was. Because you keep saying like 10, 12, 10, 12. Well, there's a big difference between 10 and 10. Yeah, I think the fire was when I was 10, and then we probably moved when I was 11. Yeah, because then when I got into junior high school, that's when I'm like, I'm going to be an athlete.

What did it start with? What was the first sport? Basketball. Well, yeah, I think basketball, football. You're just all in. Yeah, basketball, football, running. and then, you know, there was... But you had no experience playing basketball, let's say.

My dad always shot hoops. Okay, so you had a little bit of experience. Yeah, a little bit. But then I started growing. So I was like, I remember at 10, I've got this football card, and it says, like, it has your stats on the back. And I think my grandma gave me that photo because we didn't have any pictures, you know,

going back pre-fire. So I was like five foot, 130 pounds, and I was like chubby. Then when I was a freshman, so what is that, 13, 12, 13? 13, you're a freshman, I think. So then on that one, I was 6.3 130. And then by the time I was senior, I was 6.5, 205. So I just, like, stretched out and just looked like this Gumby going up and down the basketball court.

You know, my dad's like I always felt like if you tripped, it'd sound like a chandelier breaking across the ground. How much would you practice? Like, okay, so you're getting into basketball. Do you start saying, because I mean, that's a, for you to make a transition from like, hey, I'm a skater with freaking whatever. You probably had like the Tony Hawk bangs and stuff like this. Hell yeah. So you had the Tony Hawk bangs. Then you're like, all right, I'm maybe a basketball player.

You get a crew cut. You start freaking. freaking training. Is it like that kind of, are we talking rocky? What's that thing called? Montage. Is there a montage going on? No, not really because I still, I mean, I still liked, you know, getting in trouble

and freaking blowing stuff up and, you know, ordering fireworks wherever I could or egging some houses or, you know, whatever kind of this shit. I stole my mom's minivan one time. She had this Pontiac transport. You remember those ones? It was like a wedge. Like the sloped notes. Yeah, because eventually my parents got divorced,

and I can't remember when it was. It was somewhere, you know, junior high or something like that. But my mom traveled a lot, and I was home on my own a lot. And so I remember, you know, my mom would have, like, cars take her to O'Hare. And so I remember one time, like, I'm just going to go take that van out for a rip, you know, Like seven. All the ball washers in Illinois, straight up.

Yeah. So I'm driving around, you know, seventh grade, just driving around my town in this minivan. And one of my buddies was on his bike, like driving down the road. So I pull over, I'm like, what's up, man? And he's just like, holy shit, did you steal a car? I'm like, yeah, it's my mom's. And he's just like, oh.

And, you know, and I thought I could drive pretty, decent because I had my dad would never let me get like motorcycles or anything for obvious reasons but he let me get a boat he got me a 12-foot Boston whaler with a 25 horse on it so that's like I put a thousand miles on that freaking thing dude I mean my dad would fill up that little five-gallon five-gallon gas can and the Fox River chain was only a block from my house we live like right on a channel So I just drove that boat all the time. So to me, the minivan was gravy, right? No current.

You know, didn't have trim tilt. Like, this was, it wasn't a pull start. This was freaking gravy. But I'm sitting there talking to this kid, and I see someone coming up behind me in the mirror. So I said, I go, hold on. I'll let me freaking whip over, you know. And I remember putting it in reverse and trying to, like, do a little, you know, whip in but that long beak on the front of that freaking minivan I ended up swiping this dude's

like back pegs and like took him out underneath like the front of the car and like bent the back of his bike up a lot so then I ended up having to you know trade him like my good bike I had a GT you know I had to trade him like a good freaking good bike for the huffy yeah for this freaking Huffy that he had and and I'm just like you're not going to say nothing he said no but you know looking back you know if any of our kids rolled in with a brand new freaking GT you know with a gyro on it freaking pegs on the front and back you'd be like hey whose bike did you steal so anyway you know fast for today I'm narked out always always that kid broke bro he broke big time his dad's like we're out

You could drop like, they gave me, hit me, drove over me in the car. Yeah, it was just, you know, stuff like that. Yeah. Then you hear like, wait, job Dudley, that little kid was driving his mom's car. I'm going over there right now. Yeah. I don't think anyone wanted to get close because, yeah, I mean, I had, I had freaking straight bangs down here, slung it. And, yeah, just, I think, I think when I got into sport,

And originally I didn't want to really play football. I was supposed to play golf. Like my dad said, don't play football. You're not, you know, you're too brittle. Go play golf. And when I went to the high school, like the tough kid in school came up to me and goes, hey, what are you going out for? Because I was standing in the line.

And he said, I go, I'm going out for golf. He's like, no, you're going out for football. And I said, no, I'm going out for golf. I have to do golf. And I remember he said, Well, we need enough guys to scrimmage. And he said, you know, I'm quarterback. So he's like, you're signing up for football or I'm going to beat your ass.

So I freaking signed up for football and never told my dad, like, until he saw me in the paper. What do you see you in the paper for? Well, because I ended up becoming quarterback and, like, taking that kid's job. So he was saying I would take my golf clubs to school because I'd say, like, he's like, how's golf? and I'm, it's all right. But I was playing football because I kind of had to. And I started out as like defensive end and then tight end. And then I think I like chucked a football back.

You know, I think I caught a pass and like went in the end zone. And then the coach is like, hey, throw the ball back. And I think I just freaking just hucked it. And you just like, whoa, you know, wait a minute. So yeah, just one thing led to another and just I think. I think I loved, I don't know, just the constant challenge. It's hard to describe, but it's like if I know I'm not good at something, which I really had never fueled that,

then it didn't keep me coming like I'd get bored with it. But if I wasn't good at it or if I knew that I had room for improvement, then that's the things that I progressed at. But it just kind of got to the point where no matter, really what the sport was. I felt like I could do it above average. And then I honestly, like my body started to change. So it went from like me being like the short, fat skater to now I'm, you know,

second tallest kid in the school and growing and, you know, becoming an asshole, you know, just kind of being, you're just growing up just being like overly confident, you know. but I felt, I just felt so much confidence, just, it was like, gas, just sports for me was just gas, because it's like, oh, you want to do track? Okay, go do track. What did you do in track? High jump, triple jump. Whatever I wanted.

Pretty much, honestly. 100, 200, 400. And you did good at all of them? Yeah, I mean, I did for my team. Yeah, I did good. did the coaches like try and keep you focused on one thing I think you like the idea that some people have that the best thing to do with their kid is put them in one sport when they're four years old and just keep them focused on and then other people are like hey have your kids

play a bunch of different sports and it's going to make them more well-rounded in the end well it's in a way you look at it like functional fitness now it's proven that you know if I would have had more functional fitness in my lifestyle, I would be feeling a little bit better today than I did pre-surf, you know, for the first time with you. Because like some of my stuff is smoked, probably because it's not like functional fitness. And I'm, I'm a, you know, I feel like the reason I still today do good at just random things I pick up is because, you know, when you do different sports, you also get street smarts in athletics. You know, and that's, the thing, like there's book smart people and then there's street smart people. And as like an employer,

I, you know, I'm not, I don't look for a degree. I look for work ethic. And I look for someone that, you know, when they pull up and I look in their car, it's not a freaking wreck. It's not trashed, you know. And I look for people that have certain types of work ethic qualities. Because for me as an athlete, I feel like even though I wasn't like the pinnacle of all these different sports, I also learned different mechanics and different like, you know, physical smarts from doing a lot of things. And I always wanted to do good enough at it to where I felt like I could put it down and pick it up and still like represent it well.

You know, if I felt like I, if I did it and look like an idiot, in front of people I'd want to do it more until I could get it figured out but my son you know coming from England he was in the soccer first so he came over and you know he played soccer quite a bit but over here soccer's like a one-season thing so once he got into junior high you know he tried football and I realized that just wasn't his thing you know it just wasn't you know getting hit and stuff just wasn't his thing, but he was like always fast. You know, he's always fast. And he likes, I mean, he performs at his highest, if, especially when he knows someone's pumped about the fact that he just did good. So I ended up talking him into swimming because he did, let's see,

he did soccer. I knew soccer was coming up. We talked him into cross country and he didn't and really like the people. Love the coach, awesome coach. And then I talked to me to going into swimming, went into swimming, had a freaking awesome instructor, military dude, super disciplined, swam, like, honestly for how young he was, I was like, okay, these guys are crazy.

Two days, like, Sharon's getting up at 4.30, having him to the pool at 5.15, they'd do an hour practice. and then shower and then she'd get him home to feed him before we'd take him to junior, you know, whatever high school or, you know, whichever. So he had a pretty, like, awesome schedule, I thought. You know, I'm like, this guy, Andy was getting straight A's, which I don't ever remember taking a book home.

Like, I don't even remember being assigned books. Yeah, part of it was different back then, bro. It was different back then. Like, I mean, like, I didn't do, like, I see my kids, my kids will have, and they're older now, but when they were in school, it was like homework every day from day one, from like kindergarten on through high school, hours and hours and hours of homework.

I never did homework. Homework was not a thing. And I, and I, wait, now let me rephrase that. It was a thing. It did exist. I knew that it was a thing in existence, but it wasn't a thing that I was doing, right?

It wasn't like, oh, it's, you know, it's the afternoon. I'm going to do homework now. It was like the afternoon. I'm going to throw rocks and shit. Yes. That was where I was at. So what sports did you end up playing?

Because I know, like you rattled off one time to me. You're like, oh, I did freaking wrestling. I did basketball. I did football. I did baseball. I did tennis. I did freaking, you did everything. Yeah.

Well, you just named them all. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I did quite a bit. I wrestled a year mainly because I did basketball, really didn't like the coach. and just I'm like I freaking hate this guy so then I went and wrestled and coming into wrestling as a sophomore and we had a really good wrestling school too like both the guitas are from that's

right yeah you told me that yeah so like jason was my guard and and clay was um a little bit younger but you know we had a how fired up was clay guita when he was 14 dude because dude he's 30 whatever right now he's still fired up let me just tell you clay Well, Jason was, Jason was like on a clay level, but like more, like more of a gorilla. You know, Clay gives Jason a lot of credit for being a savage. And trust me, he was. Every game, he, like, before every game, he'd take a mouthpiece out of a packet, and we'd put it on his helmet.

And then he was like my pulling guard. and I remember like by fourth quarter I'd be like grabbing his mask I'd normally like grab his face mask to like call plays and I'd look and it would just be like the plastic piece like because he would chew him he would just gnaw through it like a he would eat a whole mouthpiece and his eyeballs were like this big around wait this is Jason or Clay it's Jason yeah Jason and I remember uh I remember one time like him and Him and his brother lived in a part of town that was like, you know, I don't know, there's a lot of savages over that way. You know, there's like a lot of wrestlers came from that group of town. There's a lot of badasses over there. And I remember one time, like, Jason came to practice and he was kind of pissed because he was like chainsawing something on his garage.

And the chainsaw kicked back and hit him in the top of the head and like chainsawed his head open. And dude, he just threw his football helmet on and freaking got after it. Dude, like that right there. I was just on, on Jordan Peterson. Jason and I wrestled the same, the same weight class. Which was what? I think 171 in our sophomore year.

But he was like way better. I was just on a Jordan Peterson's podcast a little while ago and he was like talking to me. I was like talking about how like when you, you're a young kid, and it's not everybody, but you just want to, like, fight and go. And that's my picture when you picture him just gnawing apart his freaking mouthpiece and his eyes are all big. This kid needs to go to combat somewhere. Like, that's what he's meant to do.

And he did. And he did. So you wrestled for, what, a year? Yeah, I wrestled for a year. But it's, look, I don't care how good of an athlete you are. You roll into wrestling. And did you not just get, like, crushed? Oh, yeah.

Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You can't catch up, you know, these kids that are. Yeah, I wrestled, I wrestled, I wrestled JV. And, I mean, they were, that we were a wrestling school. Like, you know, we had some really good wrestling coaches. And, yeah, it was, it was tough. It was tough.

But I really, I was still, like, getting into my body, honestly, because I stretched up so high. And so I didn't have a lot of coordination. But I had work ethic. You know, that's one of the things. Before, like, before I go down that route, like with multi-sport thing, with my son, he did swimming after cross-country, and then when he got to soccer, like, he started, the coach wasn't playing him. But at practice, this coach was taken weeks to try to condition the other player.

But Harry would be out there just running circles around people because he just got off of cross-country, followed by swim season, followed by now at soccer season, you're just running around out on some grass. You know, so for him it was nothing. And I remember after like three or four games of watching the coach just bypass him, I kind of pulled the coach to the side after practice. And I said, hey, I said, is there anything I should be working with Harry on so he can get more game time?

And he just said, well, I don't like single player, you know, he said, I want soccer players. Harry's too distracted with other sports. And I was just like, really? You know, I said, I deal with a lot of coaches on pretty high levels. And I said, I've never known a coach to not want an athlete on that. the team. I'm like, this kid's an athlete. An athlete as opposed to a sports specific one trick, one trick pony. Yeah. And so, yeah, right then I just kind of told Harry like, I don't think soccer's your thing. So he went into track and, you know, did cross-country track and swam four years,

even though he didn't like it, you know, still did it. And then, you know, ended up going to college to run and still gets awesome grades and runs and does all that stuff. And he's kind of like I was, but a little bit later, he's like now getting into his body to where. And he's also hit a new gear of competitiveness, which is really cool to see. Because I hit that way earlier. You know, I would get probably what held me back athletically

is I would get really pissed off. You know, it's like once I started to compete, I hadn't ever been taught the management of, like, you know, raging out when you, like, made a bad play or through an interception or something. And that actually transpired all the way into my archery career. And then luckily, an Olympic coach, like, helped that. That was a big turning point in my career, like, in my 20s when I got taught, like, how to get, you know, how to not let the arrows in my quiver that haven't been shot yet be affected by, the ones that already have and that you can't get back, you know, that's kind of how it was put to me. So that really helped.

But in high school, I think by the time I hit, you know, junior and senior year, I just started to, I just started to feel way more confident in what I was doing. And, you know, size-wise, you know, I was a totally different person than what I was. So what ended up being like the sport? Football, for sure. Yeah, football was the sport. And for me, I've always struggled with sleep. You know, I've always just been an insomniac.

And I also, one of the things that kept me awake was knowing if someone else was like having more time to train than me. So, you know, I was. Welcome to my world. Yeah. So I was like in high school, by my senior year, you know, I was like substituting any non-11. class that I had or all my study halls for like extra gym. So I'd go to like four gym classes. And then I had my football coach gave me a key to the to the gymnasium. So when I couldn't sleep at night and my mom would be gone, you know, I was home, I was home alone a lot. You know, I had,

my mom would just sign a checkbook for me to like order dominoes, you know. And whenever I woke up, I'd go to the high school, go in there, and I had, you know, my coach gave me this huge bag of footballs when I was a sophomore and just said, like, these are yours until you graduate. And so I'd just go to the gym and I'd pull the laundry baskets, you know, out of the locker rooms. And I'd just throw, you know, from corner of the gym to corner of the gym, I'd just run like three-step drills and just like run 73 passes into those or then into garbage cans or then eventually just like throwing into the basketball hoop and then just doing like three step drops five step drops seven step drops rollouts and just and then it got to the point where it's like I memorized what

I needed to do but then I memorized what the linemen need to do and then every you know like every player on the field it's like this is you know I knew the playbook front and back and how good how good was your team sucked horrible how'd you guys do senior year horrible you know just really underperformed At all the camps, we were awesome because it camps. How should you have done? I mean, were you from like a weak school, a weak football school? No. You're from a good football school and you guys were just playing shitty.

No, you know, it's kind of like when you, I forget what podcast it was, or maybe it's in your book when you were talking about through buds, there were the two teams of the two different boats. You know, I remember like one of the six. sayings my football coach always would have. He'd be like, you know, bring the boat in. You know, he always would say, like, the boat's lost. He's like, it's your job to bring the boat in, you know, and he was like. Your job meaning you, John Dudley. Yeah. Because you're the quarterback. Yeah. I was responsible for every mistake we made. You know, if we screwed around and practice got shut off early,

he would, he would like pull me back and tell me like, you're going to run laps for every person here that screwed off today and today there was, you know, we freaking 46 minutes early, we quit practice, I want 46 laps. You know, it'd be like stuff like that. But we had a small group of people for like seven-on-seven camps that were at all the, they were at all the camps. I would call them and say, let's go practice. But there was, and we, at seven-on-seven, we were great. but there was, you know, four other people that weren't being included. And then the entire defense. So we were just, we had really good pieces, but nothing ever, like, flowed as a team.

Did you do good enough? Did you get looked at by colleges? Yeah, I think the first college, I think the first college that looked at me was Ball State when I was a sophomore. I remember at the end of my sophomore year, I went to Ball State with my mom. And that was like that lit a totally different fire because then I realized like, you know, I'm going to I'm going to go somewhere. And so, you know, I, my dad, even though my parents were split, my dad was at every freaking game. And he was quite a ways, you know, he kind of moved to a different town. But he came to every game.

And yeah, I mean, my life was was sport. sport and training. I mean, I loved lifting camps like in the summertime. It was every football camp I could sign up for. And honestly, my mom's like, you know, she was so, you know, involved with her position at Baxter to where she's like, yeah, if you want to, you know, go somewhere for a month in the summer, do it, you know, because I think she probably just, you know,

was managing plants in Puerto Rico or Singapore. wherever the heck, you know, she was for her job. So I just, I did not miss an opportunity to, like, go to a camp or something like that. So did you actually get recruited to go in your senior year to go to college? Yeah, there was several. And I ended up choosing, I wanted to go back. My dad was moving back to North Carolina. My uncle was in North Carolina. And one of the coaches at Western Carolina played with my dad and you know we ended up going out there and it was kind of a decision that I would be close to to the Dudley family out that way and I like the idea of like getting honestly I never really felt like that town was home you know and maybe it's because like you know

my parents were kind of always split I saw my mom limited you know when she wasn't traveling but we like we traveled away from like me and my mom were together more when we'd go places because she'd say hey you know I've got a I've got a meeting in Salt Lake for two days do you want to come with me and I'd say oh can I go to I've been wanting to check out snowbird and she's just like yeah you know so we'd fly out there and she'd say the bus will pick you up in the morning at seven and they'll bring you back to you know just make sure you're back here this time so I'd just go up and then I started, you know, skiing and shredding, loved skiing, worked at a little ski hill up there and skied bumps, like, all the time in the wintertime.

And it's cool. So then what happened with college then? So I was going to play football. And, like, the one thing that I haven't talked about was back at age 10 when I was a super punk. my uncle and my grandfather got me into like hunting deer when we'd go down to Mississippi we'd go back down there to see family for Thanksgiving and so you know they were like you know we need to get you out in the woods and my grandpa was all you know Korean war veteran and he's like you know we need to make a man of you because I'm showing up with freaking Tony Hawk

haircut and freaking earrings and you know stuff like you stuff like that so he's out there you know making me sit and firing up beds and you know just trying to like make a man out of this freaking softy that's coming down and so you know I got into hunting and just loved it like it was and honestly probably because it was hard and it like took a ton of patience and it was very different from being able to just screw off, you know. And so it was it was the first kind of form of competition in a way, just that it took a lot of moving parts to be successful. So, you know, when I got my first deer, it was like winning my first trophy, right? I mean, I was totally hooked at how freaking awesome it was. And just seeing my family like, oh my gosh, you got a deer. And then we

ate it and everything, you know, and it was just this thing. thing. So every year for Thanksgiving, I was looking forward to going back home and doing that. And I got into bow hunting. I think when I was, the first year I hunted, they gave me, I had a gun. And then when I was 10 is when I started shooting a bow and bow hunting. So that was once a year that was happening. But then I got a little bit better towards the end of my senior year. I was shooting a lot more around home like I was practicing and stuff a lot because again I had a lot of free time you know my mom would be gone you had no homework yeah no homework if I wasn't like cutting grass like you know for five bucks a lawn then that's what I was doing but uh I ended up driving down this road

I actually had hurt my knee so I was I was I moved into college a little bit early and her my knee and then I forget what happened but I was at home back by my mom's for some reason I was just driving around on this like a back road and I think I was coming I think I went to college yeah I was I moved in I moved in and I'm talking like there a week maybe maybe a week and a half and you and on a weekend you hurt your knee at some point yeah and so you're not really able to play yeah I did whatever reason you go back home yeah we did some We did some, like, run-throughs. I know I did some stuff with, like, you know,

I remember wearing, like, pants, jersey helmet, you know, just doing, like, dry runs and stuff. But I wasn't, I don't, I never, like, hit, really hit helmets, you know, in college. And so it was the weekend. I went back and saw my mom. And then I drove, I think I went up to the ski hill just to, you know, go up there and say hi to some people that worked up in the summer. And on my way back, I took some backwards.

roads back home. And I went by this little town called Ringwood and I saw this sign on the side of the road that just said archery shoot like spray painted on a board and just had an arrow like pointing that way. So I went down that road and I'm like, what's this all about? Damn. Yeah, I had my hunt. I went down this road. Yes, you did. Yes, you did, bro. Went down the road and I said, what's this all about? And they're like, oh, we got a, you know, 40 target course and you know here's how the scoring works on the animal you know those 3d animal targets i'd never seen 3d animal targets i'd always like shot at bales of hay and stuff like that so i went out and freaking halfway through the course i was out of arrows i had freaking

shot the woods down and i remember leaving the course got my car went back up to wilmot Wisconsin, which was where the ski hill was, but there was also a Gander Mountain Outlet store there, went in and bought more arrows, like, in a rage, and went back to finish the, because I didn't want to not finish the course, so I bought more arrows to go back to finish. By the time I, like, finished, everything was pretty much done, and they were having the award ceremony, and the guys that were up on that podium all had these shirts that had, like, their local shop on the shirt. So I remember this was on a Sunday and on Monday morning,

like when they, I think they opened at 1 o'clock, but at 1 o'clock, I was at that shop. Just like, when are those guys coming in that, you know, won this weekend. And I just started staying in there and watching these people shoot and ask questions. And I was there a few days, It's just kind of being a stalker. And the owner of the archery shop called me to the side, said, hey, kid, what are you doing? I said, I'm just, I'm watching. I'm watching.

And he said, well, come in the back room. I need you for a minute. And he took me in the back room. And he said, I forgot to get this guy's arrows done. He goes, if you ever built arrows? And I said, no, sir. And he goes, okay, well, here's how you do it. And he said, you know, you're going to clean this feather like this.

Then you're going to put the glue on it. You put it in this clamp. And then you stick it down. And he's like, you know, set this timer and then move on to this next jig and do his second arrow. And then when you get to the six, you can go back to the first. If the timer's gone off, you rotate it. And so I just sat in this room and fletched this guy's arrows. And then kind of came out.

And I said, like, I got him, you know. So he came out and gave the guy's arrows. the guy just said, all right, do those ones. And he had just this buckets of arrows that needed to get done. So I just started fletching arrows. And then the next day, he's like, have you ever worked on a bow? And I said, no, I haven't. And he's like, all right, well, let me show you how to change a string.

And, you know, and then he's like, hey, if these bows are here for maintenance, you know, here's the checklist. You've got to, you know, clean these axles. You've got to wax a string and melt it in with this. just started showing me. And honestly, after probably two weeks of doing that, I ended up telling the guy, I said, hey, am I going to get a paycheck? And he's just like, I remember the guy's name was Mike Donovan, some people in the archery industry, like old timers, they still remember him because he was a pretty hardcore archery manager at the time. But he goes, you can't put value on what I'm

teaching you right now. I remember I'm like, no, sir, you can't, but I can't put gas in my tank, you know, with experience. So he, he's like, I'll give you a four, ten an hour. And I'm just like, oh, yeah, you know, I was freaking pumped. And I remember going home to my dad and I went to my dad. Home to North Carolina or whatever. Well, my dad at that time, I think was, yeah, he was still in Rockford, Illinois. And I remember telling my dad. I'm not going to go to college to play ball because I've got this archery thing going and it's good.

It's good. He's like, you're like, dad, four, ten an hour. I did. Because I remember, you know, again, he's always been super logical. And he's also, like, tried to not. He never really told me, like, at that point, He had never said like, what's wrong with you or, you know, that's a terrible decision.

But in that instance, he's like, I really feel like you need to make your own decisions and you need to know, like, what to do. He said, but I have to say, I think this is a terrible decision. And I think for my 40th birthday, he wrote me this really long birthday card. And like in there, he said, he said, he. He's like, you could have not done a better job of proving me wrong. Because he's like, he goes, he goes, I can't believe, I can't believe what you've done in like 22 years type thing, you know.

Hey, when you went to that 3D shoot for the first time on the side of the road or whatever, what do you think it, what feeling did you have? What was it that just freaking was like, this is it? I listened to Ted Nugent on Rogan And like he gives some crazy description of like launching an arrow It's all poetic and everything Yeah Is that what you you were just like?

No, never had that For me it was I couldn't like the fact that I knew That was a that showed me how inferior I was With a bow and arrow and I loved hunting And it showed me that there was every person that was in that parking lot was a lot better than me, and that was a problem. And that 100% was, you know, I had to go to the shop, I had to learn.

And then it's like, I'm not going to leave until I beat these guys. These guys that are winning, like, I need to beat them. And then once I did that, it was, you know, I remember I did really well, did well fast. and I remember going to a shoot that was about 45 minutes away to the north. And I remember going in there, and my name was like written down on a piece of paper that was like at this registration desk. And these are rinky dink like local shoots, you know.

I don't know if like you have like local surf tournaments where it's not like, you know. So I just said, oh, what's up with that name you got right there? and they're like, oh, this guy is supposed to be a serious cheater. So when he comes, we're going to send someone out with him. And I go, oh, well, that's me. Who's coming? Wait, so they were thinking this because you had been doing well in these other tournaments? Yeah, because I kind of came from nowhere.

So these people that that was their thing, they're just like, where did this guy come from? Who even is he? You know, they'd never seen me even at a local club, you know, because I was just nothing. And then went, as I always do, you know, oh, I'm not good at this, then just like head first into the deep end. Were you shooting arrows at night, waking up in the morning, shooting arrows? Oh, yeah. Just full on, full on obsession immediately. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, like, you know, had to, like sat around after tournaments and would like take down. courses for places if they'd give me a target. So I'd have another target, you know, or, you know, I would freaking cut grass or clean the bottoms of people's boats or whatever so I could buy another target. And then, you know, I had to have an entire range to practice on. And then it just, you know, and then I wanted like a colored target bow. And then it just, it's just like, it's me. It's just me. It's who I am all the time. It just, you know, I had to like, I had to get good at it. then there came a point where, and actually at that tournament was kind of a turning point because

this is the cheater one? Yeah. So I went out, I ended up winning that tournament, and they had someone like writing score. And I said, I go, well, that was kind of nice, just having someone else keep score. I'm like, hopefully keep score for these other guys that have a problem, you know, because it's called like pencil pushing, you know. And they just said, well, if you don't want to deal with it. that you could always go to nationals where there's two scorekeepers and so I'm just like where's that so

then I went to the national triple crown and slept in the back of my truck and you know shot at that and sucked at it horribly but then the next year you know I instead of going like two I went to all of them drove to all of them and just got better and got better and then within like five years I was at a level that was, you know, that I was happy with, but I was also still refining it, you know. Just there's, that's what's cool about archery is, I think the reason I'm still doing it is because, you know, I still find, if I'm not centered, then it shows.

So it's hard, like, you're never going to have a perfect game to where you could just back away and know that, like, okay, that was a Cinderella story I'm done. because you can go have a perfect round, but then an hour later have something. You've got to shoot another one. Yeah. Yep. Yep.

How do you cheat in archery? Well, I mean, there's just, there's groups where, you know, at like a local tournament, they're not going to send a scorekeeper out. So let's just say, like, we all went out with our wife. There's definitely people that, you know, they would shoot down there and score like an eight, but they just like write a 10. And meanwhile, like the wives and kids are just like not giving a crap about what's going on, but then you just turn in your scorecard and, you know, this.

But once you get into like the professional events, there's two people that keep score. The majority of the group has to agree on the arrow call. And then if there's ever a divide, then you call an official scorekeeper to come and call it, which is kind of a big reason why I liked progressing, because once I was shooting, like, internationally, you know, they had, like, you couldn't even have an arrow judge that was from your country. So if you, you know, it's like if an American needed an arrow call,

someone would come over, like an official judge from another country would come over because obviously now there's teams competing against teams. So, you know, these judges had schooling on how to call, an arrow and you know stuff like that so how does that go like you know I enter the tournament and then what I just shoot um at my own pace kind of thing and keep my own score I think what's could what might be confusing you echo is like the first tournaments that he's talking about are just like kind of like local it'd be like you go into about boa it's like going to like a little jihitsu tournament somewhere and there's not like judges you know what I'm saying where a jihitsu tournament

like an in-house jihitsu tournament like when you have like at victory have an in-house jih Tijuana tournament. There's no like escalating the call that the point keep. You know, it's like, hey, man, you lost,

whatever you did good. Someone could be like, oh, yeah, no, you're not getting points on that sweep. So these are just like local little tournaments where you go out and you score and you're like,

you know, my eight's pretty close to a 10. And I'm going to give it to myself. So there's no one watching or anything? Yeah, because you just, you just can't do it. Like,

through, like, through this course to where it's not like golf, like professional golf there'd be like a crowd following like those leaders through that course which in professional archery like that happens and then once you get into shooting in the finals a lot of times it's like on monitors and everything so obviously people can see on a big screen where the arrows are landing so I mean probably the same in competitive like rifle and stuff like that yeah it's the same in competitive anything like really like when you're at a local tournament

or whether it's freaking bowling, you know, like over the line, you know, market zero. They're just having an argument, you know. It's like you can cheat. And then, but then you turn in like a score card or something. So when you shoot, you score however many points you, and then you write it on the card, then you go what to the next target or something? And then you go through a course. Yeah.

And at the end you turn in the card. Yeah, it'd be like you playing cribbage with someone at home. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh, I won. They're like, well, wait a minute. dude we have to be at least even you're like no it's keeping score like here's how it look or you go to Vegas and play cribbage and like it you know everything you're doing is under you know a magnifying glass type thing so at what point did you make the transition or was it the whole time from like 3D archery to target archery um I got I honestly got a little bit bored in

3D archery pretty fast and part of the part of what I didn't like about it There was just, I felt like I was going to the same places all the time because there was, I'm trying to think, a turn pro in 98. So by like 2003, I just felt like I would land, know how to get to the shoot without even, like, wouldn't even need to like look at a map. I'd just know where to go. And then you go to these courses and it would be like, well, a lot like, you know, we shot Big Sky together, you know, for the total.

Total Archery Challenge. And we've shot the same course because it ends in a good place, you know. But there's certainly targets that you, like, you would be like, oh, last year we had the white bunny right here, you know. And so it got to the point where it was like that. I was going to places where I'm, you know, 26 or 30 weekends a year. I'm traveling to do tournaments. And it just felt super repetitive and in the end I realized there's probably 10 or 12 people that are fully capable of winning like any weekend but it's almost like if you had that same tournament you know two consecutive days over and over and over again there's probably like five that would win it differently each of those times and I don't know it just came it it just got to be stale for me

I got, you know, I just really got bored with that. And it got to the point where I pretty much had it set in my mind of, I'm a target archer to be a better bow hunter, you know. And that was like my mentality is I was just, I could barely be focused by the time the world championships rolled around in August. I barely cared because I just wanted to be hunting in September. And, you know, that, the hunting was always the focus. for me and it was like I got more out of it.

So, you know, I just eventually, I did what I needed to do in competitive archery to like help me build a platform to where I really wanted to go, which is I've always liked to coach, you know, and, and I've always liked really good coaches. You know, I've liked, I'm the type of person where I liked coaches that like, honestly, that like yelled at me and were like Harry's head coaches were, you know, Sharon said, that guy's just a dick. Like I kind of think I would love that guy, you know.

If he like grabbed my face mask and he's yelling at me, like it would make me do better on the next play. Whereas now as an adult, I've learned there's certain people where if you did that, you're not getting that result. A freaking breakdown. Yeah. So wait a second.

So you're doing the target archer thing and then, or sorry, you're doing the 3D thing. Then you start doing target archery. Like, at what point are you part of Team USA and you're putting on the Team USA stuff? Dang, man. I don't like have my whole life outline. So I had retired. You know, I got sick of it. I retired.

And I was working at a bow manufacturer, you know, didn't go back to the, that but at 18 um you know I started working for this archery shop didn't like the one-on-one experience that that archery shop owner was given people buying new equipment and I was spending a lot of time with people and so I got called in and he told me you know hey do not spend that much time with people when they buy new gear if they go over 15 minutes they need to be paying coaching time per hour. And I just said, well, no one was in the shop and I didn't have anything else to do. Why wouldn't we help this guy out?

And I remember he said, well, if you want to run a business that way, then you need to go start your own archery shop. So I just thought, oh, okay. And so I went and started my own archery shop about 45 miles away. at it was actually our family had a horse ranch in southern Wisconsin at the time my mom and my sister

so I ended up building a pole building there and start my own shop and that was the same time I started shooting professionally and then got offered a job from a bow manufacturer to move to northern Wisconsin to you know come in as like an early sales rep so I ended up

working for this bow company and competing so I mean my life was archery 20 hours a day. And then I kind of got burned out with it. And I found myself liking, going fishing or going hunting or just doing something that wasn't like training, training, training for archery. And then I had retired for like a few months. Retired from. I kind of just said I'm not going to shoot professional anymore.

And I just stepped away. and I was doing some coaching. Like I was doing a lot for some different, like, youth camps and stuff. And I remember seeing another archer at, like, at a trade show. And he said something about, you know, I heard you're not shooting anymore. And I just said, yeah, I got, you know, bored with it.

And I kind of just jokingly said, you know, maybe I'll come over to Target Archery, because 3D Archery is all, like, phone. animal targets with molded in scoring rings ranging from you know the size of a dime you know up to like what would be considered just the vitals which would be bigger but then target like a dinner plate size yeah but then for target archery there's several different formats and that's bull's eyes you know with scoring rings but a lot of different games to play right you know there's tons of different formats of shooting in a bull's eye

target different distances. Some you don't know the distance. You have to estimate it. Some have like multiple sized faces. Some are certain amount of arrows at this distance, certain amount at that distance, that distance. But anyway, I said to this guy, yeah, maybe I'll just, I don't know, maybe I should just try target archery. And I remember he looked at me and goes, come on in. The water's fine. Oh, famous last word. And that was it. I was like, I was like, like, okay, when's the first tournament? And the first, he told me the first tournament was at the Arizona Cup in, at the Ben Avery. Did you ever shoot at the Ben Avery Center in Arizona? So that was the first one and ended up, you know, ended up in the medal, you know, gold medal match with that guy

at that event. With that guy. With that guy. In your first event? Yeah, that won. And I showed up like everything I had was wrong because, you know, there's, I don't know how to describe it. It'd be like if you did, you know, tactical, you know, tactical competition and then someone asked you to go to a sniper event and then you like showed up with your M4 or something, you know, I don't know. No, it's, it's mission specific. Yeah. They're both archery, but one of them has like you're standing around, you got more time to shoot or whatever, less time to shoot. You're just gear is going to be different to whole nine yards. Yeah.

So I remember right before that metal match. And as it happened, I was low in the brackets. He was, you know, very high in the brackets, but we were on opposite ends of the brackets. And so at this center, you know, there's, you know, it's, let's say it's a hundred yards wide. I was like at this end and he was at that end. And as you shoot against someone and go through the brackets, he just, you just, come to the middle. So like when I won my semi-final match, I remember like looking over and I saw that he won and I'm like, okay, here we go. And he comes over and he said, man, he's like, how, he said,

how are you dealing with it? And I said, dealing with what? And he said, well, I've won this nine times and, you know, everyone wants me to lose. And he said, so I can imagine like, you know, the pressure you're feeling, you know, being that guy. And I said, man, I see it the other way. And he goes, what do you mean? I said, dude, I'm out here. My equipment's a joke. I said, I'm out here. I'm a 3D shooter. I got the wrong freaking bow. I got the wrong arrows. Never even shot this far. And I said, and I'm getting ready to roll up on you. And I'm like, you won this nine times. And honestly, I could see like that was, you know, that cracked and I ended up getting the gold metal there. Oh, so the first time you won it?

Yeah. That's freaking nuts. So then I guess that pretty much kicked off your target archery. Yeah, yeah. So we, and there was a lot of, like, that kicked off my target archery. So I did one type, then I did another type, and then I went into field archery, which is my favorite. It's kind of like the tack, but with different size bulls.

eyes. And granted, you know, in the pro class, these guys aren't missing. It's like, you need perfect scores. You know, you really do. And I went to this field, this field tournament and just sucked at it because half of it is marked. The other half is unmarked. So you unmarked, meaning unknown distance. Unknown distance, which in archery is a problem if you don't know the distance because your arrow is way slower than a bullet. So, um, I wasn't good at it and ended up buying myself an entire field round and like, you know, reading up on, you know, target faces. And then ended up figuring out a mathematical formula to estimate distances using like the circles in my scope and the circles of the bull's eye.

So I'd like frame the side of my scope to the edge of the target. And then I memorized where my center dot would be based on the rings. and just memorize a gauging, a distance gauging formula, which is what everybody does, but most people keep it secretive on how, you know, what their system is. But because the targets are all regulation, they have to be the same size. You can figure it out. So then I got good at that, you know, and that was kind of my favorite. And then, you know, made a team, made a U.S. team, and then went over and competed, I think my first

international tournament was in Croatia and you know freaking just loved meddled there and you know loved freaking when they pulled that American flag up and like you got to hear your anthem it was just like okay this is freaking this is awesome and so how long did that career run for that career ran until the archery world archery decided to do a world cup and they decided to make the World Cup. So at the World Cup, I think only two at the year. At the time it was maybe two or three archers. You had to be on a team would shoot in the World Cups.

But whoever the finalist, the top four were at the end of the World Cup, then you had to go to the World Cup finals, which was like a big thing. And they decided to add one tournament and move the World Cup final. It was like September 15th this year. And so I remember World Archery telling me, you know, hey, if you're going to shoot on the World Cup team, you have to give us the commitment that you will not only do all four World Cups, but if you make the World Cup final that you will also participate in the World Cup final. Otherwise, we're going to find someone that will, you know, because we don't want to like, in the World Cup final. up making a final and then someone can't get off work or whatever and so I you know it was in

September I just said I am not competing in archery in September and for everyone that doesn't know September is freaking prime that's hunting season yeah that's when you you're only thinking about you're thinking about one thing and one thing only yes just freaking hunting that's it that's it and so you kind of walked yeah walked now I walked for I walked for I walked from there and then you know I ended up business-wise started consulting went out on my own started consulting you know started a family Sharon and I you know it was like I wanted to be home more a lot more people could come to me you know for coaching and stuff and I was I was coaching around the world at that time but yeah just you know life changes you become 30 you know

close to 30. It's just, you know, I didn't, I just didn't see the future that I wanted just being a target archer my whole life, you know, and I think, you know, we talked about this. I think some fighters are in that same position of like, yeah, you love it. And, you know, you can go win like fight of the night and you could make a pretty good paycheck for that time. But the reality is like, you're one or two fights a year that you're going to make. a paycheck at, they're going to make 98% of the rest of your life not as, you know, not what you

could make for it if you had a different focus. So, you know, I just, I just focused on something else. Now, from a business perspective, did you have the vision of like knock on archery? Because essentially what you do is freaking give away an incredible amount of knowledge and information and instruction. That's what you do. Did you know from the beginning, hey, listen, if I just give this stuff away, then people will, you know, want to buy some of the stuff that I recommend, utilize some of the equipment that I make. Is that, did you have that vision or did it just start to happen? It's hard to say if I was in a different position then, if I would have felt that way, because I don't feel like I'm greedy.

I feel like the better I do for myself in other avenues of life, the more I can give back to my sport and I want to because, you know, I feel like, hey, I'm doing fine, you know, and I want to help other people be better. But the truth of the matter is, you know, when you're in your 20s, making 30, grand a year or 50 grand a year at your job and you're trying to go to tournaments to win an extra 10 on the weekend and you're putting a lot of time in and you're shooting 20 to 30,000 arrows, you know, a year and living out, you know, sharing rooms with people and stuff like that. Like there's a lot of stepping stones that have to, there's a lot of sacrifices you make before

it gets to the point where it's like, you know, you could offer all that. that for free. But once the community, and by that I mean, you know, I refer to them as the knock on nation, once we had a pedestal to where we were able to deliver out information and our community came in and started supporting that initiative, then it allows me, you know, the more people support like either things that we offer at the store or let's say I do a training series and there's a training series that helps someone do better, but maybe there's a product that we have as our business, you know, that'll be in there. And I know not everyone's going to buy it. But if someone does, you know, if they really like that series and it was worth,

you know, 100 bucks to them, I would rather, instead of them paying a suburb. subscription to like support us with, you know, a product that we have that I, that I personally believe in for that particular thing. Now everyone has their, has their preference. But I don't think I could have done it that way to begin with, even though when I was kind of hustling and doing what I could to like, you know, build, I would always go and do youth camps or go do Christian camps and do stuff like that for free. Like I always did that. I always worked with, you know, the kids after the tournament or, you know, it kind of got to

the point where I told sponsors when, especially when I went out and I was kind of consulting, I told sponsors, I would like to travel through Europe and go to every archery club and do a seminar. But, you know, I can't pay for it myself. would you like to be the one that sponsors the event in Dusseldorf? And if so, send me 25 of your hats and some key chains or whatever, and that's what we'll put on everyone's seat that comes. And so we just do these tours where I'd have magazine editors drive me all around Europe,

and every day was a different stop. You know, it was just kind of like a band. Every day was a different archery club. Stop, teach archery. and, you know, do it. In the end, I made something more because, you know, the sponsors were paying something and, you know, getting some exposure from it.

And then I also did a lot of writing. You know, I did a lot of written coaching first because, like, getting your foot in the door when you don't technically have, like, a name for yourself yet is a little bit of a struggle. but I saw a lot of magazines needing fresh content, and so, you know, I just started writing. So from like 2000, I would say from 2005 to probably 2012 or 14, I was I wrote for like seven different languages. I'd probably do about 250 pages a year just in articles. And honestly, my thing was I'd send these articles out.

I didn't really make hardly anything off any of the articles. I just always made sure that they used my photo content so that, you know, I was able to give exposure to the brands that I represented. And so, you know, it's kind of like the perfect storm of having enough support to where I could grow into where I wanted to be. And then, you know, then eventually like knock on. Knock On's like evolved. Originally it was a TV show.

It was just a hunting show. But it was a hunting show that I was very focused on having educational portions. I didn't like B-roll in hunting shows. You know, I didn't. I always thought there needs to be more education and how to and why was this hunt successful or here's the equipment that I'm taking on this hunt. You know, I changed arrows or changed broadheads. Here's the why.

You know, here's different mistakes. can make as a bow hunter for shooting technique. So that was that kind of gave us the platform to to create a name for ourselves. And then obviously, you know, we've just continually built. We meaning I've only ever done the content. The brand was always sharing. You know, the brand and, you know, knock on archery.com has always been sharing. Whereas, you know, I really don't like that side of things. I just really want to like, I want to teach people from my experience of, of whatever's happening at the moment. How did the TV show come about? The TV show came because one of the companies that I worked for was an archery company. And so each year, they would pick a certain

demographic and tell me to focus my initiatives there to grow the brand in that demographic. So one time it was South Africa, another time it was like Germany, another time it was Australia, but it came around to Canada. And so I went up and talked to a lot of shops up there and said, you know, hey, what do you guys think about

doing like a seminar tour, like what was working for me in other demographics? Because over there, people were jumping on that because no one would travel over there to do that. Maybe it's like that with Jiu-Jitsu if a reputable coach travels to somewhere

where they're never going to see that person, it'll sell out, you know, for sure. Versus in Canada, they said at the time, Canada just got their first outdoor TV network, which was called Wild TV, and they had hunting shows. But most of their shows were shows that we had watched here five, ten years ago, and it was just all the shows domestically were sending all their repeats up there, just like, you know, just kind of rebranding. But then also like selling that air time to their sponsors here. Like, yeah, we're also airing, you know, 10 times a week in Canada for this or that.

So when I was up there, the shop said, well, I mean, we would love to get like super technical seminars. But what brings people in the doors when the hunting shows come. Like if you're on a hunting show, if you're on wild TV, we'll freaking pack. the store. So I remember going back to my boss at the time, who actually works for us now, and I told him, I said, well, they really said to get the foot in the door, like, we need to be a, I need to be a show. And I had already done DVDs that were like, you know, kind of out of the trunk of your car DVDs that I thought were a little bit of ahead of their time because I always said that like I wanted our hunting show to be like hunting kind of crashed with MTV

cribs crashed with like Robin Big. And so like our first DVDs, that's what they were. And so they were to like way faster-paced music and like way different editing than kind of like the banjo music stuff. Do you put those on YouTube? I haven't. I need to get you one of those DVDs. How come you don't put them on YouTube on your YouTube channel? People are going to be amped to watch it now. Maybe. I mean, looking bad, it'd be like you watching yourself on video 10 years ago. You'd be like, man, was I horrible?

Well, you at least got to have some fun with it and put them on there. Oh, yeah. I mean, like that haircut you posted the other day. Prince Valgett coming at you. Dude. That was freaking awesome. Bro, it was 1977. That was what was happening.

And I didn't, I don't think I even had. I don't think, I don't think, I don't even think I fought. You know what I'm saying? I didn't think I thought about like a haircut. I think it was just, you know, my mom would come in with a pair of scissors, you know, done. Like I wasn't like, do I need hair cut? Hold still for a minute.

Yeah, do I need to get a haircut? Do I not need to? She's just like, that's, it was like, that's what's happening, right? You don't have any choice in the matter and didn't care about it one way. I still barely care. I feel like when we post this podcast, we need to put a thing in there that says like, unless you're a dork about archery, fast forward to like the hair. hair moment because me talking about my past to me seems like I don't know I'd way rather

what I remember about you the most is like how hard we laugh at stuff and you know it's such a different side than you know kind of like at the beginning of the thing when you're reading you're so serious and awesome at that like you're the you're the perfect person to like do voiceover work. But I also know, like, any given second, if it was just the two of us, you could drop a one-liner in there. That would freaking bus people up in here. Yeah.

I definitely, I mean, that's, bro, yeah, you're right. Any of this stuff, it's like you having fun while you're doing it. If it's not fun to do, then why are you doing it? Yeah. I will say, though, like, I like to have fun. You like to have fun. But, man, it's legit. When you go into, like, kill mode on a hunt, it's freaking, I'm like, I'm like,

oh yeah, here it is. Because you go into just like, boom. Like I just see him like, okay, I got to hang on because he's freaking, he's going. And it's legit, man. Well, I think that same thing that's just inside, it's dormant. And I'm pretty, I'm pretty like low-key and docile most of the time. I feel like that's how I am naturally. But then like certain things like that, when that moment triggers and it's like a game.

game face. That's kind of what happened when I recognized like I wasn't good at archery. You know, I realize like, you know, I just, it's like hyper focused. And it gets that way with my training too. If I know I'm not up to par, I get very hyper focused on, on just getting better and training. And I can kind of just go over the deep. You know, I can either be all in or totally out, which is kind of like from a target archery point of view, people ask me why I don't compete. I don't have, like, I don't have a drive to compete. That's not to say if for some reason I, you know, did it accidentally and I wouldn't get fired up again like Tyson did or something. I've seen you do that where we're walking down the tack and all of a sudden someone's like,

hey, dud, I bet I can do this. I bet I can hit that. You're like, same thing. I'll see your face And I'm like, oh, he's about to just 12 ring this thing, you know, because you get in that competitive mode that happens. You know what I wanted to come back to? And, hey, the reason why I think this stuff is interesting, look, I don't think you have to be interested in archery because your path in life was not normal, right? And people, look, you could have been talking about someone that was into spearfishing or someone that was into jiu-jitsu or someone that was into anything. Like to go down the path like you did and forge your own way ahead and make a life for yourself based on doing something that you loved, people could apply that in any category. Whether you're into knitting or whether you're into freaking bowling, it doesn't matter.

So there's some real application. I guess I should have said that in the beginning. Hey, if you're thinking about the way your life looks, especially if you're 20 years old or 25 years old and you're kind of like, well, I'm doing this, but I don't like it. I mean, here you were like going to college, but I don't really want to do that. You know, hey, and you've done that multiple times. 3D archery. I'm totally into it.

Oh, guess what? I'm not really into it that much into it anymore. Okay, I'm going to do something else. Go to Target archery. Okay, I'm really into that for a while. Guess what? It's interfering with my hunting. Not going to do that anymore.

Now I'm going to focus on hunting. I'm going to focus on building this brand. I'm going to focus on creating new products. So all that stuff, it may seem mundane to you looking back at it. But for a normal person that can take this and apply it to, you know, building something, creating something. It's like you've done well, not just from an archery perspective,

but a business perspective at the same time. So it's real lessons. One of the lessons I wanted to come back to because we kind of drifted over it. But when you were talking about somewhere along the way, you realize that you could like freaking rage doesn't help, right? Rage doesn't help. And you said you had a coach that was like,

hey, listen, the arrows that, you shot and this is such an important this again this is a life lesson and there's all kinds of things that tie into life and archery but the life lesson is like hey you shot that arrow and you freaking shanked it right yeah you can blow your next eight arrows like you can just send them all out the freaking you know into a tree somewhere or you can just be like okay that didn't doesn't matter can't change it move forward what was that lesson like who taught it to you um an Olympic arch an Olympic archery coach who I'm pretty sure was also a Marine. I mean like, you know, straight up Marine haircut all the time.

But he coached a couple, like super high level archers. But he was also like he didn't coach very many people. And he was also, you know, very, I don't know, he was, he was very like stone, you know. So you knew if he was there, he was there watching his few athletes. And they, like, would pay for them to come and stuff like that. But I remember one time I was in a leading group. You got peer-grouped. And then the second day, you know, like ranks one, two, three, and four together on a target, you know, and they shoot through.

And then it kind of came down to the last target. And, you know, I needed a 12 or something to make it into the shoot off, you know, into the top six. and I missed, you know, and I was freaking pissed about it, you know, like broke my stabilizer over my knee and freaking hammer toss my bow through the woods type thing. And, you know, ended up coming back, like, with my bow, just kind of seeing the damage I did. And he came over to me. His name was Tim Strickland, and he said, you know, you could be an amazing. archer, but he said, until you start not letting the arrow that you shoot affect the ones that are

still in your quiver, you never will. And he said, he goes, do you know a way to get an arrow back once it's left your bow? And I said, what do you mean? He goes, do you know a way to get it back other than to physically go down there and pull it out of the target like you just did? And I said, no, sir. And he said, well, once it's gone, it's gone. And he said, so if you make one mistake, don't make the same mistake for every arrow that's left in your quiver. You know, make one, pull that arrow out, throw it away, whatever you want. But there's other arrows in the quiver that are capable of doing what you want them to do. And so there's been tournaments where I've, you know, I've actually talked, you know,

where I will freaking make a bad shot and then just look down on my quiver and be like, do any you sons of bitches want to go in the ten ring because that guy didn't. And, you know, and it was just like a totally different approach and mentally. It's, you know, I've,

I've totally, it honestly helped me. This was a, it's kind of a weird thing to say, but, you know, he told me, said,

you won't figure out how to win until you learn how to lose. And that was, I was like the rage of losing was overpowering my ability to perform at my best because I was letting, you know, I was letting those things happen. And then I remember kind of wanting to get into that a little more. And I read some kind of a sports psychology book. You know, I don't know what it was called. But it said something in there that this sports psychologist had talked to like, he worked with a lot of high level pitchers. And he told him, that part of their success was that they had to be able to accept that there was going to be an umpire that would they needed to expect two to three bad calls by the umpire every game and when they got a call that they didn't think was right they could just check it off the list of okay well there was one of them and so i started doing that too and started saying okay when i go to an international event because there certainly are judges that call them really, really tight, you know,

and they're all looking at them with a magnifying glass, but there's some, like when you'll say, like, judge, and then, you know, some dude comes over that is notorious, like, if that, you know, when they do their random thing of, like, judge so-and-so, go pull it, and then you see him, you're like, it's out. Because some of you just think, like, they think, like, If they can't figure it out themselves, I'm just going to go over there and look around at it, but I'm calling it out. You know, and then there'd be some like, oh, yeah, I got a chance with this gal.

Like, you know, hey, Susie, how you doing today? But, yeah, learning that, you know, learning how to lose, because I've lost way more than I've won. And that, you know, and that's a fact of, you know, you have to figure out a way to win in life. You know, you do have to figure out a way to win. But if you deal with being hyper competitive, then you also have to learn how to lose. Otherwise, you freaking derail yourself way more than others can derail you. And I'm convinced that I beat myself way more than other people beat me in most of the things that I've lost at. You know, it's like, which is why now my coaching's involved so much because now my coaching is so focused on, you know,

you know, what you execute within your box. Because I kind of got to the point where I recognized if I make a good shot, it's a 10. That's the highest score on the paper. So if I do that all day, no one's going to beat me. We're tied at the end. And if I just keep doing that until tomorrow, then guess what? Worst case scenario, me and that other guy are still tied. But if I shoot nines, then, yeah, the other guy is already an individual.

advantage. So, you know, if I focus on just execution, and so once I kind of came to that realization of no one can beat me if I'm executing. If I make a good shot right here, I don't need to see where it lands because if my sight tape's right and I trust the equipment that I've got, I know it's in the middle. Like, I know that, but I have to execute here. And so it really got to the point where I like, I took away my spotting scope to where I've got. I, I wasn't getting in the habit of shooting an arrow looking for the result, shooting an arrow looking at a result, which is something that even today when I work with parents, I tell them that there's like parents that at an archery tournament, they sit like front row

with a spotting scope, so the kid will shoot, and then they'll be like, 10 at 11 o'clock. And then, you know, and the kid will shoot and just turn around to like dad to get confirmation of like how that was. And so part of the things when you have that type of parent is telling them like, listen, this kid, like, they need to execute. Them looking at you for, you know, the result all the time. Athletes start to lean on their coach so much. And that was actually one of the problems with some of the people that had that coach that I talked about. they only did really well when he could be there with him because, you know, he'd be like,

all right, hey, you missed that one. F those guys, you know, you're good, you're the freaking, you know, and they had to have that that continual like affirmation. Whereas honestly, from my life, I feel like most of it I was alone, you know, in regards to like, I like training alone, you know, honestly, I like archery too because, it's a singular sport. So if I train and if I prep, then I'm ready and it's in my hands. Same with hunting. Same way with hunting. I've had hunts where I've had a lot of distractions and I threw my stuff in a case the day before and went and missed a couple shots and was just

like enraged. But then I also thought like, yeah, dude, you didn't prep. You didn't know homework. you know, that's what happens. So I feel like because I've had to train that way and even when I lift, you know, I love lifting by myself versus like going to somewhere where people distract me. I just feel like, you know, I've, I know that if I put in the work, then at that point it's really on me, not on someone else. And like when I told you we sucked at football, you know, there was a, couple people like, you know, like Jason who knew their role and knew their position and other

people's position and they would cover for people that maybe didn't do something right. But there's also three cores of the team that didn't. So in high school, what's hard is I don't feel like anyone really prepped as hard as me in that because I honestly like put no effort anywhere else, you know, whereas they probably had lives and maybe, you know, actually got good grades and stuff. but I think that's why archery's been so awesome to me is because, you know, the harder I've pushed, the harder I've pushed at it and the more I've put into it, like it's not like weightlifting where you plateau.

I haven't found a plateau yet. Like I can make a target further and I can suck again. Or, you know, there's just, or I can try a different species or a different, you know, climate or a different time of year and it's a whole new challenge like it's a clean slate and then you're you know trying to formulate a plan and map out a plan of how do I you know how do I like win this challenge I was at a you and I were at tack the first time we did tech and like I was like feeling pretty good and I'm like you know you're like bro you're freaking this is awesome you're doing great

and we're getting through the course a little bit. And then, man, then I just, I like hit a branch, right? And it was a little situation where you said step back. And you meant back behind me, but I thought you meant back away from the target. And so I like, didn't, it didn't make sense to me what you said, so I didn't listen to you, which is a mistake.

So I just cracked off this around. And this thing just freaking just pang into a tree. And everyone on that mouth. Everyone. Like the, it sounded like you hit someone's like door with a mac, like with a microphone on the back side. Just.

And, and this is what I saw. So I was earlier, you know, you were saying like, hey, you know, somebody grabs me by the face mask and just like, hey,

you need to get this shit together right now. Like, that's what you want. And then, but like I've, I've done that. Like when I was in the, when I was in the seal teams and I was teaching.

Like I would be, you know, I'd have some guy that I could be like, Hey man, if I freak out on this guy, he's going to freak out. And he's going to collapse and break down mentally. And I got someone else where it's like, if I don't get their attention, you know, some guy might pull aside and say, hey, listen, man, think about what's going on. Another guy may be like, hey, well, you need to think about what's going on.

And you got to figure out what methodology you're going to use. Yeah. So what's interesting for me is when you're coaching me, like, I know what you're doing. I know that I go, oh, he's trying to get me to chill out. Because like, on that one, you were like, hey, man, you hit that limb up there. You know, it's just trying to say. but you know you said you know knock another one knock take a step back knock another one I was like cool and I was like he's just trying to get me to chill out so I don't freak out because I just freaking

teaboned a tree and and like I know what you're doing but as echo Charles says sometimes to me he knows what I'm doing when I'm talking to him about stuff he's like I know what you're doing guess what still works yeah it still works to be like hey here's what's going on man just just back off a little bit or dude you're freaking out you're not you know how to do this like those kind of coach and also being like hey, get over here. Like, hey, you need to move down. Like, those kind of things are important. So for you as a coach, the way you read,

and now I've watched you coach a bunch of people, like at Tack, you'll sit there. Like, we'll sit there at a place at one of the targets and you'll just like watch four or five groups shoot. And so I just sit there and watch you coach them, you know, and I'll listen to what you're saying. And I can tell that you're going, you're reading people, you know, and going,

oh, this person needs confidence. Or this person needs to think through, needs to slow things down. or this person's getting freaking all target fixated at the last second and they're cracking the round off. So you're reading them and then you're applying the right coaching technique to what's going on in their head. And that's freaking, that's just like, that's why honestly to me, your whole life, the number

one thing for me, when I look at you is like coach. Like that's the highest thing that I look at you. I was like, man, that guy's a, look, he's a good archer. He's a good hunter. He's a badass athlete. But man, he's a freaking dialed in. coach. It's what I'm passionate about. Like especially, you know, with honestly, Rogan introducing me to Andy, like, I think was really the thing that started everything down

the path of now how many military guys that I've been able to get into, and gals, get into archery. And, you know, I love that because there's so many things that. that are there, and especially with team guys, you know, whether it's, you know, whether it's, you know, army or, you know, it really doesn't matter. But if, if they've been some type of a team or like special forces, they just, you know, they're good students and they're hypercritical of themselves. Now granted, some of them are like, I got this. And yeah, once they realize, no, I just made an ass on myself, they'll, they'll listen. but even if they don't listen right there by the next time they talk to you they've 100% you know went crazy about trying to apply that you know ever the the work ethic is very it's like the perfect formula for a coach you know is is all those guys and every every one of them that I've introduced it to so far has needed has really needed archery as I don't know like like you said it's

It's like a quiet, it's like a quiet form of what you used to do, you know. Well, what it is really, to me, it's a new mission. Like you, you spend your whole life with a mission, with like something that you know that you're focused on. And then one day you wake up, like you retire or you get out, the mission's gone. Like, you can't have it anymore. And look, you can try and hang on to it. And you can try and re-live those things in your head. But that's not going to be, that's not going to work out.

Yeah. Because it's not there anymore. And that's a shitty reality to face. Like when I had to clean, when my, when I retired and then I went and cleaned out my cage, and I spent most of my career within like a 300-yard radius, like Seal Team 1, Seal Team 3, seal team 7. I was at Seal Team 2 in Virginia Beach for a little while, but most of it, you could throw a football to everywhere I was.

So when I was 19 years old, I was walking up the steps of Seal Team 1. Fast forward 20, 24 years, and I'm 200 yards away, not even, I'm 100 yards away, cleaning out my gear locker for the last time. And it's gone. And all that, my whole life, everything I cared about, the only thing I ever knew is gone. And look, I look back at it if I can help out in any way and I go talk to the teams, that's cool. But that's not my mission anymore.

And so this happens to guys. And they get out and they don't have a mission anymore. So all of a sudden you go, hey, man, here's a freaking bow and arrow. It's a primitive tool that you use to hunt shit. And you can get good at it. And the fundamentals are similar, you know? The fundamentals are similar. And like when you taught me for the first time, Andy was sitting there translating.

He's like, hey, what he means is front sight focus. Hey, what he means is easy, you know, just squeeze the trigger. He was translating me, for me, military stuff. And I was like, oh, got it, got it, got it. And, you know, Andy, I mean, Andy's a good example of him just being like, oh, cool, I got a new mission now. Here's what I can do. And look, Andy, of course, Andy has a ton of other things going on in his life. And he's got freaking parachuting and jiu-jitsu.

Now he's totally obsessed with jihitsu, which is freaking awesome. So people find new mission, but this is a good one. It's a good one because there's so many similarities. Gear prep, right? When you're in the SEAL teams, you're freaking obsessed with gear prep. You're figuring out, well, the best way to carry things, the best way. way to do things and you're like okay I want to be ready for this I want to be ready for this operation right I got to be in good physical shape I got to be able to like clear my mind when

shit's going sideways and be like all right what's happening right now so all those things are are so similar and I know that you spend I guess was Andy the first like vet that you worked with probably that I mean probably not I guess but yeah it was the first one where I was where I was mentally really ready for that. I think I was on a different like pulp. Like I was at a different stage. And it honestly, it meant more,

you know. I was going to say with Andy, like Andy, what may have been different is that Andy was like, what is that saying about like when the, when the student is ready, the master will appear? Like I don't know if you could have found someone

that was more ready to like pick up this stuff and start going, you know? And so that's probably why. it left an impression on you it damn sure left an impression on Andy because this this dude's totally obsessed you know so and it's awesome and you know what's funny about it well andy's freaking hilarious you want to like yeah when you talk about like oh jocco you make some good one-liners hanging out like i can listen to Andy just all day long and and what's really funny to end to me is like

how he the way he handles uh uh like mistakes his he just hammers himself he's so freaking He leaves no room for someone to make fun of them because if if you don't fire off within three seconds Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's freaking classic classic. Yeah, and that's the kind of thing is when you know when when when you go out It gives you a mission now you got your friends with you. You know now you're like okay cool now we're and we're doing things like what you do in the seal teams guess what if if Andy and I are on a pistol range and we're shooting together like he's gonna be making in front of me, right? I'm going to shank some round off or whatever. Need a mag change in the middle what I didn't need. I'm going to do something stupid. Yeah. And he's going to, it's going to be fun. And you know what? It's going to make me better. Yeah. It's going to make me better. And that's another thing I noticed at tack, like the amount of vets that were up there. Yeah. It's freaking awesome. It's awesome. And guys coming up to me and telling me like, bro, you know, I started this. I started this. This is what I'm doing. And these are guys that. freaking, you know, two years ago, whatever, when they got out of the Marine Corps after six years or after eight years or after 18 years, they didn't have a mission anymore.

And now of a sudden they're freaking jocked up. They got their gear on. They showed me their freaking range finder. And they're pumped, man. They're pumped. Yep. And so the fact that you've sort of opened up this opportunity for so many guys to start going down the path, it's, man, it's so.

beneficial to dudes. Yeah, that's freaking awesome. And it's, there also comes a point in time where you want to, like, I'm fortunate that I can pick and choose what I'm doing right now. And so I really want to pick and choose things that's rewarding to me. And hopefully that's not, you know, selfish. But there's also like, I don't know, there's, there's people that I work with where I know this person could live on this planet a lot long. because they have a new focus right now. And, you know, and archery's changed their life totally. And what's cool about it is you don't have to be in like perfect physical shape too.

So, I mean, there's times where people get into archery and they're kind of a little bit lost, you know, maybe, you know, maybe they're not as in shape as they were or whatever. But that's what's cool about it is it's not age specific. And it's, you know, if you can pull it back, you can do it. it. And I think the natural progression is you pull it back and, you know, maybe you're not good and then you get a little better. And then, you know, there's a ton of people now that are just for a better food source alternative. They're open-minded to hunting if it's, you know, in their minds, fair chase, which, you know, bow hunting, you know, kind of lowers that boundary for people to where they're like, okay, if I'm going to put in all this work and do it, I'm totally cool. You know,

eating this thing or killing it or whatever. But then once you take that step, you realize, oh, this is a whole different kind of hard because now you're dealing with, in my opinion, some of the animals are just so much smarter than other things you could roll up on a murk, right? I mean, they're freaking keyed up, you know. Because I remember Andy and I were on something where it was, it was, it was, it was, was a pretty tough, like, you know, it was kind of a little bit of a miracle that we pulled off this stock and jack something. I don't know what it was, but I remember saying, like, you know,

it doesn't seem like it'd be that hard to kill a person. He's just like, dude, because it is not this hard at all. He's like, he goes, all of us would be, he's like, he's like, he goes, all of us would be, He's like, you know, he's like a lot of us would be, you know, at a totally different level if we had to learn this way first. He's like it, he goes, if everyone had this background prior to going into the teams, he's like, it would be, it would be insane. No, it would be very beneficial, very beneficial. There's so many things that you've got to think about that are the exact same.

Well, with elk, the only thing that's not the same with elk is smell. Like, like, although if you talk to. to some of the Vietnam guys, they're like, oh, the VC or the NBA would smell you. Yeah. And so if you- And they could smell them. And they could smell them too. Yep. So maybe we need to just account for everything.

Well, now with dogs, like what I told Andy was I said, listen, you know, if I knew there was someone coming to Jack me, you know, I would definitely have at least a dog, you know, definitely have dogs around because obviously dogs could smell too. You know, if you trained them on something, you know, specific type of gear or something like that, would be an advantage. But I've actually talked to, well, one of the guys that we're with tonight, he's actually hooking me up with some of the guys that are going to do some of the training down in Lanai for the sniper training.

They're doing a couple team things there. And so he had asked me if I wanted to go down just to teach some navigation of like, instead of learning the long distance aspect to, like, like make some competitions on the closest shot to where they, you know, to where I would assess their choice of that navigation and like what they could do different to where it's like, okay, we know how far you can shoot something from. Now, you know, who can jack something at a yard or whatever, you know? Yeah, it's, it's totally different to have to get within, you know, 50 yards or something. That's just freaking crazy. Yeah. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's,

It's crazy to think that way. Whereas with a rifle, you know, you can be, I mean, at least 500 yards. You can be 500 yards and be like, you know, we're good. I got this. I was, so we went surfing yesterday. At least, yeah, we went surfing yesterday. And I was telling. Why did you pause?

Was I that bad? Was I that bad? Well, actually, no, I paused for a second to think to myself, did he surf or not? And the fact of the matter is you did surf. You did surf. You paddled on the waves. You caught the waves and you stood up. That's why I paused. I was like wait, did he surf? Yes, you did. You caught multiple waves. You paddled into them yourself and then you stood up and rode the waves. That's what surfing is. So you did we did surf yesterday and I know you'd only been one other time, which was the last time you went was was a little bit more at the pier. Yeah, it's at the pier and it's a it's a much more forgivable sort of like easier step like we were yesterday. That's like you can't. You can't push yourself into those waves.

You can't touch the bottom and be like, oh, I got this. You have to actually surf. Where we surfed yesterday, you actually have to surf. But when we were going out, we were with Josh. And I was sort of like, you know, I'm just going to let Joe. Because like I don't want to, I didn't want to be telling you things and Josh telling you things. And you're sitting there freaking got two people telling you shit to do and it just too much, right? Yeah.

So I was just kind of do, I was just kind of going. And but man, as I was going down, there was like, before we even got in the water there was 97 things I wanted to tell you like hey man you got to watch out for this this thing over here this path over here you got to watch here's the lineup here's where the here's where the channels are like this is where you want to sit here's what you want to watch like I like 97th before we even got in the water just before we got in the water and I'm not you know if you're at a at a freaking black belt level in archery like I'm not that I'm not at that highest level of surfing And I was like, man, imagine how many things were going through your head as you're watching me like a freaking monkey with a damn bow just thinking, all right.

With a 50 foot surfboard. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was just like the amount of things that that you don't know about surfing, the amount of things that I don't know about archery and about hunting and about scent and about terrain and about the way the freaking animals react to this and different animals react a different way. And there's like so much to learn. It's freaking crazy. Yeah. It's crazy.

It's hard as a coach because a lot of times you forget more than you. Like, you don't know what you should be talking about until you realize like, oh. Oh, yeah. And you gave me, like, there were several of those yesterday. Yeah. The worst one was what you told me when we were on the deck, like watching. We were like watching. You're like, yeah, I meant to tell you.

When you were like, see how all the waves are coming in right there, like off that set? Like, that's why Josh and I, when we were done, we would go around those to like loop back. And he's like, you know, you just kept going straight back up the gut. Yeah. And he's like, I was just waiting for that board to like freaking T-Rex your face. And meanwhile, I'm like, bro, that would have been something like when we were standing up on the top looking down. If you would have said, like, hey, you see how all those weights. break like this. So when you get your set and you ride that out, you know, looping behind that.

So you're not like freaking, how is full-blown like doing buds training? He was just taking him on the freaking head for freaking like eight minutes. What happened to Dudley? Oh, he's in the impact zone. Just getting hammered. But you did get up like while we were surfing, you know, you did surf. And to me, that's a testament to, you know, like being athletic and Being able to actually, really your first day out to go paddle into waves and stand up, that's not easy to do. Now, Josh Hall did make you a freaking, basically an aircraft carrier for a surfboard. It's freaking massive. 116, and it's like over four inches thick and 24 inches, which anyone that's a surfer is hearing these numbers going, damn, that is an actual aircraft carrier.

But that's what a perfect platform. And plus, how much do you weigh? 240. Oh, yeah. Like, that's a different level. You need a big ass board. And it looks like, Echo Charles. Yes, sir.

What's up with your surfing career? Minimal, at best, we'll say. How come? I don't know. There's no tangible reason. I mean, I guess if I search my soul, you know, I did bodyboarding, sponging as it were. Splendering. You know, for the most of my adolescent life.

and then, yeah, how did you not, how did you not, like, say, oh, wouldn't it be cool to stand up on this thing and ride this wave and glide through the ocean? I don't know. It's just one of the things. You know, like, where I grew up on the south side of Kauai, they're actually not, they're surfing, but I grew up at the beach, like literally grew up at the beach. And then again, you're saying this, like, this is some sort of a weird way that you wouldn't be surfing. You're like, no, no, no, I grew up at the beach. Yeah, exactly. Right, but if you understand the progression,

just naturally kind of growing up, there you go, you're swimming, you know, in the baby pond at Paible Beach, and then you're like, okay, then you're kind of body surfing a little bit. Then you're boogie boarding, bodyboarding, sponging, you know, all same things. And then. Yes, exactly. Then you start to go surf. And there's a, there's a, how should I say, a geographical element to it as well. You're literally in the baby pond, then you're outside the baby pond.

and then the surfing waves and the surfing spots, those are out. So you always see the surfers, but they're way out. So maybe I think when we started getting into football and stuff, it's like the beach started to be less and less. And then we just never, I don't know, I never did. Are you thinking maybe an hour of time? Yeah, step. So like you're going to have to get out, like you said,

where you want to be is a little bit further out. You know, that's where the good stuff is. it's best to crush an armwork out like 45 minutes before your first day. Yeah. Well, that was interesting too. So like we get in the water. Well, I have been surfing before though. Right, right.

Yeah, I never. No, but I'm, I was, like, I'm talking to Dudd. And I'm like, bro, I've been on hunts with him. Like, I'm watching him move through the forest. And he's just like, you know, freaking 14 foot legs. And he's just stepping over. Like, he's stepping over small, like, Yeah, like small trees and stuff like this.

And I'm like, dude, you know, and then watching him shoot, I've watched him shoot a ton and then like, hawk a football or whatever. I'm like, yeah, this guy's a great athlete. And so I'm thinking, we're going surfing and I'm like, okay. You know, he's, and I said, man, you're going to, I was, I told you this. I go, bro, with your long arms, you're going to just be like, and this big board. You're going to be, you're going to be like a freaking, you know, a cigarette boat just

going through the water. So we go in and I, like I said, I wasn't doing any coach and I was just kind of leaving that Josh and I get in the water and I start paddling out and then I look back because Dudd was going next and then Josh was doing sort of like cleanup right in case something went sideways and we're getting in so then I see Dudd like okay he's good he's in and then I start paddling and I'm not like racing but I'm just paddling out and then Josh comes up next to me and I'm like oh that's weird I wonder where Dudd is so I'm paddled a little bit more and I look back so now it's been like probably one minute and 30 seconds maybe I look back and I look back and

And as soon as I look back, I see Dudd, and he looks like he's just like, they got into a wrestling match with a bear. And I'm like, oh, yeah, because here's the thing. And you brought this up to me a long time ago, Echo Charles. If you're not used to it, that's like it, if you're not used to it, it doesn't matter. Look, it matters. And if you weren't in good shape at all, then it would have really sucked. Yeah.

But if you're not used to that little particular muscle group and the tech. because you're in the water and there's balance going on. And yeah, it's a little bit tricky. I mean, I was laughing at myself because, well, first off, I didn't know, like, where we were going. Because we were, we were surf, you're going to be surfing sets, right, that were further out. You know, I don't know where it was. Probably won't say because I know you have your spots. But so my first experience was we walked out from the people.

and like where stuff was breaking right there, that's where I was surfing. So when he kind of jumped off the rock and went out there ways, and I was talking to Josh and Josh's like, yeah, just get where you're comfortable and launch out on your board, you know, wait for a smooth spot and jump out. So when I did that, by that point, Jocko was like 100 yards out. So I thought like he's where we're going to be waiting for these waves. So I just went like full sprint for like the first 30 seconds and then Josh like as I'm like kind of starting to burn out You know that freaking Josh just like strokes by and they're just going and then Jocko's just looking back he's like

Got to go about 200 more yards and I was just thinking like for and dude like For bro I was going into like I was saying this kind of stuff like bro you got to give me like two minutes a hard pattern I was in that You know what I'm saying? It's like two minutes and it's over. Two minutes. You got to get out fast because he was kind of in the lineup. Like not, sorry, he was in the impact zone.

And all of a sudden there's a lull. And I'm like, because now I'm real, now I put everything together in my mind. And I'm thinking if this, if this brother doesn't get out there like now, he's going to be in here for a long time. So I'm like, you got to give me like two minutes. Give me like two minutes. It was. But see, I love like, I love that. I love something.

that, you know, it's just, to me, struggle gives you, like, gives you a purpose. You know, today, when we were waiting to come here, I just sat out there and watched those things, and I was, like, thinking about every mistake I made yesterday and how I would do it differently today. Paddling was one of them. But, like, even yesterday, Chaka's like, hey, dude, you know, just hit the garage for your workout. So I went down in there, and it's very different. than mine, you know. So I'm kind of looking around, looking at the, you know, the tools trying to figure out, like, what I can construct, you know, that day. So I freaking, you know, hit his rings for a while and stuff and, and, uh, did some kettlebells. But then I also thought,

like, you know, a lot of it's like freaking gorilla movements. So he, you know, his wife and girls had some bands over on the side. So after I, you know, slung some. You know, slung some kettlebells around for a while. I, you know, went and grabbed some bands and just did some, like, burnouts of, you know, shoulders and, you know, freaking arms and stuff, which I thought was, you know, I worked out for an hour. I was pretty happy with, you know, everything. But like, dude, at like a hundred yards out, freaking trying to paddle that aircraft carrier. And he's like, 200 yards, bro, and you got it. And I was just like, oh. my freaking triceps.

You know what he said to me later? We got back. He's like, yeah, you know, bro, I mean, I just realized for the first time that, like, when you see a surfer, that guy's in, like, better shape than a wrestler. Like, he's in sick. You got to be in the sickest shape. Because that's how hard it was. In a way, yeah.

In a way, but also not in a way. Let's face it. You can be like a fat old dude that surfs. Like, I'll take you to. Yeah. They're just used to it. And they got good technique. And they just go out there and they don't even, you know, they don't even freaking try.

And they're out there killing it. What's like when I give a bodybuilder. you know, a bow and watch them like struggle to get it back. And you're like, dude, this is a 70 pound dumbbell row right now. And you can't do it. You know, and then because, yeah. What is that? Is that that they don't have like the little stabilizer muscles or something?

No, it's just like, it's just the understanding of like the technique of like where you're pushing and pulling and like the leverage of it. It'd be like, you know, it'd be just like walking up. And even if a big dude you said like, you know, hey, do a clean and jerk and you just like put 200 pounds on there you I mean it's just going to be a train wreck they don't have the technique whereas you get a little female that knows how to do a clean and jerk she'll take that 200 and throw it up like it's nothing oh we talked about that on the mace today we're yeah yeah what the swinging one yeah the big mace yeah that uh for surfing yeah you're right

like actually you don't have to be in that good of shape you just have to be used to because it's so repetitive like just paddling it's so repetitive so it's like not knowing how to swim. Honestly, like on that board, I just felt like, you know, the first time, even if someone knows how to swim, you throw them in the water. If they don't know, like, stroke and, like, how to block and breathe and you're, like, taking on water in your mouth and you're, like, trying to blow that out. And, you know, you're freaking sprinting when there's waves up, like, and it was, like, simple stuff, you know, I got my first ride in. I think I was on my, like, I went up to one knee, and then got up to one foot for a little bit.

And then, like, as I'm going back out, I'm just, you know, taking freaking, taking them on the head. Taking the straight line straight out. And I did that a couple times. And then I'm out there with Josh. Jocko had rode one in. I'm out there with Josh. And a couple, like, a big set came that were crashing kind of further out. And, like, as we're going up, he knew it was going to, like, crash.

And he goes, he goes, bro, when you go up, he goes, do a push up on your board right as you're hitting the, right as you're hitting. you know, whatever he called it, you know, the flake or whatever. The white water. Yeah, he's like, you know, do a pushup on your board and then it drives the nose down. Then you can just ride the back. And I'm like, I freaking went up this thing and I'm just like, and rode down. And I'm just like, now you tell me, dude.

I freaking was taking like full endos just freaking one after another in the, in the freaking mortar zone, just taking heavy artillery. Jago and Josh are just out there like, watch me just like, you know, he'll be back. He'll be back out here at 15 or whatever. There's a lot of technique, man. And then he told me the button hook method. The channels. Yeah, to teach them about the channels.

We got all the way out and climbed up on the rocks, and we were there to take a picture of the three of us, like up at the top of the cliffs. And he goes, see where all those are breaking? He's like, yeah. Don't paddle out there. He goes, that's why I'd ride it out. way and then I'd come in around the back of that and then Josh you know how Josh

always wrote out that way and then he'd come around the back he's like you just kept going right up the middle I was like man you think you'd tell me that like 10 minutes in yeah at least you you know what as you said there's like only so many things like the 97 things that I wanted to tell you or that Josh wanted to tell you yeah that just didn't make the chart yet and then once you once we realize, okay, he's going to be able to survive, then that made it on to the freaking, on the prioritized and execute thing. Don't just sit there in the impact zone and try and paddle out.

Hey, so going back to the business side of things, because, again, to me, that's one of the, that's what makes us applicable. That's what makes your story applicable in so many different realms is the business side and the way you've set things up. You ended up eventually, kind of like, I don't know if this was your final move, not it's not your final move,

but one of your biggest moves was partnering up with PSC. Yeah, I mean, that definitely came later. But yeah, I mean, there came a point where our business had grown a really awesome community that was, you know, thriving for the educational content and then also like products that supported that educational content. which was all, you know, Sharon's side of the house. I was more, you know, I come up with things to talk about based on someone I'm working with at that time.

But yeah, the brand became a community, you know, it became, you know, Sharon always said, like, we're not, you know, we don't have fans. We have, you know, we have a community. Like, we have, you know, we have a knock on nation. That's kind of what we referred to it probably five years ago, you know, five or six years ago, which, we just turned 10 years old. So, you know, halfway through we realized, you know, like what really fit our model. And then, yeah, one of the hard things for me, one of the hardest things is, you know, I'm a very loyal person, you know, and I've since I've also been, I've worked internally at manufacturers, I look at, you know,

ambassadors or external representatives in a different light than, you know, if someone just out being an ambassador, you know, or public figure, whatever the, whatever, you know, it's way different now. But when I was internal and we had pro staff, you know, you just, you see what people do that really helps the company and makes you like never in question of should we get, you know, who are we going to keep around this year, I just knew those types of things, you know, to where if it was, just like with, for me, like with my friendships, if it's a two-way street, then, you know, that's a good relationship. But if it's always like, you know, there's always a give and a take, then, you know, that's just not, like a healthy relationship.

Like you built me a bow, you taught me how to shoot, you took me on haunts, and then I broke your neck. That's the good relationship. Yeah, that's what I'm looking for. That's exactly what I'm looking for. Yeah, a lot of people don't know that like when you were here doing the podcast with Andy and Trevor, that was day one of Jiu-Jitsu for me. And I was actually in this room. I just couldn't talk because my neck was broken.

I was over in that corner just trying to get oxygen, freaking pull my esophagus off the back. neck bone I had. Meanwhile, you nanny are just freaking laughing. Cutting it up, man. Check. All right. So we form these really good relationships.

It's a two-way street. Just like you and I got. Yeah. And so it's always been tough when you change, you know, if you change brands, because I don't ever want it to be a reflection of loyalty. But a lot of times, a lot of times, like the higher up, you, go in what you're giving someone or what they're giving you, there's obviously there's just more expectation and there's more, you know, I don't know, it's just like the higher up and rank you go,

there's, you know, there's things that you need to do better than other people. And so, you know, when you climb to that spot, sometimes it's hard when you get to a higher level to then change because I don't ever want people to feel like I'm just making a change from a, monetary point of view. But for me, I had gone through two consecutive contracts that were multi-year contracts, and both of them kind of got cut when our business is trajectory in this format, but then, you know, they're like, well, you know, we're kind of plateauing from a marketing point of view and, you know, we're not getting added budgets, but we need to make room for other things.

So they were always transparent, but it also became clear of, you know, we're trajectory up, and I want to provide more free content, but I can't provide free content to the consumer if I have no support from, you know. By the way, when you say your trajectory is going up, you mean knock on archery is growing. You're getting more and more people following. there are more people watching your instructionals on YouTube. There's just a whole new archery pie. Like, you know, people within the archery community,

that pie would be like, you know, local surfers around here probably, you know, that's probably a pie. Whereas if someone just really started focusing on, you know, teaching surfing to people like me, you know, and I came in, they like start this whole other thing to where these people all over here we're probably looking at it like, what's this guy even doing? You know, why is he doing that? But the reality is, you know, we're kind of like baking a whole new cake

because the people that we're getting from the military and, you know, the people that we get from a lot of our mutual friends, like, I'm beyond busy just with our, just with people that we know should be getting into archery, right? And at the end of that contract, my last one, I kind of knew I need to open my ears to everybody because I had been with that company for 10 straight years, but I also had taken six years to where things were plateauing. And I could see there wasn't progression. So I listened to everybody.

And, yeah, I mean, through everything, there was, honestly, there was multiple deals that were better than where I was. But PSC came in and pretty much said, like, we love what you're doing and we want you to support what we're doing, but we also want to give you the tools to where if you want to do more, we'll give you the tools for that. So they said, you know, if you feel like you want to create a bow that's specific to, you know, to your followers,

or if you want to do something and I said, well, you know, can I bring in a bow that's like at a budget price, you know, and they just said, you tell us what you want it to sell for. You know, we'll assign an engineer to you and you can, you know, you can do whatever you want. So it was, it was just, it was just a different door, you know, that got opened, that allowed us to go a direction with our brand that I feel good about.

And I feel like, you know, I sleep well with just knowing that we're giving back a lot. And, yeah, PSC's been a huge part. of that. You know, they've just given me the tools, you know, the first bow we came out with is the one you and I shoot. And then came out with another bow that was focused on, you know, a price to where the average person can go and get into archery with a really good setup, but probably still less than what you could buy a surfboard for. You know what I mean? And then, yeah, we can choose our direction. So it's been an, it's been an awesome partnership. and everything's made in America for the stuff that we're designing.

And it's just, it's really cool because it's actually the company, my first bow was a PSE. And last year was their 50 year like anniversary. So and PSC started in Illinois, like very close to where that road that I turned down was not very far from there. So there's just a lot of cool things like that that, you know, a lot of times if things are meant to be, they happen. You know, I've just learned that, you know, if you force stuff, it's not for the right reason. So I've just really, I've been fortunate that I haven't had to make a decision based on like I can't pay my bills if I make this decision. So I've always just let things unfold of, you know, really what's meant to be will be. and you know, and I feel like my progression of shooting tournament archery and learning what I

learned there and learning the connections and growing up working with the manufacturer and seeing some of that behind the scene stuff. Like all those were just sacrifices and building blocks that I had to do to get to where I really want to be. You know, I never, I never wanted to be the best tournament archer. I never really wanted to be, you know, I didn't want to just work in an archery, you know, manufacturer or, you know, go to all the, the shoots. I just, I love hunting.

I love teaching. You know, I like, I like going to new spots and seeing new things and having new challenges. So, you know, that's kind of what it's done for me. Yeah. And what I like about it, and I remember as this deal was unfolding, you were telling me what it was like, and it's a true partnership. Like you said, you're allowed to go in there. you can help design exactly what it is you want.

It's your name going on this equipment. So it's like you can't be any more invested in this company, which is awesome. Yeah. And the other thing, too, is everyone needs to remember, you know, if you can't shoot it well, there's no purpose to it. So like through that whole process, I got equipment from all these companies that I really hadn't done a hadn't done a lot of due diligence

shooting to where I you know because I had only shot two other archery brands really from a like professional level each one for about a decade so I shot other competitors to know what they felt like but that doesn't mean I knew what they

would do like in my hands every day so I needed to know that and right away after three or four days I thought this is a seriously underrated product, you know. And I went out there and met with them and they talked about a lot of things that they wanted to do, especially like at that 50 year, you know, they wanted to, you know, make some changes from the sales point of view. They wanted to make some marketing decisions that were

different. You know, they said, you know, we want to be able to hit some like niche markets, which for them our community was a niche market, which I think was very underrated. You know, now I think they realize, you know, what the impact is. But yeah, it really gave the ability for me to take people that had incredible ideas internally and awesome patents, which, you know, for me would be hard to go out on my own and do it because I'd have to work around so many things that now that I've shot their bows, I personally like. So, you know, I would be trying to figure out a way around what they've solidified as a, you know, as a proven design. So it just, it was a, for me, it was a plug and play.

Like, and that's what it had to be because, you know, we've worked really hard, Sharon and I to, you know, really stay on our path at knock on archery because there's there's been a lot of opportunities to you know maybe I don't know if sell out would be like the term because it probably wouldn't be that drastic but we could have definitely made a lot more decisions that would have put our following secondary to decisions that we made and the PSC collaboration was a was an awesome plug-in play for us. And I think as a, especially me, I feel like I was an athlete that built a career out of the discipline of athletics, honestly. I feel like those are the little things in business, you know, especially now like so many people build business based off social media or,

you know, maybe they've, you know, maybe they've been with origin for, you know, you know, using your geese for a year and you guys have been good to them and you're you're laying down foundation to get to where you want origin to go but then you know brand y comes in and says well you know we're not just going to give you a discount on a ghee we'll give you a gee and you know i was always at the the mindset of okay if i get a gee one do i really need to get a free gey if i've got one even though i had to buy it from origin, you know. And okay, let's say I'd take the free ghee. Well, now I've like also started a brand new relationship. So, you know, I think we made a lot of really good choices by weighing out like long-term relationships that understood the direction we needed to go,

but we weren't there yet, but they were going to help at a rate that they could to where we could get to our goal versus like, you know, a lot of startups are the perfect example of like, you know, they wait, they make a lot of dumb decisions as I did as a business, you know, giving stuff away to the wrong people. And those, those places come and go all the time. And I think as like an ambassador type figure or whatever, you can, I think Andy likes to call them influencers. That's our hashtag influencers. Yeah, which, yeah, that's your official hashtag. hashtag for Andy. But yeah, you can, you know, you can burn a lot of bridges.

And it's just my experience that a lot of these, you know, Jiu-Jitsu, surfing, archery, they're like, they're small demographics. They're like small ecosystems. So it's like there's only so many times you can burn a hole in the freaking ozone before eventually people are like, that dude just burning the planet down if, you know. Yeah. What I like about what you guys, what you and Sharon have done, and I think this might be the biggest lesson that I look at you to try and pass on other people is you guys have done the right things for the right reasons the whole time. You have put the customer first. You put the clients first. You put the people that are watching your videos. I mean, there's, well, that's what you've done. That's what you've stuck to. Making the best products you can, trying to get them at a good price point. I mean, for you to go to PSC and like, say, okay, I could make wonder bow, you know,

and this super high-end bow, but you went there and the first, really, I guess the second move you made, because you did make that first bow that we're shooting, but then you said, okay, here's the first move. We're going to make a bow that is affordable to people that still kicks ass. Yeah.

So I think one of the lessons that I take away from this is like if you're doing the right things for the right reasons, in the long run, strategically, you're going to be better off than, you know, trying to maneuver real quick to make a little bit a buck here and a buck there. Like you said, you're burning a hole in the world that you have to live in. And it ends up not working out well. I hate to ask you this because you've probably been asked this 10,000 times.

But look, we've been going for two and a half hours or something like that. But if someone is starting, if someone's like, hey, dude, this sounds awesome, I want to get into this. I want to get into archery. I want to get a bow. I want to, you know, I want to go hunting. I want to be freaking stalking around in the forest with Cammy Payne on my face. Like, I'm in. I want to get into it.

What do you recommend? How do you go about that? Well, I think first you should just, you know, Google, you know, Google archery shops and look at ratings. There's, you know, some areas are very fortunate to have an awesome archery shop that, you know, has amazing, you know, entry level, you know, classes and programs like that. But also, like, especially from our point of view, knockon archery.com is, you know, we offer free, you know, lessons and content. I just put out a series, you know, Archery 101 with, you know, Mark Shanker from Kixband because you and I both were like freaking hair slingers from the 80s.

No, you're thinking of Laif Babin. Lafabbin was a hair slinger. Was he? Not me. I wasn't listening to freaking poison like you were. I'll give that to you, bro. Hold what you got. You know you do.

No offense against kicks, but they weren't in my freaking tape deck. What was your top three before we go ahead? Black Sabbath, Motorhead, Led Zeppelin, ACDC, and then just straight into all the hardcore stuff that I grew up on, Cro-Maggs, bad brains, agnostic front, right on down the line, who wants some? Well, if you wanted that easier listing, you had alternatives. But no, we did a, we did, I just thought it was a really cool story because, you know, he's, he's later in life, decided to pick up jujitsu, you know, went down that path, you know, wanted to honestly wanted to like get away from factory farming and so decided to go down the

archery path and you know wanted to like get good enough to where he could you know get his own food so to speak so it was really cool and we documented that and that's you know it was like a three-part series which takes someone from who had never pulled the bow back and just walked walked him through like you know same thing i did with helen right yeah you know And same thing you did with me. I didn't know anything about archery. You, again, man, so thankful that you decided like, hey, you will, you are going to really like this stuff because you heard me on Rogan and you're like, this guy needs to get a

freaking bow. So you set it up, you came out here, freaking like, what do they say? Like, it's not going to come to you on a silver platter, right? In life, things are going to come to you on a silver platter. I literally got archery on a silver platter. And I know it to everyone out there that's like this son of a bitch, just. just had freaking Dudley build my bow and then teach him out. Like that's what happened.

I know. I'm sorry that I got that freaking lucky. You know, my buddy Jack Daniels at Eschon Front. You know, Jack? Bro, he's like, man. He's like, he's like, man, Dudley taught you how to shoot, man. He's like so freaking pumped. So I know that.

I know that I got that. But I didn't even watch into your videos like before you came out to teach me. And so then immediately I go home and I'm like, like all right what are these videos that he's talking about and I'm like oh that's literally just what he told me to do yeah like I went through and I'm like oh this is what you so anybody that's thinking I got so lucky I did I'm not taking that away but you can get just as lucky by going to pressing freaking play on a YouTube video and you're going to get you said the exact same things to me you're like hey this is what

you need to do here's restart here's the string here's this and I'm like okay cool and I'm doing it and then I go home and watch the videos I'm like that's what he just told me he could have just sent me the YouTube link you didn't have to fly out here to San Diego go. So every, the fact that you've given access to your actual program of coaching, and it's available to anybody. Yeah. It's available to anybody. So. And on our YouTube channel. You and I parallel each other in that format. Like, um, and I heard you talk about it in the past. You've talked about, you know, like, you know, for extreme ownership, right? When you first started doing it and you would,

you know, probably when you started, you would, you know, probably when you started, you would, you would, get cash by going in places and doing that presentation, which is kind of like when I used to travel Europe. And like my slideshows, you know, if people took pictures of them, it kind of weirded me out like, I need to be booking, you know, I need to book another spot.

That's how I'm paying for my bills, you know. But then it gets to the point where you realize, no, actually, the more people you're helping, the more people that want to dive deeper. So, you know, there came a point for me where I kind of knew I was going down the right road when people that were on higher levels were getting mad at me because they're like, don't show them how to do that, you know, why are you showing them how to do that, dude?

You know, and because the U.S. was so dominant in archery competition for a long time in the compound bow category. and so like learning that ranging system on the unknown things. Like, you know, that was never tell anyone that sort of thing. But just all these small little things, you know, we'd go to another country and see him like punching triggers or something. And, you know, my buddy would look at me like, you freaking talk to them about punching that trigger and I'm going to punch you in the face, you know.

Let's freaking nuke these people. So, but yeah, I just felt like the more I'd, The more I gave away, it's also a really good filter because you really start to see how many people are absorbing what you're saying and not, you know, not being an ask hole where they're just asking and they never apply, ask, never apply, never apply. You see people where you look at them and you're like, oh, hey man, when did you start shooting that silverback? And they're like, yeah, I watched, you know, video blah, blah, blah, and I've been working on it. And I think I'm getting better. And meanwhile, I know this because I'm seeing. you know, what I try to teach being applied by someone that I know I didn't directly tell it to.

So then naturally it's like, well, hey, let me give you a little bit, you know, let me help you progress this a little bit. And I feel like for you and I both, you know, we just got to the point where we realize lay it all out there. And yeah, there's certain places that will say, Dudley will give you anything to come out here and like do it in person and blah, blah, blah. And yeah, I've got people, you know, we've auctioned a couple bows that have gone, you know, for a lot for good, always for a good cause. But we auctioned a bow that went for a lot for the Navy SEAL Foundation to get to that million dollar, March to a million mark.

And, you know, even though it was a raffle, you know, people still, Well, you know, not everyone's got 20 bucks to buy a bunch of raffle tickets. And it's like, you know, you can't make everyone happy. But the reality is, you know, if someone really wants to go through and put it all together, they can, you know, they can read all these and, you know, so many different things that I've heard you talk to people, you know, and give them, I don't know, people will come and. and be like, hey, you know, Jocko, give me some advice about this. And then, you know, I'll go through and look in here.

And I'm like, oh, yeah, well, you know, I've heard him apply that exact same thing. And they acted like, you know, he just told him something that's never been said. And it's like, actually if they, yeah, if they would follow that, like, you know, I'm a broken record when it comes to archery. I've, I've boiled down a recipe to, you know, what I feel is like a balsamic glaze. it's like the good stuff, you know? And I know like what can make most archers who are brand new, be at a very high level fast and eliminate a lot of mistakes. But, you know, whether you watch every video I have

or read all those articles or you come in person, now granted, it's easier for me to see in person a breakdown, which that is the benefit to being in person. you can directly connect. Like right away, you're not having to figure out what am I doing wrong and research it. But other than that, like, we put it all out there. If I learn something new or if we come out with a new product, then, you know, we're going to put it out there.

And most of everything we do is always, it's always a derivative of a need that I see that we can help with. And I remember specifically, like, on that bow that we were talking about, I have chalkboards all around me. Like, you've been to my house and stuff. Most anywhere where I, if I sit down and I'm in there very long, there's chalk, you know, most of my walls are just painted with chalkboard paint because I just write stuff down so I don't forget it. But I remember, like, meeting this person that kind of said, like, hey, you know, I'd love to embark on a lot. an archery journey, where do I start? And so I remember like writing that down, which is the name of that bow is embark, because I'm like, you know, embark on your first archery journey,

embark on your first bow hunt, you know. So a lot of the things that we put out there are because there was a need. You know, my subject matter comes from someone's problem that I need to help them fix. Yeah, I've been the subject of that a few times on your social media. You're like, Hey, start looking at Jaco's shot. He's doing this. And I'm like, there you go. And it's awesome. You know, and that's the way it should be.

You know what's funny is what's not funny, but probably like the third podcast that we were doing, maybe the fourth, something, but very early on in the podcast, I remember I had been asked a question about leadership and I was going to give the answer. And I was like, this answer that I'm about to give is like very, very, very valuable. And it didn't. It wasn't like I had a major debate in my mind, but it was more just an acceptance. It wasn't like I said, maybe I shouldn't give it away. But it was more like I said, when I give this way, this is giving away something very,

very valuable. And that's what I'm going to do. Like maybe there's a little bit like, well, you know, because I look, I have a leadership consulting company. Yeah. Right. That's what I do is I do leadership consulting. If I'm just, you know, hey, go ahead.

I'm just going to give away all the answers for free. Well, maybe that's not a good idea. And I own if I had that thought, it was like a split second. And I realized it was like, no, actually every possible thing that I can give to people to help them, that's what we're doing. That's what I'm doing. And that's what you do. And like you said, what it helps is that solves, look, no one in life is going to get to the end of their problems, right? No one's going to get to a point where they just like, oh, I don't have any problems anymore with leadership.

Right. Oh, I've got everything figured out. No one. And so there's, so you solve a bunch of their problems, cool. Then guess what? Now when you work with them, you can do a problem that's actually a little bit more complex. Yeah. It's actually a little bit more challenging.

You know, like I get kind of like you, you get asked, hey, dud, you know, I'm, you know, sometimes I hit a little bit low to the left. And they're thinking that that's the first time you've ever been asked that. You know what I mean? Or they say, hey, you know, once I'm sitting on on Target, I start my, I start to, my hand starts to shake a little bit. Like they're thinking that this is only happening to them. You've been asked that question 15 million times, right? It happens to me too, like, you know, hey, Jocko, I know you talk about cover move, but sometimes the people I'm working with, they don't really, you know,

they don't want to do their part. So how does that even work? It's like I've been, they think that that's the only time that's ever happened. And it's actually happened 15 million times that I've been asked that question. So give it away, give away as much as you can to people, and that elevates everybody. And that means they're, they're seeing value in what you're doing and they're appreciative. and now guess what? They get their problems.

That problem solved? Cool. If they never have a problem again, that's great. Cool. That's great. Good for them. That's awesome. I'm happy.

Someone else is going to have that problem. I'm going to learn, by the way. It's just doing the right things to the right reasons. Like I said earlier, if you're doing the right things for the right reason, it's going to pay off in the end. You and I are really similar in a lot of ways. Like, you know, right now,

Sharon and I are staying, you know, in your old house. So just lurking around and seeing some of your stuff. I mean, you're, you're not like a gadgety person. You're very, like, even your weights are, you know, the first one you got at eBay or where, you know, before eBay, when you walked in the freaking second wind fitness or whatever

and freaking bought this rusty whole freaking thing you got. But you don't. I keep it freaking old school. You do. What? You do. everything you do is that way. I'm glad you knew that the bands you used to work out were not mine.

They were my wife's and daughters. But I think your consistency with like you get good at the tools you have and you build yourself around those tools. You don't get tools to try to continue to make you better. You know, you're not like looking for the cheat code, looking for the cheat code. I know you talk about that. Looking for a hack. Like, if I get this, it'll make me a little bit, it'll make it a little bit easier. Now, I'm glad we're not talking about surfboards because you also saw my amount of surfboards I have, which is kind of freaking ridiculous.

Yeah. Yeah, surfboards is, it's like a freaking junkyard of surfboards all over the place. Yeah. And there's a little bit of an excuse for that because different waves require different boards. Yeah. And there's a lot of different waves to surf. I mean, my archery room looks very similar to that. But I don't change unless there's a change needed for the application.

Now, one of the things with me is I never really had great continual coaching. A lot of the things that I teach are from mistakes. Like, no one ever told me why I missed low left. I had to figure that out over a lot of frustration. And so, like, once I've learned those things, everything I boil down is to try to help eliminate those mistakes and learning curves, you know. I shouldn't say it's cheat codes, but just like me,

freaking surfing yesterday, I do try to take a direct line of attack. So my coaching method is very direct line of attack to where you're eliminating mistakes, but like getting to that particular point of topic as efficient as possible to where you're not expending valuable energy in that archery shot. I just want to make sure we capture a couple things here.

So I'm never done archery before, and I want to get into archery. We look for a good archery shop. We read the reviews. What's a good amount of money to spend on that first investment? Is it better to go and like, hey, should you go and try? Like, hey, can I try a bow? Like, let me shoot something and see what it feels like in the shop.

Just to make sure you're like, oh, yeah, this is freaking cool. Or is it like, you know, spend $1,000, spend $800, what's going to get you in the game? Well, I think if you go there and you try it, most archery shops are going to let you try it a little bit. I think that would be valuable. And be really specific to them to where you're new,

you want to make sure you buy equipment that's very suited for you as a beginner. And one of the examples of that is when you buy a bow, they have like, you know, they all have pulling weight. So when you pull them back, you know, it takes a certain amount of strength to pull them back. I'm real strong. Yeah. I want 500 pounds. Yeah, that's Jocko walking in. But a beginner, like our wives, for example, if they went into a lot of shops, some shops, especially if they were excited and just wanted to buy it right then, they would make do with equipment that they have and like size it down for them versus, I would way rather say, hey, I'll wait a couple weeks to order something to work.

It's my pull weight. The bow is the right size for me because they can always make it work. But getting the right equipment off the get-go and being upfront with them of, hey, I really want to do this. I enjoy it. I want the right equipment. And it's my personal belief that if you get in on like the lower end stuff, you're going to you can progress really fast with archery so what'll happen is you're going to do it just a short period of time and realize I'm actually better than this beginner piece of equipment and then you realize the value of beginner equipment is kind of a poor investment because it's just you're going to sell it for way less because everybody got that cheap entry point so like with the bow that

we did the embark, that bow allows you to get a bow at a price to where you can put some really high-end accessories on it. Because the accessories can carry over. It'd be like, you know, if you went and got a, you know, a cool freaking AR, but then like, you, you know, shot your wad on buying that thing. So then you went, you know, you went and bought a Neveski. And then you're like, well, I got 50 bucks left and you got to borrow your buddies like Red Rider BB gun like scope that came on it to like put on your Novasky that's going to be a problem so I tell people you know get high end accessories get you know quality arrows high end accessories get a bow that's in the middle of the road to where if you move up in that bow you can transfer your accessories over which you know we

we've done with you know we can transfer the accessory I went high end on your accessories because you don't want accessory, like you don't want your site moving. You know, if your site's moving around or if your arrowrest is moving around, then there's none of us that are going to know how well you're really shooting because there's just continual variables. But I think for a thousand bucks, you can get in to where you can get in and stay in without having to re-up and re-up and re-up. But you want something that has the ability to, especially if you're,

still growing. You want to have a cam system that, and that's kind of the pulley looking things on the bow, you want to be able to have something that's adjustable. And especially when you're learning, like, as a coach, I'm not going to be hyper-sensitive of you being exactly your draw length, which is like your posture when you're at like a full draw position with your bow pulling it back, because you can pull a bow back to different lengths. There's a good chance that your technique is going to slightly change over the course of getting better to where you might need to make some adjustments with that. So having something that has the ability to adjust is also awesome, which you get when you spend. It's kind of like I think there's like $100 increments.

Like you can get a bow for $400, but you're going to be limited. And then I think once you get to like $6.99, $7.99 for the bow only, you're in a really good. good position and then put good accessories on it and you know you'll be enjoying it for a while that that level bow like the embark like you you go out and hunt with that thing this is yeah i'll i'll shoot one day at the tax will be with an embark and then one day it'll be with an ntian like when i you know i and last year um i took that bow you know on one of my most memorable hunts you know because i i've always, that's one thing I've always done is I want people to feel like even though for a particular brand, they have a low end model, a mid-grade model, and a high-end model. I've always put some of

those budget bows to a test and I've used them because I want, I don't want people to feel like they can only shoot archery if they have the best gear. I've proven time and time and time again that that middle range is a, is a very good place to get in. and you can honestly you can stay there and be totally okay but you know it's no different than you know there's a lot of cars that are awesome but you know I like my RAM but I might want that hell cat ram even though technically it drives the same yeah right on well I think that's that's good info and I'm sure a bunch of people it's probably good yeah we're a in three hours right now, but I just wanted to make sure people are going to get interested in this.

I want people to, and by the way, you have all this information on your YouTube channel about, like, how to get started, what to look for, everything from freaking arrows to the book, like everything. So it's all out there if you want to go a little bit deeper. But yeah, man, obviously I appreciate you coming on, but, man, I appreciate what you're doing, what you're doing for veterans, you know, that are out there, what you're doing for your whole community of people that are making their life better because they're out there, they got a mission. And absolutely what you've done for me, help me out delivering silver platter,

bow hunting to me, which again, I'm sorry for everyone for being so spoiled. I'm lucky and I appreciate it, but, man, it's been awesome. And I want to help get other people heading down that path because, man, I think it's beneficial in so many different ways, man. Yeah, it is 100%. I think it's an awesome, an awesome sport, especially for people that come from your background who are looking for a new mission. You know, you said it perfectly because with all of you guys who have done it, you know, learning a new discipline or a new trade is one thing. But then once it comes to like packing up to freaking go on call, that like, like, a whole different intensity where, you know, hey, we're meeting, you know, we're, we're out at dark, back at dark. And when you're out there, you know, geared up and freaking ready to get after it, you know, I remember the first time you and I went out and we were on that hillside glassing and you just said,

bro, this freaking, this is recon right now. Like, you know, I'd have a team right. over there there'd be freaking two dudes right there they'd be like you know back up and then we'd be here and like you know the shit would be all pulled over tight you know it was you were in your element just dorking out yeah well you were head freaking dork on the scenario so it's all good awesome man echo Charles you can see what kind of focus and consistency it takes to uh to approach Excellence in any element. Cognitive focus. But the pursuit never stops.

The pursuit of excellence doesn't stop. What suggestions do you have to get us moving in the right direction? Many, you know, we talked about being an athlete, right? The importance, the value of being an athlete, which I was with you the whole time. I agree fully. But we don't want to stop that just because we get older and take on other responsibilities. Are you getting older? Well.

That's got to suck. It's just one of those things, man. The life I live. Nonetheless, we got to stay in the game even on our off time. There's no off time on time. There's just time. Something like that. Nonetheless, we have things to help you through this journey, supplementation.

First thing, you talk about focus. We have discipline. I was able to look at you just to get you on track, bro, because you were starting to stray. Why? Whatever. You guys are talking about all this cool stuff. I can probably chime in on a few things,

because I can tell you, like, three things. that are pinnacles for me from, you know, from origin. Cold War, freaking joint warfare and the vitamin D freaking have powered through COVID, you know, COVID year was like, no factor. No factor. But I was, those three for me are every day that are like right next to my cup of coffee to where I know I'm getting after it first thing in the morning. Yeah, that's, um, those are, Those are freaking legit. The joint warfare is Go read the reviews on joint warfare.

Don't listen to me. Who am I? I own the company. Of course I'm going to take it's good, right? Go read the reviews from other people and what it does to them and what they say that grandmother started taking it and all of a sudden, you know,

she's whatever playing tennis again and whatnot. Yeah, it's true. But the whole purpose, yeah, you own the company. Cool. But the whole purpose that you have this stuff is because that was like your pursuit even before that. True. Like, yeah, you got to take the stuff,

cruel oil, you know, all the ingredients, you know, and then, well, you added some ingredients in the joint warfare. We did.

We stepped that up. To make that one better. Because why not, like, it's not like, oh, I'm just going to take, no,

make it better. Yeah. Make it the best possible thing that you can put into your mouth. To make your freaking joints bulletproof, son. Yeah. Yeah.

True. And I'm with you with that, that combo every day. The cold war, not as much. That, that's kind of a, seasonal thing.

Don't like the cold. Super krill, too. Get that krill oil on, man. Get them little fish down. What are they fish? No, little shrimp. Little shrimps. Little shrimps.

Little shrimps. Kind of like shrimps. Yeah. Fish oil, good, though. You know, I want to look at that one. Fish oil is good.

Yeah. You're right. Chalk, there is a label reader, I will say. There is something. If it's in there, he's read it and researched it.

There's a reason that we, see, fish oil is like, whatever, that's your freaking $400 bow. Yeah. Crill oil?

That's the entry. or the krill oil is the freaking top of the line gotcha is the top of the line super krill is where it's at I understand fully I mentioned the discipline discipline go look hey look

some of us are into energy drinks but really we're not into energy drinks we're into the idea of energy drinks and what they don't tell you about the whole energy drink thing is that there's poison inside straight up normal energy drinks yeah tradition

tradition that's why yeah so this is the upgrade This is the, I don't know, whatever you guys call it. I don't even think it's an upgrade. I think it's new category. Yeah. It's new category. It's like, oh, we're over here drinking poison. You're over here drinking something that's awesome for you.

Clean alternatives is like a long overdue category for because think of how many guys went in and got after it in victory and then walked out and just grabbed dog crap in a plastic bottle to like have something on the way out the door. it is way past due. Yeah. Way past you. Yeah, it's almost like, and I'm not as in touch with it, but I'm a casual, we'll say, but it seems like the whole energy drink.

Casual, what? I mean, besides life. Everything. All of the above. You said you're a casual. What are you talking about? A fan of energy drinks. Oh, before you were.

See, if it wasn't for me being on deployment, like, like with energy drinks and needing them because I need, it's like, hey, I'm freaking wicked tired. and I've been awake for 48 hours and I need caffeine into my system that's why I started drinking

energy drinks and then but what do you deal with? You deal with oh I got done drinking the energy drink now I don't have that freaking high anymore and now I feel like dog shit. Yeah yeah and that's exactly what I'm saying. Because there's a bunch of junk in there. That's exactly what I'm saying

you're talking about like extreme stuff. What about when you were in the club? What about you were a freaking doorman of the year or whatever? I never I never I never got into energy drinks as much you know every once in a while or whatever I just drink coffee because they have coffee available whatever as far as staying up

no but I'm talking about like activity you're talking about going on deployment all this stuff I don't like the taste of coffee okay yeah I understand sir I was talking to Evan and Evan's like he's like I want to get bring you up to Utah and I'm going to figure out what what coffee you know what coffee you like

you know there's got to be a way you know he's like a He's like a Somalié of the Java bean. Right. And he's like wanting to create it. The Javier. He was texting me this. He's like, yeah, man. He's like, come to Salt Lake, man.

I'm going to get you the, you know, the bean that you like and the roast that you like and all the stuff. I texted it back. I go, bro, I don't even like coffee ice cream. Good luck. And he started laughing. But that's kind of an important factor right there because coffee is like beer where it's like at the end of the day. You're always going to have the beer flavor. There's a beer flavor.

Like there's a coffee flavor. And then from that flavor, then you get all the different fridels or whatever. If it wasn't tasting like coffee, it wouldn't be coffee. Exactly. If you made it with freaking cocoa beans, it wouldn't be coffee.

Yes, right. If you made it with tea leaves, it wouldn't be coffee. Correct. Yeah, exactly. Or strawberries or whatever,

Evan was trying to put on your flavor. We'll see. I don't know. He's a freaking, he's into it, man. Maybe he can pull it off. We'll see.

It's chocolate peanut butter. You might be all over that. Well, that's like you with mulk, bro. Like, I sent you like a whatever. You got some milk and then like two weeks later

You're like a freaking cracker You're like a freaking cracket Yeah We need some more there's milk of you in you man I was like dude All right We'll get you some more Bays and that freaking mold dude

Yeah it's true But the energy drinks is like a lot of these activities That they're sometimes in my observation Which is limited I know But in my observation It's associated with these activities That are kind of Let's just say they would benefit more

From a healthy Oh for sure Fuel for sure Source Yeah why would you be doing out something that's physically demanding and putting poison in your body. So you, okay. Don't do it.

You go to big sky or whatever. You know that hill. You're always sending me videos of you guys charging or whatever. What's it called? The big. It's a mountain. Yeah. Of course.

Walk up that thing. Let's tell me to say a hill. Yeah. Bro, when I ran up that thing after you and I were like, kept walking down that mountain every day and be like, man, this would be a good workout. When I went and did it, I was like, yep, confirmed. That sucked. Yeah, and that's what I'm saying.

So, so, and you write the lift up there. Okay, so in the snow, we'll say, if you're really used to it, okay, good. But just being in the snow, just like just being in the ocean or on deployment or in the woods, pardon my lack of terminology. It is technically it is woods. Okay, just being there, bro, it's like that's in and of itself is a thing. Like you can't, you're not just cruising. You're just, you're working. Right.

Okay. And then you're doing your activity on top of that. And whether you're in big sky, you know, the woods, water, whatever, like, Bray, you're not going to want poison in that scenario right there. No. Or even anything that you're going to pay the price later or something like that. And it's not needed. You don't need to.

You don't need to have poison. And that's why the discipline goes. Boom. In the house. Hey, Wawa. If you want this stuff, if you're on the East Coast, go to Wawa. And, you know, they were saying they tried to pull the reins on us. They're like, don't, don't tell everyone to clear the shelves.

Stop sending customers. We're back. See if you can run that supply chain into the ground. I challenge you all to see if you can run that supply chain into the ground for me. See what happens? If you do, I'll figure something out. I'll do. What's something I could do?

Like make a funny hat, put on a funny hat and do a video or something. Grow those bangs back. Go out for its valiant haircut back. That ain't happening. To me, to me, to me, to me, it's bothersome to me when my hair is like a quarter of an inch long or whatever like it already bothers me so go going that distance would freaking drive me crazy unacceptable yeah yeah vitamin shop or something out yeah vitamin shop and there's a subscription scenario jockofuel.com you don't want to run

out of that that that everyday supply you know jacofuel.com which by the way is where you think they called the good good what's the good good that's subscribe oh yeah the subscription well here's the deal man we're we're not look we're not alone in the world there's there's capitalism out here we're competing on an open market we're competing with some people that are pretty big so when you compete with people that are pretty big you've got to figure out how you're going to make something happen so what we want to do is free shipping right because people are very used to free shipping because there's some companies out there that do free shipping and so how do we how can we make that happen the way we made it happen

is if you get subscriptions to any of these products the boom shipping's free there you go all right Cool. Also, origin USA.com. Okay, this is where you can get American-made stuff from jujitsu stuff all the way down to non-jiu-jitsu everyday stuff. Like, for real, everyday stuff. Like jeans. Like jeans.

Like a wallet. Boots. Still waiting on my hat, Pete. Which hat? A beanie? A ball cap? No. You know the one that he wears?

We both wore that. What do they call those? Those are called a flat cap. But they're like kind of the Frenchy ones? Yeah. It's called a flat cap. cap. It's not like a fedora. No, it's called a flat cap. It's like what you see like a little British dude wear. Dude, Andy got me one in France, a camo one that I wear sometimes. And it's made up-

A camo flat cap. Hell yeah, dude. Legit. And it's made out of like sweatshirt material and it's freaking comfy on your head. I hunted with it. I told Pete like make me that out of my origin hoodie material because that hoodie is like my favorite thing I wear around the house every day. Oh yeah, that thing is freaking... The freaking midweight, that soft-ass one, it's freaking

awesome. Right, I used to say it. Most comfortable sweat suit ever in existence. They make pants to match that? Yeah, they do. That are like longer than 28 inches or... Oh yeah, you got a situation, but... We'll sew two pairs together for your freaking long

ass legs. It's true. I heard they all where I saw they had some socks brewing. Yeah. Socks are brewing. We're going to make everything. Interesting.

We're going to make everything. We're bringing it back to America. We're going to make it so you can wear it. And we will make it. Like they're making all these different like cool socks. But at some point I'm just going to make straight up white socks like you know. I roll. See, you have a lot of good ideas.

You do. That one. When are you going to make a jock strap? Oh, no. Dude, you need to make a jock strap. That. That's a good call, man. That's a great one.

I've been hearing that joke since I was in third grade. Well, for good reason. But yeah, good. Yes, all American-made stuff really good. Also, Jocko is a store. It's called Jocco store. And this is where you can get shirts and rash guards and hoodies and hats and stuff. That are representative of the path directly.

And then there's the shirt locker, which this is how. This is what savages people are. Yeah. By the way. This is how savage people are. So we have this thing called the shirt locker where it's a subscription. And if you're on the subscription, you get like a one-off t-shirt.

Yeah. Like if you have to be on it, like you can't go buy it later. Mm-hmm. So somebody's actually, I think a couple people are already jacking the designs. I don't even know how they're doing that. That,

it's not like that design is like on display somewhere. People posted it. People posted the real one. So like, And then they jack it and they put it on these websites like, hey, it's freaking ridiculous. That's how savage people are out there. It is savage and it is lame, but it's, there's like a few violations. You told me the other day I only use the word savage in a negative way, but I all, no, I definitely use it in a positive way.

Yeah. More off, I think you just, you just more attuned to it because I say it with such dislike those just, that's just, what a savage. Yeah. When somebody doesn't have the creativity to figure out how to make a cool t-shirt and sell it instead, they're just savages and just stealing a design. Yeah. Who does that? Yeah. Yeah.

Savages. Now what's jacked up is you could also be like, oh, man, like, it can obviously be super positive thing. Like, oh, these, like you, like, you said earlier, you're like, hey, where the Gwita twins are from or where the Gwita brothers are from, there's a bunch of savages in their name. They're wrestlers and their fighters and I was like yeah cool. I totally knew what you were talking about Yeah. So it's one of those words that can go either way, but that's a compliment word. We've had many conversations where if Jocco says Savage, it's it's a high compliment for someone that doesn't know they just got one. It is a weird thing because I use it as the highest one of the highest compliments or the lowest. One of the lowest insults I can give. It's literally the same word. That dude's a savage or that dude's a savage. What a

freaking bunch of savages. I don't know how they get the design. Because it's not like, okay, like the one, okay, so hardcore recondos are good or discipline equals freedom. You go to, like, I don't want to tell anyone how to get it, but it's on display somewhere,

you know, but the shirt locker ones, they tend, they're not. There's like a hint of them somewhere. No, but, no, no. People are taking, when they get their Sherlock shirt, and they're posting it. No, no, they're posting. They're like, yo, got the new shirt locker shirt. Oh, yeah.

Game over. Okay, so how they, how they do that, right, the knockoffs, basically the counterfeit, pirated, like, design shirts. They go to one of these,

like, internet, yeah, yeah, yeah, what do you call, purchase, buy, to order, or whatever.

No, you can do it, here's how bad it is if you, if you know about it, and you can, if you just have, like, half a brain,

no offense, to the people who bought those, but you can tell, you look at it, and it's like this weird, like mock-up, of the design on this real, like, real, like, what do you call it, emaciated model? It's like when you buy a Metallica t-shirt, like, from some dude on the beach.

Yeah. And it looks like there's, like, plastic stickers. Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Stuck to your freaking shirt. Well, what I feel bad about is, though, is I know that some people are doing, like, they're like, oh, cool. Like, I want to support, because we're like you, like, hey, man, if you want to support what's

going on here, then you get some, get some gear. And so they actually are stoked, like, oh, cool, I'm helping out, you know, the podcast. We're in the game. And then they realize they're giving their money to some freaking savage Some freaking savage out there Stop the savage support Yeah And they use like super when I say substandard material

It's like you know it's like the internet shirt that you print You know it's like that then they get that And then it's like well not to mention there's more to it than just that front design There's a lot more to it Oh there's layers layers there's little elements of the shirt if you examine it You're like okay I'm in the game with this shirt even on a physical level, not to mention the philosophical level. And you don't get that either, man.

So it's brutal. Anyway, if you want to get involved with the shirtlocker or any of these other things, jocco store.com. Also, we got, you know, you should possibly subscribe to this podcast. But on top of that, so you have a podcast. There's a podcast, it's knock-on podcast. Yeah. And it's talking about archery, but it's not just talking about archery.

you talk about, you interview you know, different people. Yeah, cool people. Different people from different walks of life, how they got where they're that, where they are. Of course, you do cover, if you just want to get freaking granular

on some archery shit, well, you can go, you'll get so granular, you won't even know where you are anymore. Yeah, we've imploded friends that try to go too deep down the archery rat hole. Like, we had one blow up today.

It's freaking, Can't go too deep. You got to be careful, man. It's like crack, dude. You know, like you got to be careful. You start going down that rabbit hole. Next thing you know, you look up and your world's exploded. So yeah, check out, check out that podcast, knock on podcast.

If you want to hear more about archery and just other aspects of life. Obviously, you can subscribe to this podcast. We also have Jocko unraveling. I've been rolling out some episodes with, with, with, uh, Daryl Cooper, which are, which are kind of some crazy episodes coming. out and they're just getting crazier him we want to talk about red me and him are like rabbit hole freaking uh point men in nom going deep in some mayhem with a with an angle flashlight and a 45 caliber pistol and we're going down some holes that they're scary so you can come check that out

we got the grounded podcast we get the warrior kid podcast uh we can also you can also join us on the underground for the jaco underground which is it's just a little bit little it's a little like when you like here's here's something you'll understand that what Charles you used to work in the clubs right yeah you in the clubs yeah I wouldn't say and there's like the front door right where people are coming in right and they're feeling like yeah I'm in the club yeah but then there's also like a VIP scenario okay I understand yeah he calls at the back door yeah so there's something else there's like a little bit more right going on yeah so we have we have the draco

Underground podcast. Jockounderground.com. If you want to come and hang out a little bit more, Echo and I are, we're in there, we're chilling. We got bottle service back there, I guess.

Is that the type of thing that's going on? Yeah, sure, there's bottle service going on. There's bottle service. Metaphorically, metaphorically, because you can send a question.

And if you're in the underground, you can send a question, we're going through those questions. I'm putting out little other things that I'm diving into. Yeah, and they're interesting because they explain a lot like when you listen to it you're like and you kind of put it all together if you're one of those people who are like oh I see what he did there when you remember some stuff that you heard

you're like ah and it starts to paint this bigger picture and explain a lot of the stuff yeah there's a there's a holistic viewpoint that starts to come into the horizon so go to jocco wonderground.com if you want to get in there it costs eight dollars and eighteen cents a month we're trying to jack all your money no if you can't afford it go go to assistance at joccawonderground dot com but we do need to have a contingency in case things go sideways in case freaking big brother comes down and just starts stomping out freedom of speech we got to have a little access port to be able to still do what we're doing and put out the word we also don't want to have a bunch of of uh of uh sponsors that are saying um hey we don't want you to

talk about this because we think it might be offensive to our brand we're not doing that jocco underground.com. YouTube, we got a YouTube channel where Echo puts up videos. Also, all kinds of more information than you could shake a stick at, knock on archery.

So check those out for a bunch of information. Also, Origin USA has a little YouTube channel. Talk about what's going on up in Farmington, Maine. We got psychological warfare. What's that all about Echo Charles? It's an album. It's a Jaco. album with Jocko tracks on it, helping us get through our moments of weakness if they may come about.

100% effective, by the way. Excellent. We got some books. Final spin. It's a novel. It's kind of a novel. It's kind of crazy. It's cool.

The final edits are coming back right now. And you always get like little comments. We'll just say it's going to be interesting to see how this one hits. Oh, comments with the edits when they come back. Yeah. They'll put like something. They'll give you edits. but then they'll be like,

you know, this is like, yeah. So we're getting, it's, check it out if you want that first a dish, leadership strategy and tactics, field manual,

the code, the evaluations, the protocol, discipline equals freedom, field manual, way of the warrior kid one, two, three and four,

Mikey and the Dragons, about face by Colonel David Hackworth. You're going through that right now, right? Yep, three quarters of the way through, I guess. You're listening to it.

Yeah. How's that, I listened to some of it. It seems like the guy is a pretty good reader. Yeah, yeah, I agree. I mean,

some of these readers, are just offensive. Like you listen to him and you're like, this guy is just picked this up for the first time. He has no idea what's going on, no context, and he's just reading the words on the page. I thought that the first like hour,

I probably thought. But then some of the things that he wrote reminded me and my grandfather so much to where now when I hear it, I hear my grandpa talking because he was, he was gritty, you know, Korean War gritty.

And depression gritty. So, like, I'm hearing him tell it how it is. And, you know, and even, like, the terminology is like, he was a good man. That was classic, you know, that was classic Papa right there. He's like, you know, he was a good man or, you know, that man's a coward or, you know, he was like, there was a clear line. You're above it or below it. That was it. Yeah.

Yeah, Hackworth Hackworth definitely does that. Hackworth said this guy, the guys are either studs or duds. No offense. Totally true. We got Eshlonfront, Leadership's Consultancy. We solve problems through leadership.

You go to ashlamfront.com for details there. We have EF Online, which is online training for leadership. We have musters where we get together and we get granular on leadership. We're executing these this year. The only reason we didn't,

we were going to execute one last year, the last one of the year, and then I got Miss Rona, so we had to freaking cancel that thing. But we're doing Orlando, May 25th and 26th, Phoenix, August 17th and 18th, Las Vegas, October 28th and 29th. Go to Extreme Ownership.com.

We've sold out every event that we've ever done. So, and these events are, we have less seats, because of social distancing and whatnot. So there's less seats. So if you want to come, get there ASAP. We have EF Battlefield where we go out onto actual battlefields. The next one's coming up, we're doing the battle of Gettysburg.

We sold out the first one. We opened up a second one. Register ASAP, if you want to come to that. And if you want to help service members active and retired, you want to help their families, you want to help Gold Star families. You can check out Mark Lee's mom. Mark Lee's mom has her own charity. organization and if you want to donate or you want to get involved go to america's mighty warriors

dot org and if you want more of my sustained sagas or you want more of echoes mysterious meanderings you can find us on the interwebs on twitter instagram and on facebook echoes at echo charles i am at joggle willing dudley so dudley can be found at knockon archery dot com and then on instagram Facebook and Twitter. It's at knock on TV. Yep. What else? YouTube, knock on archery.

Yep. Yeah, just Insta's knock on TV. Oh, okay. Check. Wait. Twitter might be too. Twitter is too. I checked them this morning.

And Facebook looks like that too. Echo, you got anything else? Yeah, if like I have kids that I want them to get into archery, obviously you have, you know, direction for that scenario. Oh, yeah. Yep, no, same exact thing. It doesn't matter the age group. You know, look for a good shop, see if they have a good youth program.

If not, then dive down the YouTube rat hole. Or, you know, following social media, try to give some type of free education, you know, if not every day, every other day. I mean, a lot of what I do is just trying to help the archery lifestyle in some form or fashion. Is there, so I got my son, he's four, a bow from Amazon. on.

And it's like perfect where he puts a lot of effort and then he can pull it back. So I remember pulling back thinking like a compound bow. No, it's like four. Yeah. It's the kind of where I pulled it back. I was like, oh, he might not be able to do this. And then when he does it, he can do it. But what's it?

Is it shooting suction cups or what's it shooting? No. Nerf things. What's it? I would say. And I don't, yeah, I don't know about all the arrow tips, heads. Like what is it? What is the end of it made of?

It looks, it reminds me of looks like. you know the old school like you know if you have archery class at school you know the thing like it's it's not sharp but it's made to stick into something right a blunt point yeah like a yeah but it has a little tip to it kind of nice but you couldn't like cut yourself just by scrap scratch yourself with that negative but i remember those but but the question is like if i just buy a random bow like that is that like a note like should i not do that or is honestly with kids that are that young, just let them freaking watch arrows fly and have fun.

Okay, that was my mindset. Pull back and let it rip. Keep them close. So, you know, I tell people, you know, kids like playing games that they always win at. So, you know, if you try to make your kid shoot a target at your distance, it's going to be problematic.

You know, keep it target big, keep them close. If they see themselves hitting in the middle, they don't really make the correlation of, well, that target's bigger than dads or this one's closer. If you're just like, all right, you know, you shoot for the gold, I'm going to shoot for the gold. And if they're like, I beat you again, I beat you again, that's perfect scenario.

Echo Charles, we started talking about making a warrior kid bow. What do you think? I think that that's a great idea. Yeah. What age does can a kid get like a bow that's freaking like pretty legit? yet. I think probably by seven or eight they can be going down the right path where you can teach some solid fundamentals and get something set up for them. Yep, that's the warrior kid age too, coincidentally. We might have to keep going down that path. Awesome. Dudley, anything else?

I'm good. Right. Oh, man. Awesome. Well, like I said earlier, man, thanks for, thanks for everything you've done for the archery community. Thanks for what you're doing for all the vets all over the place and and really you know thanks for what you've done for me i know that you like i said silver platter man it's been freaking awesome i appreciate it um and all you got back from me was a freaking broke neck and a freaking brown paper sack for instruction yesterday i figured and you nearly drowned i broke your neck and almost drowned you i'm from the best man i'm just a savage He calls his friend Josh over to, like, give me a board. So I'm like, oh, man, this is freaking awesome.

Like, he didn't even, like, deliver the cherry. He, like, had someone else make the cherry. And then freaking just threw me into the freaking sea soup of freaking, watch me drown seaweed and get that 40-foot leash that was on my board wrapped around my neck 15 times. Yeah. Look, I'm not the best guy in the world. I'm sorry. I appreciate your efforts back at me.

Thanks for telling us everything you learned today. Like I said, it's not just about archery. It's about life. It's about business. It's about moving forward. And thanks to your dad and his service. And thanks to all the vets out there. And thanks to the current service members out there around the world,

protecting our freedom. And when you get done with that mission, you're going to need a new mission. Check out some archery, man. It's good for you. And to the people out there in service here at home, to police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, and all the other first responders.

Thanks for protecting us in our times of need. And to everyone else out there, just remember that bow hunting is like life. The wins don't come easy, and you don't always win. You don't always win. But you still have to prepare. You still have to get the reps. You still have to go through the process. And you have to keep going, keep trying to improve so that you can get what you are after.

And until next time, this is John Dudley and Echo and Jocko. Out.