The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 629: Hunting With The Armless Archer

Episode Date: November 25, 2024

Steven Rinella talks with the "Armless Archer" and Paralympic Gold Medalist Matt Stutzman, Randall Williams, Cory Calkins, Austin Chleborad, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: Zero arms; polished form; winning Paralympic Gold; doing everything with your feet; how you must be physically located in the state of Arizona at the time of raffle tag purchase; 54 pounds of beaver sausage with a hint of red fox mixed in; listen to Season 2 of the MeatEater Kids Podcast; "The Fingerless"; hunting to feed your family; when your able-bodied competitors claim you have an advantage over them even though you're missing both arms; the foot that carries the gold; preparing and working to be the absolute best; and more.  Outro song "Opening Day" by Jared Hicks Connect with Steve and The MeatEater Podcast Network Steve on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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So anything can happen? Well almost anything. This is the Meat Eater Podcast coming at you shirtless, severely bug-bitten, and in my case, underwearless. What? The Meat Eater Podcast. You can't predict anything. The Meat Eater Podcast is brought to you by First Light. Whether you're checking trail cams, hanging deer stands, or scouting for elk, First Light has performance apparel to support every hunter in every environment. Check it out at firstlight.com.

F-I-R-S-T-L-I-T-E dot com. Just for you listeners out there, sometimes something will be happening before we're ready and someone will say something and I'll think that that should be in the show. And chilly sharing with us about getting his ass kicked by an Olympic wrestler. Yeah. Which, uh, which is fitting because we have with us a gold medal archer from the 2024, uh, Paris Paralympics. I'm actually holding his gold medal. Matt Stutzman is here today in the studio and Chili's trying to find a point of

connection with him and in trying to find a point of connection to him, he's like, Oh, you're an Olympic gold medalist, are you? Well, I want to be done by a medalist one time. I want a pink ribbon and then got beaten by a medalist one time. Did he have arms? He did. He did.

So tell us what happened, Chilly. Oh, this fella named Lincoln McAravey, Olympic gold medalist wrestler, came to South Dakota and put on at a wrestling clinic and like you know we got he'd like always pull up someone to demonstrate a move or whatever and he was explaining to us that like a lot of the technique and power comes from your legs and so he actually put his arms behind his back and he was he did like a little leg sweep of my legs with his right leg, and I did like a backflip So he literally I was also like 12 years arms tight behind his back. Yeah, there's a chance for me

Let me meet this guy But yeah, it's just My first first lesson wait you were 12. How old was this guy? Oh? He's like 35 40 somewhere in there Yeah, and he's I mean at that point you don't need to be an Olympic wrestler to beat up a 12 year old right? No, but he sure was It's gold medals heavy yeah, I'm a little jealous because I've never actually held it yet, but, uh, I'll take your word for it. I think it weighs like a pound.

Joined today by Matt Stutzman, the 2024 Stutzman. I'm doing that right, right? Yep. 2024 Paris Paralympics gold medal archer and bow hunter. Zero arms. For those of you listening, you might have picked up on a couple of mess. I knew a lot of hands. I talk with my hands, which is weird. Dude, when I was watching you shoot,

one, when you won the gold medal, you were shooting again, I don't know, I don't wanna be, I don't wanna be, you're, how do I put this? Opponent was. Politely. Your opponent had both his arms. Yeah, so it's actually,

I just wanna be the best in the world, so I was just like. You take it all. Yeah, bring it on, I don't care. the best in the world, so I was just like you take it all yeah Bring it on. I don't care And then if I lose I have an excuse he had arms It was you know my favorite your form um Your form is so polished to the point where I don't know if you know this to the point where when you when you're at full draw

The corner of your mouth does the same thing every time the other corner of your mouth. Mm-hmm Like it's incredible. You know what my favorite part of your form is though the flinch No, my favorite part of your form is that your when you shoot your release winds up over your shoulder It actually taps me on the back says good job on that winds up over your shoulder. It actually taps me on the back says good job on that 10. Your move that flops your release back to the front is polished. I've been practicing that one. It's like a little flick of your shoulder and all of a sudden that release comes back around. That's my favorite part of the shot. It's the between shot part of the shot that's good I wish I could tell people there's there was times during the shot process where the announcers would say I was flinching I

know I got it talking about well like you would see me jerk or something like that but if you notice I had so much control over my shot you know it's that moment where your brains like shoot now and then you just have a mental freak out and you just shoot, well usually, usually people shoot when that happens and the arrow goes wide or goes over, I'm able to control it. And so when it's not right, but my body says shoot,

but I'm not ready to shoot, I can flinch and control the shot and not actually shoot the shot and then reset mentally to make it work again without letting down. Yeah. I have a thing where yeah I'm real. I Was I don't want to hack on him. I wasn't impressed with the announcing The guy that was announcing his name was John Stubbs and Probably because he's never beaten me in 12 years of competition and he's now retired

we're gonna we're gonna dig in all this and your whole bio and everything but what um when they're calling those shots on the 10s they're calling them as uh what's French for 10 I don't know no they do deuce dose dose it might be dose it's deuce oh yeah that's right they go deuce 10 deuce 10 um oh so we're gonna get into all that we gotta do a couple things real quick Oh, we're gonna get into all that. We gotta do a couple things real quick. You can chime in though. Corinne and I owe everybody a huge apology, policy, what's the word I'm saying?

Apology. Corinne and I owe listeners a huge apology, but just to help it make it better, I want you to know that we lost out too. Yeah, we both did. We both gave our money away accidentally as well. Going way back, October 11th. So going back a month ago, we were, we were pimping a Arizona big game, super raffle.

Hmm. Okay. To remind, to remind listeners, Arizona's game commission had voted away to get, had voted to move away from what's called governor's tags and they're hoping to do raffle tags to allocate these permits in a more democratic fashion for an inexpensive raffle ticket and so we're talking about the the budget the the the financial um man it's gonna be a rough morning for me. I don't know what happened, I thought I slept fine. The revenues produced by it. Raffles versus auction. So they used to auction the

the governor's tags off in Arizona and it raised the whole boatload of money. They're moving away from that and they're going to raffles, raffles versus auctions. And it's projected that the money coming in will shrink now because raffles aren't as profitable as auctions have been to help with this budget shortfall or financial shortfall. We were promoting to people, Hey, go on and buy Arizona big game, super raffle tickets. go on and buy Arizona big game super raffle tickets. I went and spent a whopping $100 on Mule Deer super raffle tickets.

Corinne went in for a whopping 150. I'm just gonna make one correction. That was in the Duck Stamp contest episode, if anyone is searching for it. The Duck Stamp, no, no, no, no, no, no. That was not when we did that it's in my notes I just checked it Corinne I don't care what you know what say that was not when we had the duck

stamp painter in here okay any sorry it just wasn't I will bet you I will bet you five dollars Six eleven the duck stamp champ it is in the show notes the Arizona Wrong the Arizona raffle. So that's in there. Wrong. We did. We talked about this when I went in and said, I spent a it's just not right. But either way, either way, I'm right. I'm correct. Whether I'm right or wrong. I'm right. The problem is for all you people that went out and did this, this is almost like how they allow you to do it when you can't do it I don't know but you have to be present in Arizona why would they let me do it? At the time of purchasing because it's complicated with roles and laws. It should have a thing that says hey are you sure you're there because they sure like

that's fine I can have my hunter box. Yeah. My kids, my kids will still eat. But why would they allow you to make such a mistake? So, so you can't buy not, you can't just go buy licenses. A couple of things. I accept full responsibility for not reading the instructions. Thank you to the podcast listener who did and then sent in the correction. But it's very complicated for them to prevent that when they're actually looking at, when they're drawing, they will be able to identify based on IP address where the person, where the computer was that purchased at the time of purchase. But they have graciously offered to return the money of any podcast listener who bought

their raffle tickets upon hearing our announcement. Yeah. Oh yeah. They have. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'm only out 95 because I just won five in a bet. Congratulations. Related to this. Corinne's now out 155. We're gonna have to play that podcast back. Corinne's out 155, I'm out 95. I'm gonna let him, I'm putting it in my mind that it was a donation, which I kind of felt like it was when I put in for the thing anyways.

I know, based on our chances. Yeah, I never win that kind of stuff. Do they cap the raffles? No, that's the whole, no. So they could be a million tickets Everyone wins everyone's gonna win. Mm-hmm. Well, they also have like other prizes and stuff too, like yeah She'll call her Swarovski's and like yeah We do want to encourage everyone in Arizona or everyone visiting in Arizona

to Continue to buy raffle tickets and I think it's up until Christmas Day. So you're saying I got to fly to Arizona, buy the ticket in Arizona, then I could fly home and then I could use it? That'd be great. If you're stop over at the Phoenix Airport, that's weird. But in all seriousness, if you did that, in all seriousness, apologies, and I, you know, we take a lot of the blame, but I also just throwing it out there. If you go to buy, like if I was going to go right now and buy a resident hunting

license in Arizona, there's all manner of things that would prevent me from doing that, right? I feel like it should be like a little,. A pop-up. There should be a little alert saying like, you know when you go on a gun manufacturer's website and it's like, hey, are you 18? But you can lie on that too. I know, but if it just said, it should pop up, be like, hey, are you sure you're in Arizona? But also if you are out money because of us because of me

Feel free to write Me Deeder and she'll send you the yeah, and and we'll get it sort of who's to say that someone just Reaches out to you that didn't listen the podcast and you're like, well, I want my money back She's gonna tell them how to go apply for a refund pain and and sorry Conservation first USA. I definitely don't wanna give them more work, but it's like, I address search. You might just think of it, if you're in a position to do it,

you might just think of it as a good donation to, you might just think of it as a good donation to wildlife conservation in Arizona. Done with that. Ready for the next thing, Matt? Absolutely. conservation in Arizona. Done with that. Ready for the next thing, Matt? Absolutely. You being from Iowa, this might interest you.

They just made it illegal in Minnesota to eat a beaver if you've killed the beaver under a depredation permit. And there's a lot of head scratching going on about why is that true. Yeah, I sent this to Yehavang and he was like, dude. It is now illegal to eat a nuisance beaver in Minnesota. And see the Minnesota Star Tribune, they're trying to be cutesy with it and they're using all these little puns in the article. Like it's a gnawing question. They're trying to be cute. And they're acting like no one knows why I think I have it solved like I might have solved it for you Minnesota Star Tribune I don't know but here's my guess

oftentimes like do you remember we reported on when they made it that if you, our friends in Australia, right, a small percentage of our people in Australia, I would call our friends, but our friends in Australia had a thing where if you were to kill a kangaroo under depredation, you couldn't market it. Yeah. Part of what, when you get these rules like this, what they're trying to do is they're trying to clarify what your actual reason is for killing it.

Meaning, you draw a depredation permit for beavers, they're sort of like, well, is it really a depredation issue or is there something else at play? Like let's say all of a sudden for magically, for some weird reason, beavers were all of a sudden a dead beaver laying there's worth a thousand bucks. I could picture it.

Some like, you know, like someone they determine that it's the, that beaver caster is like the world's greatest aphrodisiac or like Keir's baldness or something whatever and all of a sudden the Beavers worth a thousand bucks laying there dead. A guy says man I got an idea I'm gonna get a depredation permit and I mean there's big there's a big they're cutting my trees down I'm gonna get a depredation permit and I'm going to be able,

I'm going to kill beavers year round and sell them all for a thousand bucks. So oftentimes if you get a depredation permit, you can't utilize the resource. It's like a DLP killing in Alaska. Yep. If you, if a bear breaks into your house and you kill the bear, you don't keep the bear. For instance, if I, we have a bear lurking around our neighborhood right now getting everybody's trash. If I came out and the bear was standing in my garage, I can kill

the bear. I don't then also get to sell the hide and eat the meat. They come and take the bear because it's sort of like, did you kill it because you wanted it? Or did you kill it because it was causing a problem? So, they're making a big deal about this as though it's a big mystery. It's probably a part of de-incentivizing claims of depredation that aren't depredation because you're trying to get... Does it? I assume it applies to the the fur as well. No, well... But then right, like when they say like can't sell it or can't... I don't know if you can't market it. You know, because how many people are really like love eating beef? I don't know, but I'm saying I think that that's... I don't know

what the rule is on selling it, but if you trap it during season you can eat it. You just can't eat it under depredation. Also, I have a feeling, I don't give legal advice, you know, all that kind of stuff. I'm not giving legal advice. I just have a feeling. Just financial advice. I have a feeling that if you're in Minnesota and you've been eating a lot of the beavers you catch on your depredation permit, I just have a feeling that if you were to continue to cut a hammy off those one of those beavers now and then and keep eating it I just don't feel that you're gonna wind up in a bunch of trouble yep have you ever eaten beaver

yes is it good piles of it one time me and my buddy Seth made 54 pounds of beaver sausage what that's a's a lot. It is. It's supposed to be really good. You know what I mixed in there with it? It's a little bit of Red Fox. Oh. Oh. Oh.

Oh. So I know this isn't. Just a hint of Red Fox. I know this isn't Minnesota, but in Iowa, my brother makes a living getting animals out of people's houses. Sure good for him. So like trapping beavers out of ponds and and all that stuff but I'm gonna have to ask him. He's in the ADC business. Yeah. Not EDC. ADC. I'm gonna have to

ask him why he doesn't try to eat any of that stuff but probably cuz they can't I'm guessing. He probably just gets a little sick of looking at it Beaver recipes in our way books yeah, he's like roast a whole tail and yeah Yeah, I'm gonna have to try beaver soon so yeah if you're trapping under a depredation permit and like and you catch one and you kind of look up and down the road and There's no one looking and you're down in the bushes and decide to Get a hammy or a little bit of tail. I don't know So what if you run over they're gonna spring out and bust you What if you hit it with a vehicle because I ran over a beaver like last year and you're a okay

if as long as your state allows you to keep roadkill kill one if I wonder like if you I wonder if I wonder like if you Reminding me of a story last last winter a Lady in her had hit a deer a friend of ours had hit a deer with their car on the interstate and we called the DNR and got a tag so I could keep the meat. Yeah, so I'm out there It's probably 10 o'clock in the evening and it's dark and this I'm skinning it out I do you are you able you can skin with your feet. Oh yeah, absolutely So I'm in the middle of the road there in the ditch there and pull the guts

But it's with my feet you know you You know those bags that you use? That go all the way up to your armpit like I just put them on my Waiters yeah, but they don't make them. They don't make anything for feet like that So I have to make it work, but I can make it work so I'm I'm gutting out the deer in the middle of the night basically and a car pulls up and It was a car full of old ladies, and she are you full ladies full ladies how many were they for? For ladies and they go

The buddy part is anybody here against their will in this car I Think the funny part about it was that when they pull up and they asked if I was okay, and I stand up and I have blood from my knees down, and then my buddy stands up holding a knife. Of course they can't see the deer in the ditch, and all they hear is, go go go! It took about ten minutes and the cop showed up so Like this guy without arms, you probably thought I was getting all cut up and stuff, but anyway That was what I was thinking

What I was laughing about Anyway not to get off track there no that's right on track because a deer you can do that right and I was it's state by state yeah like for a long time you couldn't hear now you can in fact there was a whole like a whole series of states that that that overturned prohibitions on keeping road trendy for yeah I got trendy for a bit bit. That's a good kind of trend. That's a good kind of trend. Black Friday sale. So when's this kicking? Oh, now from now, as you're sitting here listening to this through Monday, December 2nd, stock up on products at

discounts of up to 50% off. Head over to firstlight.com and Black Friday deals from First Light, FHF Gear, Phelps Game Calls, Dave Smith Decoys and the Meat Eaters store. Now through December 2nd. Big old savings up to that. So get your holiday gift stuff started. Oh, and while you're over there,

the fucked up old shitter's calendar is out. Get that too. Yeah, all year long, every month, you can look at a fucked up shitter on a calendar. Sounds like a great gift. I mean, great stocking stuff. You don't have to look at the fucked up shitters your your family your friends your co-workers Anyone you think might enjoy it. You know it came to me in a and uh I Like wake up in the middle of night often, and then I think for a long time before I fall back asleep

There now sinking of a of an ad for those shit that fucked up old shitter calendar that involves Santa Claus. Needing to... Let's do it. Needing to take a deuce like in the middle of his frantic, the one night a year when he really works. We can make that happen. We've got the most talented production team out there. But do we have Santa suit? I'm sure we can find one.

It's in the budget. We got Amazon. That's a great idea. Look under S in the budget. Bretton Reeves can play Santa. He'd be a great Santa. Santa's definitely like a Yankee. Mm-hmm Yeah, definitely

Santa's a Yankee. He's from the North Pole, dude. Oh, yeah Right there. Yeah. I mean unless you went so far south that you came back up the other side and back around on top. I Mean that's more the, not a geology. That's like a geography question. Randall, you'd make a great Santa. I said before, anyone from the state that has ice fishing, you can't be from the South if people ice fish in your state.

That's how you know if you're in the South or not. And people ice fish up that way. Toward the pole. Well, yeah. Toward the pole. Folks, I've got some very exciting news. First Light has just launched their all new completely reinvented whitetail line. This has been after years of brainstorming, prototyping and field testing.

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They are all featuring new, more technically advanced and more weatherproof fabrics and insulation. Like I said, three new jackets with a whole bunch of interesting new features, including an improved kit link pass through system, interchangeable hoods, new cuts with collars and wrist gaskets, all sorts of stuff. learn more about the new First Light whitetail system that's right for you. Just going over to firstlight.com.

Is that everything? Kids podcast. Oh! Out now, today. Kids podcast is out now. So we did Meteor Kids. We kind of made it provisional. We told everybody, like, we're doing this, but we don't know if we're going to keep doing it because we don't know how much people will like it and how much people will listen. Well, they liked it and they listened. So now we're doing another run of the Kids Podcast. And again, it's for your kids.

And the Kids Podcast works, there's like three acts. There's an act up top, it's like a biology and history, biology slash history slash interesting stuff lesson for kids, which I do. Then we have a, there's this thing called Guess That Critter, which is about animal vocalizations, and we play animal vocalizations and sort of build a bio and leading your kid to try to guess what animals make in it. And we pick animals that have crazy varied vocalizations like a crow probably gonna make the cut. Right. A sea lion would make the cut. It did last time but we won't give away season two's animals. No, because sea lions make crazy noises. Mm-hmm. It sounds like

goire concert. That was a fan favorite quip. The... And then the third act is when we bring actual real live kids. This might be an AI thing we could figure out so we don't have to deal with any kids anymore. Oh, wow. Interesting. We bring actual... Definitely in the spirit of the project. Get rid of them. We bring in actual real live kids to play trivia, but the way we do it with the kids in the spirit, in the American spirit of, of destroying America's competitive sense,

you know, and like making it that the American no longer has this competitive edge we've taken away where the kids, the kids don't compete against one another. They work together. They're all winners. They're all winners and they work together to build up a little booty of money to go to conservation. Because it doesn't work to have 14 year olds whipping on seven year olds. Seven year olds get too sad. Like Chile and Olympic wrestler No, we should do it. No be great is uh we should bring in chili to play against the kids. Yes. Yes That is me and I'll have you know last trivia I did pretty good. Yeah

Chili's uh up-and-comer that would be a huge show. I'd be like where chili comes in he gets whooped by kids at tree Steve. You're not the first person So like okay Mabel you're 12 how do you chill? 30 This is stupid I don't like this idea of never playing trivia again. That's all a joke. We know the Chilean win. You don't sound too confident. He'd have as much of a chance as anybody of winning. My six year old's pumped about more episodes though. Every time we're in the car going somewhere more than ten minutes He's asking are there more meat eater kids trivia episodes great

Matt you ready you should do one about what does the Fox say? Mmm. Oh, I think Steve's heard that song. Yeah, I know that song. I do. It's a classic. Yeah My kids wanted a dog said memorize the words of that song I don't have a dog yet It is a popular song and I still don't know what a fox says He says Matt Stutzman, you know, how comfortable are you talking about? Super you were adopted. Oh, I was I'll tell that story man Matt's dudsman, you know How comfortable are you talking about? Super you were adopted. Oh, I'll tell that story man. Yeah, so like your parents got overwhelmed

You know, it's funny because I don't remember any of this Because I was too little but When I was born they there was a surprise that I had no arms. Like my mom never did ultrasounds or anything like that. So they're like, oh my goodness, here's a kid without any arms. What do we do? And the doctor told them that it was going to cost millions of dollars to raise me and that I would never be able to do anything on my own ever. So my parents were just like...

Have you ever found a doctor when you had a chat? You know, I was thinking like, if I ever could punch, but I'd have to get real close. I've never met the doctor, but because of that guidance, it actually was huge for my life, because where I ended up and the family who adopted me, like taught me how to adapt to the world and taught me to think I can do anything,

and then I don't need no one's help to do it. And so I'm glad I was adopted. I'm glad that I was put in that situation where my family had eight brothers and sisters and we lived on a farm and we lived off the land, and there was times where I was just taught, there was a time I was hungry. So I went in the woods with my 22 and I shot a squirrel

and then I scanned it and I made a little fire and I started cooking it and I was naan. It was sitting on my shoulder and I was just eating it when my brother walked up and apparently I didn't cook it long enough. But that's the type of stuff my parents were like, hey, you just gotta figure it out. You gotta go do it and so

I'm happy that I was put up for adoption and and are you in touch? Are you in touch now with your biological parents? Ironically they came Got in touch with me after all this happened with the no yeah, no legit In 2012 when I won my silver my first games ever I won a silver medal They just all came out of the woodwork. Hey, I'm your cousin from your mom's side do whatever and then hey I was you know, I gave birth to you and hey, I'm the dad. I'm your dad I'm like what and it's happening. Are you serious? Yeah. Yeah, but to me I like

It didn't bother me any cuz I know who my parents are and you know these are you know no hard feelings to them whatsoever Sure, you know they they had me and that was pretty much the end of it how I look at it. Yeah Cow man. Yeah, I had I've had a good life. You know, like I know that I do a lot of motivational speaking and they want you to come in and talk about the ups and downs of your life but I've had and I have had I've had ups and downs but I like I've had a good life you know like I don't have any modifications in my house I can do everything everybody else can do I hunt fish drive cars like I draw yeah I was watching that that that profile piece they did that you don't have you don't have a modified car and

your parents made a decision kind of early on that they were going to modify anything in the house. Nothing. They were actually offered by the insurance company like $500 a month and back in 1982 that was a lot of money. But they had to spend it on me and they had to spend it to modify the house for me. And they're like, no, no. And they turned it all down and they're like, we're gonna teach this kid how to do stuff without anything modified. Because someday he's gonna be out in the world on a meat

eater podcast and he's not gonna need someone to be beside him to help him get there. He can do it on his own. Like they knew that stuff before I did. Wow. What was the first time you ever laid eyes on a piece of archery equipment? My brother had a bow when I was younger and he couldn't shoot it worth a crap. What were his intentions with the bow? I don't even know. He just lost arrows. But I remember, I tell the story where I first got into archery in 2010, but the story that nobody knows.

Sorry, but how old were you in 2010? Oh shoot, I'm 42 now, so I would have been 28 maybe. But the little story that nobody knows is that I tried archery when I was probably 13 or 14 and the technology of the rest and stuff back then wasn't that great. So every time I would try to draw the bow back, the air would always fall off. Because it would be on a flipper rest? Yeah, or like one of those steel prongs with the little, you know, where the odd feather would go between it.

You know, like it just was... What rest you talking about? I don't even know. I just remember it's like a, yeah, like a steel prong. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I could never really make it work. So back then, when I tried it, it was kind of like a short lived. Thing. And that was one of the obstacles, keeping the arrow on the. Yeah, I missed a huge buck because of it.

So I was like, you know, like if I had a gun, I could just shoot. Sure. You know, it'd been better. But for me then it was in 2010 where for me, archery really kicked off. But I think a lot of it, the technology then, you know, in 2010 when I said, hey, I'm gonna shoot a bow,

they had a whisker biscuit, right? So they put a whisker biscuit on the bow and I could do what I, I could throw the bow on the ground and it wouldn't fall out of that thing. And so that's when I really excelled with the archery and fell in love with archery as we know it. For people who haven't watched you shoot, can you describe what your process is like?

I could do you one better. What's up? Well, there's gonna be listeners. No, but he can walk. Oh, I see. Yeah, I think you should ask because people that are just listening will help. But I know Philip was intending to pull this up anyway.

And I'm curious too, like how you got there. If there were other... Oh, check this. This is a good This is a good video. This is a good video but not the one These are the ones I only have the hunting ones prepared I only Sent him hunting ones because They're in a dark ass blind

We can't show Broadcast video Like we can't show like Paralympic, like we can't show like parallel like we can't show that to our audience All right, so you just whacked them dumb. Oh, it gets better. It gets better. Wait for it. Wait for it. No Oh, no back. Oh, what are you doing? Hey buddy? Oh, I think I would like to eat you, too Bye-bye Bye bye. Nice hit.

That doubled up. He didn't go very far either. That didn't show really how I shoot. So I'll explain it. Ironically in 2010 I Googled how to teach an armless guy how to shoot a bow. Was there much out there? There was nothing. I couldn't find nothing. So everything was self taught. I'm gonna tell you a quick thing though. When I was in archery league

as a kid, we had a guy that was very very good, a one-armed shooter. And then it's like the... And he held it in his mouth. He had a mouthpiece. What was his name? You know? I could find out, I could ask around. He had a... From Arizona? No, Michigan. Michigan. I can't remember how his release worked,

but it was like he'd bite down, and it was like a string release for his teeth. Like a mouth tab. Yep. And he would just relax. His jaw. Would relax his jaw. And he used to dominate in league.

Yeah, I have a buddy, his name is Eric Bennett. He's been to five games actually. And for the first three or four, he shot with a mouth tab. He was pretty good at it. And he only has one arm too. But, this is before I met all those guys, right? So I didn't know what I was doing.

And I knew I just, the reality is didn't know what I was doing and and I know I just The reality is the reason why I needed to get a bow in 2010 is because I couldn't get a job I would like people would have me come in like I would apply like yeah You're perfect on paper, and then I would come in and then they would look at me, and they'd be like Do you have prosthetics like I would hire you if you had prosthetics? I'm like well last time I had prosthetics. I'm like, well last time I had prosthetics, I wore them to show and tell. And then, it's cool, because I wanted to be the only kid

who could take off his arms, right? But I just remember thinking like, I was getting judged what I looked like, not what I was capable of, and I didn't have any food, and I was sitting at home, trying to figure out what I was gonna do and bam, a guy on TV was in the woods hunting.

I saw on TV, it might have been your show even. I don't know, did you have a hunting show back in 2010? Yeah, but we didn't have a, we didn't have a, Was it on public network or? We didn't have an armless archer on it. No, it was a regular gentleman out hunting with a bow. And I saw that and I was like, that's how I'm gonna provide for my family.

So I Googled how to teach a guy with that arm how to shoot a bow and nothing came up. But I went out. Nothing came up. Nothing came up and I went to my local archery store and I said, I wanna buy that bow right there. And he said, how are you gonna shoot it? And I said, I don't know.

So you bought a bow off the shelf. Off the shelf. But what did they set for the draw length? They had no idea what they were doing. And I didn't know what I was doing. I literally said, just give this to me. And then I just went home. Like I didn't like let them like figure it out with me.

Cause I had no idea. So I go home and there wasn't even a D loop on it. So I was just grabbing the string of my teeth Hmm, and then my buddy had a release aid. He's like you need to wear one of these. I'm like those it's a wrist strap What do you want me to do? But I actually was able to slide it on my shoulder and activate it with my chin and oh the rest was history I went out I and activate it with my chin and oh, the rest was history. I went out, within two weeks of learning how to shoot,

I went in the woods and shot a deer. Wow. What? Yeah, and that's the video we have. Or no. That's, no. This is a lot further along in my career, but yeah. Do you have a personal video showing in daylight

how you shoot? You mean like how, besides the video you just seen. Do you feel if we put that up, someone would actually, we would actually get like, really get in trouble? Oh yeah. No, those, okay. Olympic broadcast stuff is really, yeah it's tough. Okay, so I wish you could go onto my social media

because I have a ton of stuff that I own the rights to. We can. So why don't you pull up one of my videos? Keep telling yeah, keep telling the story. They'll work on it. Okay, so What the hell you were what that were you asking about Randall how I shot I know we got Oh, yeah, I mean so you but you're Was it just instinctual? I mean you use your feet for everything Everything like you were just like of course. I course I'll pick this up between my toes and jaw. Yeah, so the guy that I saw on TV held the bow with his right arm, so I grabbed the bow with my right foot.

And then once I figured out the release aid, I learned that it needed to be on my right shoulder for string alignment. I don't know why I figured that out, but it needed to be on the right side. Plus I. I don't know why I figured that out, but it needed to be on the right side. Plus I was right eye dominant, so that kind of made sense. And then that's pretty much it. Like it didn't really, you know, just for people listening or whatever, I hold the bow with my right foot.

And so as I'm sitting there with the bow unloaded, I actually have the bow on the ground. I will pick the arrow up with my right foot, load it into the bow. Then I pick up the bow with my right foot. At that point, I gentleman will cross my legs, if that makes any sense. Then I lean down to the string,

and I attach my release aid to the D-loop. I then sit up, and I kinda look like an accordion at this point with my leg right like right in front of my chest and Then I push my foot away from my chest which draws the bow back then I get into my release and anchor Position while I'm aiming and then I apply back pressure to the release. Okay, that's what you're using Yeah, and then that activates the shot and your release around your torso your neck the releases around my chest So I've got some Instagram stuff pulled up here. I don't have a lot on Instagram okay right there now go down show that one right there here that the the sushi shot the the target

Yeah, yeah do that one. Oh cool. What kind of role is that the sushi roll? This is a hundred hundred? 101 yard sushi shot no hunts that now yeah 101 yard sushi shot Matt is that your account because I also see armless Archer. It's one of my one of them Yeah, apparently I have several but that is definitely my video way down There I think this was like I shot this right before Tokyo. So right there. There we go. Can you pause that video? Hmm so if you look like how I'm holding the bow with my right foot

And then I have a release aid around my chest over my right shoulder. That's a back tension release Yeah, that's one that I designed. It's called the fingerless back tension release. Yeah, that's one that I designed. It's called the Fingerless. Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha! I'm not gonna make millions of dollars off of it

because I think there's like eight arm massages. One day you'll be like, I sold one! In the world now, but yeah, so that's how, and then I activate it with back pressure. Now, one thing I couldn't figure out, when you touch off, how are you not dropping the bow? Do you got that good of a grip on it with your toes? Yeah? Yeah, I got some pretty so a lot of it has to do with the angle of how I'm shooting it to

My figured out like I'm leaning back so the weight of the bow is actually kind of more over my torso. Mm-hmm Wow, damn, there's even a little breeze to hit a sushi roll. Yeah 110 yards so I've noticed that like you know like as I we all shoot a bow like we hold it with our left hand Release so like it's off kind of opposite. Yeah, but it's the same side like it's a right leg And then the release is on your right shoulder mm-hmm, and that was just like you just naturally that's how you did it Yeah, that just kind of something that was just natural for me because I was trying to figure out When I would switch to the left side and then try to like the string alignment was bad, right? So for me Here's here's something that's interesting. If you watch when I'm shooting everything is like

Like I'm facing my bow, right? Like most people shoot bows kind of there, they stand at an angle sideways and the bow's left or right. When I shoot, the bow goes straight out in front of me. Which actually helps in the woods because when I'm hunting, I can draw right at a deer and they don't run off or nothing. And I think it's because when I'm drawing,

I'm pushing the bow straight at them. And the only movement you have is my leg going forward, which is in line with the bow straight at him and only movement you have is my leg going forward which is in line with the bow how many? How many pounds because you're using your leg? How many pounds could you? Pull with your leg You're pushing up pulling how many pounds can you push the guy like a leg press? Motion it is like a leg press to be honest. I had

Hoyt build me a custom bow not too long ago and it was 90, it was with the turbo cams, it was like 93 pounds. That's what you're pushing? I don't do that anymore because I realized I was down in Arkansas, Bentonville, Arkansas, and we were doing where there was a bunch of deer in town that they needed to get out and get rid of. So they brought me down to kind of thin out the herd for them. So I wanted to see if I could shoot through two deer at once. So there was, the DNR was there and they put out a bunch of food and I went and sat in a blind and I think I shot 22 in nine hours maybe.

But I shot through several at a time because they would be all stay and they're skinny I mean I got to tell you that like Arkansas their deer like their world records are probably like 120 inch or you know I mean like They're all skinny. They might be 130 plays just like Yeah, they're not that they're not that big I know what you're saying. And they're skinny. I know some guys in Arkansas that are just like, what, what, what. So I come from Iowa, so unfortunately,

but I don't pull that much poundage anymore just because it's a little overkill. The technology on the bows nowadays are so good, and the way you can build them with speed and kinetic energy and all that kind of stuff, the arrows. What's your target bow coming at? 60 pounds.

And that's the max that you're allowed to shoot in competition. And because, if I could, so we shoot distance, 50 meters. Well, if I could shoot 90 pounds all day long because I'm using my feet, and I'm shooting against you I mean that's a big difference when it comes to Getting the arrow faster. You know getting there the arrow to the target faster without being Deflected by wind or anything like that well at that point it now becomes an advantage to me mm-hmm

So it they just capped it everything at 60 pounds mm-hmm So tell that story bringing that first bow home and trying to get that thing figured out. So I bring it in. Why didn't you go? Why didn't you ask the? Why didn't you say, Hey man, can you help me get this figured out? Because I figured out if I'm going to fail, I'm going to fail in the quietness of my garage.

Right? Like I didn't want, you know, this was something that I knew I wanted to do. I just didn't want someone to see me fail at it. Because I felt like, I knew I didn't know what I was doing. And to be honest, if I walked up to you at a bow store and asked you to help me out, you wouldn't know what you're doing either. You know what I mean? Like some armless guy would be like, hey...

But a person that knows a lot about bows. You're right. Would be more equipped to be like, let me think here a minute. Yeah. Maybe I have some ideas. Then a person that has no idea about bows. And that is true.

I think it was a, I just didn't want people to see me if it backfired. Once I figured out how to shoot the bow, then when I go into the archery range, it was Finn and Feather in Iowa City, they, like, I was like, okay, help me out now. I know how to shoot the bow, how do we figure out spine, how do we figure out this?

And then they kind of guided me after that. What's your draw length? 32 and a half. And I usually run like an inch D loop. When you went back to the archery store after buying that bow and walking out of there for the first time, what was, when you went back the second time, what was their reaction? They're just like, we're waiting to see what happened with this. So I remember going back, the guy that was helping me me his name is Chris Mobley and

I said dude. I could shoot a bow. He's like let me see So I showed him we immediately made a video. He's like dude. We're making a video Yeah, we made a video and that thing went viral is like the like the only guy in the world with that arm shooting a bow yeah and And even then even like I remember doing that like a week or so after learning we had two weeks after figuring it all out Mm-hmm. I was hitting a pop bottle it at 20 yards pretty much every single shot like within two weeks of Learning even how to shoot the bow.

And those guys probably feel pretty invested in, at that point they're probably like, oh yeah, they wanna see this work. Yeah, at that point they're like, okay, let's figure out how to get you some better equipment, better stuff, and for me it was all just because I wanted to go out in the woods and put food on the table.

And I remember when I shot that deer, I remember being like, I got emotional because I'm like This is the time I could put food on the table for my family No one's telling me I can't do it, you know, like with jobs and all that stuff Like I'm out here doing it, you know, like I did that I brought I brought the deer home I hung it in the tree. I lived in town and I hugging hung it in the tree So I could you know gutted it and all that stuff I'd brought the deer home, I hung it in the tree, I lived in town, and I hung it in the tree so I could gut it and all that stuff.

I don't mean to keep asking the same question. Hey, it's okay. Can you hang a deer in a tree by yourself? Oh, absolutely. You know, I can climb tree stands. We got a video of that. Oh yeah, we can try that. You know, people ask me all the time,

like when you go hunting, do you hunt on the ground or blinds? Tree stands are my favorite. Let's make a deal. If we encounter a thing where you just can't do It yourself you just let me know that you couldn't do that yourself, okay? I'm not saying this is the safest thing because I don't have any safety stuff on oh no shit, man, but that's a 20 Think I was a 21 footer

Got it. That's gonna be my next question is, with your form, can you shoot a downward angle pretty good? Yeah. Beautiful buck. That was 50 yards. Oh! Dude, he had a little get up and go before it got there too, man.

I had to lead him a little bit. He's a little late to the game though, but so this this moment that we're having right now is he still going down Yeah, he oh you went down right there This is why this moment for me is really awesome. So I grew up in a So This is the you guys are getting like the good footage right now, and I wanna tell you why. So when I got into archery, yes, it was hunting,

and I grew up hunting, and I never posted any of this on social media. And it's because when I got into the Olympic and Paralympic realm, I started getting like major sponsors, BP and Allianz and things like that. And so I have tons of footage of me hunting all over the place with tons of things that I've harvested and I've never posted on social media before

because I was always concerned about the backlash for my sponsors. But guess what? I'm retiring. Oh, why? From competition. This is my fourth is my what fourth games And I brought it around full circle

And I really want to spend a lot of time hunting and filming hunts and doing that kind of stuff And I can't do it when I'm in the US OPC space like I'm you know Like I just was you considerate of my sponsors, so you guys are getting the very first ever Well, you thought your sponsors it'd be like put off and it'd give you a bunch. Well, if you thought your sponsors would be put off and it'd give you a bunch of financial trouble if you were like posting, hunting stuff. There was times like when I would, yeah, I would sign a big deal with BP or whatever

and they would be like, hey, we know you hunt and stuff like that, but we're just gonna politely ask you to just kind of keep that stuff. Like if you want to show a picture of you in the animal. Because Lord knows, we've never done anything that would harm anything. So, but it was, you know, I. We might have bagged a couple with that oil spill we had,

but. You know, I, it's one of those things where it was like, I respect the fact that they were, they were giving me financial money. Listen dude, I'm not hacking on you. Oh no, no, it's fine. I'm not hacking on you, but it's just funny from that perspective. It is funny, but I am happy that I can now share that stuff

and I don't care, you know what I mean? That's who I am anyway, that's me. I am now to the point now where, since I'm retiring from the Team USA, I will always shoot my bow. But could you stay in Team USA? I could stay on Team USA, but I'm retiring from the Team USA, I will always shoot my bow. But could you stay in Team USA? I could stay on Team USA, but I'm like, I don't know how to top that.

Yeah. No, I don't know if they've come up with anything like that. You know, you can't top. Like a gold plus? Yeah, a gold plus. So here's what's interesting about the gold medal match too is that I shot a world record. I shot one point off perfect,

which means if I would have took that score into an able-bodied tournament, I would a world record. I shot one point off perfect, which means if I would've took that score into an able-bodied tournament, I would've won it. That's what I was gonna ask you. Yeah, so like it's like. That's one of the questions in the back of my head is, like, what are the Olympic rules? Like, are the rules such that you couldn't go to, what do you call the, well, the.

We call it the regular Olympics, I guess. What do you, yeah. Could you shoot the regular Olympics, or can't you shoot the gear that they have to shoot? So, yeah, I would have to switch, I would have to switch to the recurves. But a lot of it comes down to, they don't want, I mean, the reality is they,

the reality is it is equipment, but I already get protests that are ready and able-bodied competitions for what so you ready? So you get you get guys bitching about you the regular competition. Oh, yeah So I only shoot against the para the Paralympic people Or people with physical disabilities when it's at like the Paralympic Games or like world championships all the other tournaments I shoot against I want to be the. All the other tournaments I shoot against, I wanna be the best in the world. So I shoot against the best in the world with arms, right?

And in 2017, I won Outdoor National Target Championships against Team USA, which is our best guys in the world. And I won like 20 some points. And it was a little bit windy that day. And within five minutes of me winning, a well known archer who is very famous and a good friend of mine, complained and threw down the money

and tried to get me booted because he said, I shot in the chair, therefore I was lower to the ground, therefore I shot under the wind. Who's that person? I don't know. Psh. Yeah. Yeah.

The reality is, if you were standing beside me and I was in my chair, I'd only been like maybe two feet, a foot and a half lower, two feet lower than you. So really it's not- I don't know enough. I don't know enough about it to like tell whether that's legitimate. I mean, the wind thing feels fishy,

but I don't know enough about the whole thing to have a- Like it doesn't wind. To have a big- Wind blows everywhere. everywhere. It was one of those things where When I first got in archery was there must have been something else. He wasn't talking about the wind No, that's literally what was on the paperwork. No, no, but was that what was in his head? Probably not He was just mad that I beat him. Yeah, like the wind seems yeah It's like a red herring like to like an equipment advantage. Yeah, whatever the hell Yeah, when I first started it was cool cuz I had no arms, right? that seems like a red herring to an equipment advantage or whatever the hell.

When I first started it was cool because I had no arms, right? You're the guy without arms that shoots a bow and then I started doing well and they're like, let's say I won my first event. They're like, wow, congrats, you won. And then I started really winning and then they're like, wait a minute,

you have an unfair advantage and then it turned into, you know how it gets. So if I gave you arms right now, like, whap, there you got arms, you're not gonna change your shooting form. I'd probably fight a surgeon to remove them. I'm curious like that. Like is form, like in those competitions,

is form is for like in those competitions is form regulated No, right cuz like that's when I think about it. I think that's what really struck me watching you was like You put a target out there Here's a guy. Here's a bow. Here's an arrow arrow goes in the target If I were doing this if I were competing against you I'd have the same equipment mm-hmm same setup and everything so like Other than saying you have to have two feet on the ground or whatever I don't like if that's a rule you know there actually is a rule like that's like that where really before I before I got into archery They said you got to have one foot in front of the line and one foot behind the line Oh, and I was like well. I sit in a chair, they said you gotta have one foot in front of the line and one foot behind the line.

Oh. And I was like, well I sit in a chair. So they made an exception for me. You just put the two front legs of the chair above the line and the two back there. Yeah, I have the chair out of the line. One of the cool things though about archery that I love a lot, and I tell people this all the time,

is that when they ask you why did you really get into archery, Yes, it was because I wanted to provide and put food on the table But archery doesn't care. I have no arms. The bow just wants to be shot, right if you take archery in the Paralympic space it's one of the only events in all of Paralympics that we Compete that we could take our scores and put it with able body scores and we would have beat them or tied them or been on the same page as them.

Because if you look at, I don't want to bash swimming or anything like that, but you have swimming, you have different categories. Like if you have no arms, you race against only people with no arms. Or like somebody who maybe has no legs because of the way the rules are. and they might have won a gold medal but you take their time against Michael Phelps and Michael Phelps has blown them out of the water okay right

but you take me an archery and you put me against the legit best Olympian in the world him and I it could be a coin toss I could him. And that's why I think it's so odd. With the same bow, yeah. With the same, yeah, the same, we run the same equipment, we rock and roll, it's just mental and who has, you know, who has the game that day, and it literally, you know, I can win.

And that's why I love archery so much, because that's one of the only sports that I can do where I'm not stereotyped as an athlete or divisioned down or whatever, you know, I can just be the best in the world Mic drop turn the machine off What uh what I was watching that profile piece on you, um, you can change the tire on a car peace on you you can change a tire on a car I said I was done talking about it but I'm back into it. You can change a tire on a car but okay

can you um what about installing components on a bow when you get like little teeny little screws what do you do? You ready for this? I do all my own stuff. They sent me the bow, I set it up all myself. I build my own arrows, everything. If you wanna take an Allen key, and you wanna take an Allen screw, and you wanna wed the Allen key and the Allen screw, and then you wanna put that in a little teeny hole and line up those threads and go righty tighty. Lefty loosey.

Boom, I can do it. I believe in archery, you gotta have confidence in your equipment, and the only way that I'm gonna have confidence in my stuff is if I am the only one that puts my feet on it. I think you could have everybody in this room work on your bow and you'd be the only person who puts their feet on it.

That's true, that's true. Just a side note real quick I actually a professional drag racer now I have a professional drag racing license and I race a pro mod car with like a You know several thousand horsepower car and I drive with my feet and I work on it with my feet and I do all the stuff With it on my feet, you know with my feet and I joke all the time that I'm probably the only person in the world that Can have foot pen foot pound torque a car But I've always been I've always been gifted to use my feet like hands You know so you know one of the things that my dad my dad was my principal

you know I went to a school, but my dad was also the principal of the school and During some PE things where like let's say they're just like something I can't do in PE He would take me down to his buddy's mechanic shop, and I would spend the hour I see so I learned because I always love mechanics and and how things work and designing and things like that so That's how I learned like I think the dexterity of my toes Learning how to work on my own bows sw swapping mods, you know, all that stuff. Do you, when you were trying to,

you were talking about applying for jobs and people wouldn't give you a chance. What sorts of jobs are you applying for? Manufacturing or? No, definitely not fast food. No. Why is there a toe print in my burger? A lot of it, the ones I remember specifically

were like just driving jobs. Like I was just gonna be like, let's say on a Raleigh's delivery driver, drive and deliver parts, auto zone, things, stuff like that that I could do easily. I remember one of them was, I even did telemarketing for a little bit, but then I got fired because I couldn't type faster than 21 words per minute.

I typed 20, but they're like, ah, it doesn't make the gut. Like little things like that. So they weren't like jobs I couldn't do. I just would walk in and you would immediately see their face. Like, oh, he has no arms. He can't do anything. It's funny because when I won my silver in 2012, I came back into the town that I lived in and everybody who wouldn't hire me,

like they weren't gonna give me a job, were like, hey, you want a job? I was like, wait a minute, that's backwards. But the reality was is that they saw what I did and they were educated by the fact that, okay, maybe he could have done something. Oh, sure, man. The education 14 years ago

about what people can do with disabilities was not that great, right? Now you can see what people with disabilities can do. You have people without legs climbing Mount Everest, you know what I mean? People are amazing if you just give them a chance to prove what they can do really mm-hmm Yeah, imagine you're a pioneer for other armless archers you mentioned there might be a few more out there that are using your release

Yes, I'm actually excited about it actually In Paris there was four armless archers wow that all had and how you get into the games is you have to set Shoot delete scores, and you have to like go through a trials process It's not like you can just show up. They always want the best at these games and All of these archers. I've helped get there Wow and fact for LA there'll probably be eight of them And they're shooting like legit good for all guys that you had some anger and girls. Yeah, so it's it's the number one ranked Women archer right now is a girl from India who's 17 with no arms. Wow.

Oh, I think I saw her shoot. Yes, she actually won a bronze at this game in team rounds. And it's crazy because the joke is kinda like every country's getting theirself an armless archer. Yeah. Because they all understand the benefits of having an armless archer I guess.

But now the reality too is that if you give somebody a purpose, they're going to perform better than somebody without a purpose. And you give that armless person now, like just from me speaking of what archery gave to me and how I felt, now you have all these other armless archers in this situation now have found that they can Be the best in the world at something They're gonna work so hard at it. They're gonna figure it out. And now that's what you're seeing you're seeing armless archers right now At the four that were at the games, you know three there's three almost people in the top probably ten in the world

hmm, what do they call the what do they call whatever happened in development that would cause you to be born without arms? Probably drinking. Oh, really? No, I really don't know. They did some tests on my mom, but they didn't find any. So it's not a known name of a syndrome or something that would. No, back in 1982 there was a bunch of stuff that, not drugs, but like over the counter drugs that people were taking that were causing birth defects. But supposedly that was not what happened with me.

And then do you hang out with just like your normal buddies from hanging out, do you mostly hang out with just total able-bodied dudes that you just have always known, or have you become buddies with a lot of disabled shooters? I am buddies with a lot of disabled shooters and people like that, but I spend 99% of my time hanging out with people that have arms.

Yeah, just like dudes you know. Just dudes I know, people like to hunt and fish and drive cars and have arms. Yeah, just like dudes you know. Just dudes I know, people like to hunt and fish and drive cars and have fires. You know. You mentioned earlier shooting a 22 at a squirrel. How do you shoot a rifle or a long gun or whatever? Yeah, actually if I were to have known this now, what happened back then, but before I got into archery,

I was probably 12 years old. I got my first 22, it was a Marlin 10-22. And I could hit pennies at 50 yards. And I just thought everybody could do that. I just have that gift of being able to hit things. I'm really good aim. And I think it comes down to my mental process and how I mentally process it.

But same. How do you shoot? Yeah, so when it comes to handguns, in my book they're called foot guns, but I can actually hold them between my toes. My left foot holds like kind of like the grip and then my right foot, I kind of reach around and you can use one of my toes to activate this shot. I

Have videos I should have sent you all these videos, but when it comes to a rifle I usually sit I have to sit down on the ground and a gentleman Let a gentleman cross my legs again for that one and then my right foot I can actually hold The stock and then I can reach the trigger with my left shoulder. So the butt of the gun is on my right shoulder and then the left, then I can activate the shot with my left shoulder there. Yeah.

I figured it out. I don't know, I've just been this guy who's always been able to figure everything out and wanted to hunt and do all that stuff. When you were little, did you ever have, you're so optimistic and capable now and not intimidated by shit, but did you ever have any kind of crises

when you were a kid about, do you know what I mean, have you always had this attitude or did you arrive at this attitude? I definitely had that attitude when I was younger, but then my dad would just be like, get your shit together. The reality is is that you're not gonna have arms. That's the reality, right?

You could sit on the couch and cry, complain about having no arms for the rest of your life, or you could put on those clothes right now and go out in the woods with me and let's go hunt. You know what I mean? Let's go figure out what life is really about and live how you wanna live. That's what he would always tell me.

So every time I would get in that slump of, I wanna play sports, right? And never getting picked first and always having to sit on the sidelines and watch everybody else play sports and just never being able to be a part of anything, when I would start feeling down about those moments, then he would just be like,

dude, get your crap together. Like, you can do this. So I remember one day I wanted to be a professional basketball player. And instead of saying you can't do that, he actually went out and bought me a hoop and said, here, I want you to start training right now. Like, that's how my dad was.

He was never like, you can't do anything. He was always like, you know, you got a full life ahead of you. You can just, you can be awesome if you want to be. You have to make it happen, obviously, but go make it happen. What an incredible dad. Yeah. Yeah.

That's why I'm saying, like, when I talk about being adopted, like, I'm perfectly fine with the fact that I got adopted into a family who was like that. Yeah. What's he think now? Oh. He won. He uh, um, this was a pretty special

moment for me because in Paris, I got my family there for the first time and we've, we've called it the memory games for a long time and they were in the stands when I won. Um, and I actually brought them down and we walked out onto the podium together. I was the first person to be able to do that, which is really cool. And we're on the podium and my dad goes, How come you didn't shoot a perfect score? He sounds like an Asian tiger mom. Of course he was joking, right? Because he was crying and happy.

It was like, you missed perfect by, if you would have shot one point better, you would have been the first person in history of the Olympic or Paralympic games to shoot perfect. Wow. And that record would have stood forever in the history of it. I'd be like, well, dad, I didn't.

Yeah. I missed one. I don't know, that's new. But it was, that whole experience just being in Paris I missed one. But it was that whole experience just being in Paris with my family was pretty cool. Yeah. What's the walk me through what the Olympics is like in general? Like how long did you go for?

I was there for three weeks. Okay. My family came over for seven days. I ended up when they got there staying in Airbnb with them. I didn't even stay in the Olympic Village during that time. Yes, there was cardboard beds at the village. I don't know what that means. Well, that was a big media story.

Like, legitimately. It was like all over, yeah, you always had all these, I remember a guy with a BMX bike showing you how crazy these beds were, but the whole bed is made out of cardboard so they can recycle it Okay, it's environmentally friendly And he was like doing more friendly than just a bed

The Olympics have kind of over corrected on not leaving a crazy Footprint yeah like a physical footprint after the games are done and so they went with cardboard beds They went a cardboard beds here however, it was a problem. Well for a lot Oh, yeah, it was not for me because I like hunting and living on a you know the ground, right? So for me, I was like hey, what are you guys complaining about? But there was a lot of people complaining about the fact that there was a cardboard We're at the Olympics and it's a cardboard. So it's a big thick sheet of cardboard you lay on? Well it's basically, imagine your bed frame

being all cardboard and then there's a little thin mattress on there. So what were they griping about? Just to, I think. There's a lot of athletes that felt they'd trained their whole life for this moment and then they were gonna maybe not get the best night's sleep before their competition on a cardboard bed.

When you're sleeping how do you know what the legs of the bed are made of? I'm just relaying what I was told. To me, to me it doesn't make any sense. Like I was like perfectly fine with it but you are right there was a lot of people that were complaining about it. Yeah you're like dude I've been through I've been through more challenging situations I don't care about a cardboard cardboard bed. You know like I got you I think they have LeBron James made a big stink about it Well, they actually spent like 30 million dollars and went to their own private hotel and yeah lived in luxury, but Which is fine, you know But as far as the games are concerned it is it is awesome because I will tell you that

It's kind of For me every four years when I've gone it's that two week period of time or three week period of time where Nobody hates anybody. Oh is that right? Like everybody's getting along you literally are see like if there's a war going on You're sitting beside the people who like you literally have the two countries that are at war sitting beside each other talking sharing food and laughing Huh it is one of the coolest Things I wouldn't have guessed that I guess yeah

I'm not like I've seen it You know even in the field like in the field of play and they're like let's say basketball volleyball whatever Afterwards are very friendly. They're you it, you know, even in the field of like in the field of play and they're like, let's say basketball volleyball Whatever afterwards are very friendly. They're you know, you know Hugging it out like it is a very like they all understand what they're there for and it's just to have sport and they forget about what's happening at home and People are just people and I've seen it every single games and it is just so like It's a super awesome memory that I have because you just see you just see these two countries

That are having it a war right now, but yet when they're at the games there and just like completely friends when you're when you shot for the Olympics the How many like how often you actually shooting to arrive at, like through all the eliminations? You know what I'm saying? Like how many arrows are you shooting? Quite a bit. 15 arrows per elimination round. And you go through what, five elimination rounds? And that plays out over what period of time? One day. Well, for us-

Oh, so all of a sudden it's like, here we go. Yeah. For us was we had one match Like the first day, but it was raining and the way they they did the schedule So then the next day we had four matches just bam bam bam bam bam. So that's what it comes down to Yeah, it's one and I thought it'd be more like milked out. No, no, and we only get one medal Like when we go we get a shot at one medal. Gosh, be like. It's not like if I don't do good now, I got the 100 meter tomorrow. The 105 meter. I can get a-

25 yards, finally 50 yards only. Right, I can go after another one tomorrow, but that's not how it is. It's just that 150 meter shoot. Yep, and if you make a fist right now, that's the bullseye that we have to hit at 50 meters. So it's like a three inch circle. So when you get a deer at 50, you're like.

Pshh. Pshh. Pshh. Pshh. Pshh. Pshh. We have to hit at 50 meters. So it's like a three inch circle. So when you get a deer at 50 you're like And you just flung some arrow at 300 right 300 yards 310 Yeah, like I that was actually the world record so ironically there's all these videos right now with these guys shooting like there's a guy dude perfect just did like a half a mile shot with a bow. And there's all these guys who shoot like 500 yards. But what they don't know, I still have the record, and this is what they don't know, is that in order to be a Guinness record

for the longest, most accurate archery shot, your bow can only be 60 pound pull. And you only get three attempts and you have to call the shot. You don't get it to sit out there and fling it. Like you have to be like, this is for score and you shoot. And if you hit it on that temp, then you get the record. Like, you know, they're out there all day shooting

to hit a half a mile and they're like, we got the record. Well. And they're rigging up an aim point. There's lots of stuff. Yeah, you don't get any of that stuff. Yeah, I gotcha. You literally have, like, so, I wanted to set that record just to, you know,

have an able-bodied record, I guess. So with your, like, competitions that you said that you got a lot of backlash from winning all these competitions, did you get a lot of backlash from, like, for holding this record? Like, got a lot of guys reaching out saying, well, I shot 500 yards, or?

No, I mean, I did have some people that would send me messages like I could shoot farther than that and I just I don't give them the This is why I don't feed into the internet much There the comments on that shot will be like well, you know Because he draws the bow back further than us because he uses his legs the arrow goes further like I Mean yes kind of but that's not the point of what's happening here like Just because I use my legs it doesn't mean I draw it back further because I get it, but a lot of them just don't quite understand the concept of and and so I just let them bash or have their joys

And I laugh about it and move on because it's not worth. It's not worth my energy to like you know It's so funny. There's an impulse to put the armless guy in his place. Yeah I remember when I posted that I had just got my I remember when I posted that I had just got my Knock him down a room with a silver spoon in his mouth Hey, I listen I Could tell you right now that those people who comment that I laughs it makes my day I like cuz none of it makes when I got my It makes my day. I like, cause none of it makes, when I got my professional driver's license for my NHRA

or my drag racing license to be certified to legally drag race and I posted the picture and it went viral because I'm the only armless guy to have done this, right? The amount of people that were like going on there and being like, how did he even sign his name? You know, this is fake because he doesn't have arms. He couldn't even sign the name on the paper. And then the one guy goes, I would never line up against him because what if we're doing 100 miles an hour

and the axle breaks and then he's gonna wreck into me? I'm like, if the axle breaks were all done anyway. Like, I just wanna go there and just comment, but I don't say any of that stuff. And then one guy said something about like, I don't know what I would do if I ever raced against an armless guy. And then my buddy commented like,

you probably don't want any of him. And one of the reasons why he's fast is because he cut his arms off to save weight. And I was like, oh my goodness. Like, I told my buddies like, dude my goodness, I had to tell my buddies, like dude, stop calling, you're just egging it on now. Now the backlash is just gonna come even more. I don't know if you ever heard of that fella

named Shakespeare, but Heavy is the head that wears the crown. Is that Shakespeare? I believe so. Isn't it? I think so. Either way, Heavy is the head that wears the crown Why don't wear a crown so you got that big-ass gold thing? Yeah

You can make a crown So heavy is the heavy is the foot that carries the gold The carries the gold, you know just something I wanted to just say real quick as China I knew I was gonna win that match and it's the first time in quick is China, I knew I was gonna win that match and it's the first time in my professional career that I knew I was gonna win something. How'd you know? Because when, when.

He was shooting a good game. Oh, he was rolling, he was good. So as the higher ranked archer, you get to decide if you get to shoot first or second. And it is in your advantage to shoot first because then you set the tone. I can't just nod and act like I know what that means. What does that mean?

So, let's say you and I are shooting an event, and based on qualification round. No, no, what setting the tone. So, if you, let's say you decide to shoot first or second. You shoot first, right? You shoot a 10, now I shoot, because you alternate. Oh, that's the tone. Now, I'm like, oh, I just saw you shoot a 10, now I shoot, because you alternate. Oh, that's the tone. Now I'm like, oh, I just saw you shoot a 10,

I gotta hang with it. I see. And a lot of people can't do that. I got you. But because I was a lower ranked archer the entire games, I shot second the entire, all of it. So when I went into the gold medal match, right before we went out, he goes,

you're shooting first. And I was like, oh, he's done. He's done. And the reason is because he was more concerned about getting into my head about my game than he was about his own game because he was trying to mentally throw me off. He didn't realize I didn't care.

I didn't care if I shot first or second. Like I don't care, I don't worry about that stuff. And he was worried about it. And if you notice, like closer to the end of the match he he started just And and it's funny because there's one match or one arrow when you shoot and he almost shoots an eight And he looks at his bow and he like pretends to adjust his sight well. That's this far off His bow didn't just poof in 30 seconds go from bullseye to this far off because of a site moved But he acted like his site was off and I was like, oh, he's so done

He didn't want the people on TV will hook and go Like you better act like my site was messed up Yeah, and it was and I knew like I knew it was over. He was so in his head and I knew when I walked out there It's like the first time like this piece came over me and I was calm and I was like, this dude's going, this guy's losing. It was so, I don't know, I can't explain it. I've had that feeling with the deer before too, where I just like, oh, 74 yards.

So in Iowa, I get three buck tags because I have no arms and I can take advantage of the disability season. Okay. I'm sure this has been, the unfairness of this I have no arms and I can take advantage of the disability season I'm out hunting and it's like I'm saving my tag because I have one I have one that I'm watching And it's like the last day. And this buck comes out, I think is, I don't even know if we had it named, but it was a deer that we knew we had to take out of the herd. Right. It was the antlers on the right were deformed and he kind of walked with a limp or whatever.

And I just knew we needed to get him out. And I was like, well, I don't want to just waste the tag. So he's good eat and I'll just take this one out of the herd I still have two more buck tags 74 yards and and we filmed it and it's my brother he films it and my brother takes the camera as soon as I whack him and he goes like 30 yards and he turns to me and I'm like like excited right and I he's like dude. How does it feel to shoot your own kind? I just shot a disabled here. I was like oh no Oh, no

It was good eating, but what's more nerve-racking the gold medal shot or shooting that buck oh? I don't know got your composure. Yeah, really good at the deer the deer Honestly none, I don't know I just have this gift so the adrenaline all that stuff doesn't happen to laugh towards Yeah, it's huge. I'd love some of that Hope I could do that in trivia You get adrenaline no like bark fever. I'm just trivia fever? Did your arms start shaking like this? Pretty much. No, I just get into a room where I'm like,

all these guys know a bunch of, to me, useless information that I don't know. And so, I wanted to ask, because I saw something that I'm actually more jealous of than the gold medal. You gotta meet Jackie Chan. Oh, yes. got to meet Jackie. So can you walk me through that? Like how'd that come to be? Oh I should probably, too bad I couldn't show you some clips. The vice president of the Olympics was like sent me a message the

day before and he's like I think Jackie Chan wants to meet you and I'm like so I was like come on Jackie Chan never, no and everybody says they want to meet me and I'm like so I was like come on Jackie Chan never know what everybody says They want to meet me and then it never happens And so I shot my first match and as soon as it was over they pulled me off the side And apparently Jackie Chan showed up specifically to come watch me shoot that match oh, and well went in the back, and I got to meet him and of course I watched all his movies when I was younger and It was pretty cool one of the funniest things though that happened was he picked up my bow and

He's like whoa like in his accent like whoa You know and then and then he then we took a picture And then he told me to get out of the picture because he just wanted a picture with the bow He's like now you go And it was like a school red, white, and blue bow that Hoyt had made for me just for the games. And it was like this, you know, it's the only one that's like it, right?

And he just wanted a picture with the bow. Is he a big archery guy? No, he's not really. He's a fan of people doing incredible things that they never thought that people could do. So like, he wanted to meet me because of the fact that I was just an archer without arms that was doing all right.

And then after I won, so him and I are still stayed friends now, so after I won, he sent me a message, he goes, I had, what'd he say, I had no doubt that you were gonna win. And then I said, oh thanks, and he goes, but I think you could have done a little bit better. I'm like, what do you mean? Yeah, the tiger parent came out he's like well you almost beat the world you almost got the perfect score So I was like the second time I've heard that

When you look at that one nine you got When you look at that one nine you got Do you know what happened? Oh, yeah? Yeah, just wasn't it was it was a little bit to the I think it was high or something I got no me. Did you know did you know like as you're letting it go? Yeah? Yeah, it just wasn't correct in fact if you watch the video you actually see me tell the crowd It's okay like as soon as I shoot like I knew and I'm like it's okay It's fine like I just knew like you like this isn's okay. It's fine. Like I just knew. Like. You're like, this isn't me falling apart.

Yeah. That was a one time deal. Yeah, I knew exactly. I drifted a little bit when the shot broke and it went right there. Hmm. Yeah. And you didn't let it melt you down?

No. You know, one of the cool things, and I talk about this quite a bit as far as people wanna know if I'll over coach someone to be the best at something, but to the measures that I had to take to be the best in the mental space to handle all of that, the ways I had to trick my body and mentally.

So one of the things is I didn't shoot my bow for like three months before I went to the games. No shit. Yeah. How's that helpful? I'm gonna tell you why. So when you, in the previous games, like I've shot, shot, shot, I knew it was the best,

I knew I could win, and then I would get there and something happened. And it was out of my control. Like in Rio, a knock broke and put me out, right? I put so much pressure on myself that I've trained for this moment for four years, I need to win. That kind of mentality can come back and bite you

because then you start putting too much pressure while you're shooting. Let's say you make a bad shot, then you start falling apart because now you just wasted four years of your life. I've been there in previous games, I felt that feeling. So I had to tell my body, my brain, that going into this games, it didn't matter what happened because if I don't do good, I can just blame it

on the fact that I didn't prepare. But I had prepared. It was a way of telling myself that it's okay, it's okay that you don't win. You're capable of winning. When you started that break though, when you started that, when you set the bow down, you set the bow down in a position of perfection.

Yeah, I knew it was fine. No, I mean like not only the bow, but you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like when you called it, you were there. Yeah, yep. And if you weren't there, then you couldn't take the break, but you just got there and you knew you were there. Yep, I knew it.

But then the next arrow you shot wasn't for competition. So when you got there, you shot a little bit, right? Yeah, just a little bit. Like 10, 15 arrows, and then I just rolled right into it. Were you feeling good? Oh yeah, I knew it was over. I knew there was a moment in time during qualification round where I was having a problem with my release,

and I took it apart and I cleaned it up, and I went back to shooting, and it was crisp and clean, and my arrows just instantly went to the grouping of a three-inch circle, and I was just like, oh. The last time my release broke, I was in 64th place, and I came back to win the World Championship in Dubai. I was like, oh, that happened now. And sure enough, it's a way of putting your...

It's a way of just going out there and enjoying the moment and not having all the pressure of you have to win. Because I know if I just do what I've trained to do, I'm going to be fine. It's the pressure. Everybody says, oh, it's the Olympic, it's the pressure, everybody says, oh it's the Olympic or it's the Paralympics, right, and there's all this pressure that you have to perform, but what's the difference between that one

and that one at your house? The ways I train at my house though, are not what everybody else does either. So like I've jumped out of planes, and then I'll land by the target, and I'll shoot until my adrenaline wears off, then I'll jump out of planes and then like, or. We oughta try that.

Yeah, they're taking notes. Out season 2025. So I'm not even, I had this idea in 2013 where I won. I just did that for the first time and holy cow. It's a blast. Well yeah, but I mean you're like, Do you do this? You're in an altered state.

No. Because I, it doesn't help me, I just go like, whew. You're in an altered state when you're in, man. But your heart gets, it naturally creates adrenaline and you start pumping. I always thought it'd be cool to jump out of a plane up in Alaska for a grizzly bear hunt and then like land close to one

and then shoot, a grizzly bear. You can't hunt the same day you fly. I know, so it won't work. But anyway, so I would do that kind of stuff and before you get the land and sit there get the land 1158 p.m. No, you might be able to do that but Those are the kind of extents of the training that I took there was a shot that right before I took the three the three-month break Mm-hmm. I opened the doors of my house and I take my,

drag my Pro Mod car and I put it out at 100 yards and then on the backside of it, I put a target with a balloon and then I take my Olympic medal that I won in London and I wrap it around the balloon. So I have an eight inch balloon at 100 yards and then I go on the backside of my house and I shoot through my, the arrow go on the back side of my house

And I shoot through my hair goes in the back of the house through the house out the front door Through a little window in my car about this big through the car Through the metal and then hits the balloon and if I mess up of any of it I hit the house hit the car which is expensive hit balloon. Hit the metal that I can't replace. Like I added, I was shooting to add value to my shot. The only thing you do now is take one of your kids and be like, I want you to stand right here. Don't move.

Get an apple on there. Don't move. I actually joked about that one time. I was somewhere and they said, did you ever shoot an apple off someone's head? And I said, I mean, I feel like I'm good enough to not miss the apple, but I can't control the person who's standing there, whether it be a flinch or whatever.

And then I said, but honestly, I guess it really doesn't matter, because if I do miss and the guy ends up getting hit, I said, I still am not gonna go to jail because I don't leave fingerprints. Anyway. You know, we're working on this deal. Me and Randall are finishing up this history of the mountain men that we're working on. We did one on we did one

called the Long Hunters and it was about the deer white-tailed deer skin trade Daniel Boone and now we're doing one about the the beaver market. So Jim Bridger, Jed Smith and there's a story that's in there as these two guys that used to have a drinking trick where they would shoot Cups off each other's heads with bows or slingshots guns They'd shoot cups off each other's heads is like just like a like a party trick. They would do They get the big fight over a woman right I forget what it was but They had a quarrel. Yeah they get in a big fight they eventually patch shit up and to demonstrate just how good

they are with each other how cool they are now they go to do their drinking trick and he smokes the guy. Oh no. He might not have totally gotten over that argument. He was probably definitely not over that argument. Kills the guy and then another guy kills that guy. Cause he knew. Cause he knew. It was a mistake. And then he drowned. And that guy drowned.

So the moral of the story is don't shoot anybody. Yeah. And be careful with your party tricks. The amount of people that die in this thing is unbelievable. Is that a story online I can read? I can read about? You have to listen, It's audio original audio

I'm at the listen to it. I will tell you the whole damn story Either way when people think who's the writer that hit somebody with a bow burrows, right? I Don't know. Yeah, didn't burrows Tuck that up brother burrows shot. I think didn't burrows Kill he tried to William tell somebody. Yeah, he killed somebody, didn't he? William S. Burroughs? Type in Burroughs, Apple, Robin Hood. It was Burroughs.

Thanks, Phil. Killed her, right? Yes, and also heavy is the head that wears the crown. That was Henry IV, that was Shakespeare as well, so you're on a tear today. Damn, man, and I got Burroughs, right? Tropic Cancer, Tropic Capricorn, Burroughsrows how far was the shot on the William tell do you think? Considering the technology is it true. Yeah, is that story true? I think I'll Joanne vol. I think it's apocryphal

according to Wikipedia He killed her yeah, was it a bow or a gun He didn't get in the hell without a trouble in 1951 burrows killed Wollmer It was a drunken attempt at playing William Tell doesn't say how far it was You know she was drunk too when you miss Yeah The guy that misses high got to aim at the top of the apple apple. I actually know why. I always know why they miss low. Tell me.

So when you're hunting, do you come from the target down or do you go from the target up? Do you wanna know the truth? Yeah. I come from the left. Okay. I mean, that works. I've never shot an arrow in my life. I come from the left.

So which way is it? Your pins are facing the right on your outers? I shoot left handed and I come in from the left. My pin comes in from the left, horizontal. So you follow the pin in so you can see basically. The bow goes across the target. Like if I drew back right now and I'm going to shoot Randall right in the tip of his nose. Right in his apple. Well, I probably hit a little, right above his- Imaginary apple?

Okay, I'm going to shoot- Yeah, but I'm at, okay. I'm going to come to draw, okay? Yeah. I'm shooting like how I did when I was a kid. I'm going to come to draw and I'm going to go pop right in the head. So you move- So you- The apple's still there.

So you move to the right because your sight pin is on the left side, so you, if you're moving to the right, you can see what you're coming into the shot. That's what it is. Yeah. Well, I can't, when I shoot just like instinctive with no pins, I don't remember what I did.

But I've been shooting pins so long, that's how I do it. I mean, I wouldn't change it, it's working. I don't know that I wouldn't know. Works like sure, sometimes. A lot of the time, not all the time. A lot of archers, a lot of beginners, for even people that are not beginners, they usually start below the target and come up, which is not bad. I mean, it's bad to do that, but that's probably why they always hit low.

They start low and come up. I always start above the target, and then I relax my legs to let the, then I can, so you're more at a relaxed state. If you're, you gotta use muscles to lift it into place, but if you're above it, you can relax to come down. So you just calmer. Like what are you doing like when you're breathing? I hold my breath actually. You know what I was talking about your form is so straight you um you

kind of like you like you adjust your mouth a little bit every time the left side of your mouth just just it's got a quiver to it just a little bit it's something you do I was watching it's like the same like you got it's got a quiver to it. Just a little bit. It's something you do. I was watching it's like the same Like you got it. You got your form your form is like when you shoot. It's like how you shoot I Spent eight hours a day when I first started shooting for basically ten or eleven years just eight hours a day That was my life Different different blow a shot on a deer it's been a long time I think in the last 12 years maybe two okay and it wasn't because I blew it completely I

was it turned or it jumped you know know, and it just was a bad shot. Like that buck showed us, he was like, I should probably get going. Yeah, he knew it was coming. But I led that one. I was like, he was in the open field and I knew. I took the gamble because I was hoping he would go forward versus duck it. But the gamble was good on that one. Do you have any dream hunts? Elk, other guy, I don't know, other critters? Elk and grizzly bear.

I wanna shoot a grizzly bear. I wanna be on the ground too. I don't wanna be up in a tree stand. I can hunt really good off the ground. So with the short axle axle bows, I don't need a chair or nothing, I can just sit around the ground and shh. And I like the adventures of that.

So someday, someday. I've had several people offer me grizzly bear hunts in exchange for some promotional things, but it always fell over some major tournament. So that's one of the reasons why I wanna retire from the competition side, because I want to, eventually these guys are gonna stop saying, hey, do you wanna come hunt?

Because it's been like three or four years of me saying, sure, and then oh, hey, I got something that I came up, and I wanna take advantage of that. And I would love to elk hunt at some point, too. This is probably a stupid question, but I mean, when you're hunting, what percentage of the time are you wearing, you're obviously, when you're in a shot situation,

you're not wearing shoes, like on a grizzly bear hunt or something like that, or like when you're hiking in, are you hunting in bare feet a lot, or are you taking your shoes off? before you shoot like what's the What's the strategy the joke that I always tell everybody is especially if you're hunting when it's cold out in a stand in Iowa It really takes a lot. It takes a good deer for me to want to take off my sock and shoe Three degree weather like a boot you just slip on when you're gonna keep warm

Yeah, I got like a quick a. But now I have, they make toe socks. And they actually have toe shoes. Yeah. So, and. And you have the dexterity. I have the dexterity that I can still use those. Oh, that works? Oh, yeah.

Oh, okay. Well, you know, you should, it's good that this is a good platform to bring up that you'd like to go elk and grizzly hunting. Tell people how to find you. Okay, so where do I begin? Facebook is kind of like my main platform. So if you go under the armless archer, you can always send me messages there.

I do have Instagram and Twitter that I'm working on building and I believe they are ArmlessArcher, and then I might have ArmlessMatt as well on one of them. There's a theme there. There's a theme there. I also think that someone should be able to make you some gotten gloves. So it'd be like, you'd prefer it to be like

a thumbless mitten. Basically, yeah. As long as I have a dexterity So if you if you on my big toe and then this to my pocket for your big toe coming off the side of that sucker Yeah, absolutely. I love anybody in I don't know if anybody listening deals and that kind of stuff So when I nice little thing when I got into the racing side of things Ironically one of the things that kept me from going 200 miles an hour I got into the racing side of things. Ironically, one of the things that kept me

from going 200 miles an hour was the fact that I didn't have the proper foot gloves as far as safety, fireproof. So last year, a company, Stan 21, made me full on custom the highest fireproof rated sock foot gloves on the market. And so now this year, coming into this next year, I'll be able to do 200 miles an hour,

legally, without getting in trouble. You got fire retardant foot gloves. Fire retardant foot gloves. So, I know there's a way, I know there's a way to make these gloves work, you know, for even, even if there was a better glove that I could wear for hunting, right? Like, that was warmer than a skinny shoe

or something like that. You know what you might try out, man? I think it might be a good product for you to look into, is there's a company called Wiggies. Wiggies. Yeah, W-I-G-G-Y. Okay. Wiggies.

And he makes like a over boot, a muck luck overboot. That's like unbelievable. It's meant to be that you can put it over your height. You can put it over your boot, but a lot of like stand sitters and super cold areas, you can just go to your stand and your fricking sneakers, put that thing on, but I have a set of them and the way they're lined and mega insulated You'd be able to just put if you had your sock on or whatever to hell and you understand You just be able to drop your foot in there and just lift it right out of there really and you couldn't possibly get cold

So here here's a question wants to go in on it, set up a map. You know, I did have a deer get spooked one time when I took off my sock, and I was like, I know I washed my feet, but walking in, if you're sweating, you know? So that's one of the things I tried to not over, like it's okay to have a little bit colder

You know it's okay to freeze it a little bit Yeah, because walking in if you're sweating in your foot, and you have to go for shoot a shoot then You get a little bit of that odor going dude. I'll tell you what I would do man if I didn't have any arms I'd take One of those boots. I'm talking about and I'd hot glue that son of a bitch to a little piece of plywood So it's sitting there. Oh, oh yeah and I would just very gingerly slide it out coming out of there because it's hot glued to a board right hot glue to some bitch right to my stand you just leave it there I'll need like 30 30 gloves

I would need like 30 gloves. I got sand everywhere. So. They're full of snow or water. Who wants to sponsor me 30 of them? No, when I leave, when I leave, if I didn't have any arms, I'd take a five gallon bucket. Yep. And I'd set it right over that boot.

I'd take the rain and snow out. See, he's thought this all through. All of your problems are solved. All of it. Steve the engineer. So you need a bunch of boots and some five gallon buckets. You need a bucket sponsor. You need a bucket sponsor. I mean that would work.

I think a lot of it though is I play the wind. I have to think about the foot thing quite a bit. So I just play the wind and I like to be somewhat mobile-ish, you know, so. All right, so don't glue your boot to the board. Yeah, don't glue the boot to the board. Boot to the board is out. No, one time on accident, I stayed at a buddy's place, and he had a log fire to how he had his hunting cabin.

And I remember going out in the woods that night, or that morning, and I'm like, oh, all my stuff, I forgot, everything smells like smoke. Just reeks of wood fire. I had, that was one of my most successful weeks I've ever had. I was sitting by a tree, it was still dark out, and I had a doe just walk from here to the camera.

Just boop, and then I smelled my clothes and then walked off. I'm like, there is something to the smoke. We're in Wired to Hunt territory now, but yeah, man like there's a lot there's a lot of opinion out there about there's a lot of opinion out there about how a Lot of opinion about how ungulates regard the smell of smoke. Yeah, like how omnipresent it is. Mm-hmm. And then

Also when you have smoke on you, is it covering it or is it that there's the smell of smoke, which is there, but also there's the smell of you. Right. And it's just like, it's not that one overrides the other. It's just that there's two things happening. You know what I mean? Like, oh, it's Smokey. And there's a dude. But yeah, I don't know. It'd be great. I'd like to have a show, if I ever do another podcast, this is gonna be where I interview game animals.

You're gonna need a medium to talk them through. Y'all have a big buck in. Okay. And I'd be like, Kate, during the rut, man, you're kinda out a lot. You're out walking around a lot during the rut. Like, are you nervous? I've been run over by deer before.

I've been run over by a deer. It was hit? Huh? It was hit? No, I was sitting on the ground. I was laid into the stand and there was this brush pile, I was like, I'm gonna sit by this brush pile on the ground. And I hear all this noise and the next thing I know,

I'm just like, pow, on my face. And the doe was being chased by a buck. And they went right between where I was sitting and he just ran right into me, just shh. And I'm laying there and he stops like he hit me and he's standing over the top of me and I'm like. What? Yeah and I look up at him and I can see his belly.

I'm like. No way. Yeah. That's cool. I'm just like laying there trying to figure out what happened and then he goes shh and took off running. I'm like, oh now you smell me. I had to blow at you though.

Yeah. My old man got hit by a buck and he got injured but he got injured by his own arrow when he got run over. He got run over by a buck and cut his hand pretty good with his own arrow. He had an arrow knocked and somehow the arrow got blown right off. The broadhead came around and got him. That was the only injury he got from getting hit by a buck. Talk about karma. Sure.

Does that speak a lot about the broadheads? You know, this is back in the, I don't know if you remember like, this is back in the days when, you remember those- They're made out of rock? No, like those steel, like deltas. You remember like with the bleeders?

Remember those green, those green like kind of riveted delta points and they, you know, you take you, you take your wooden arrow and bevel that wooden arrow down to a point. And that Delta point, um, came with a cone. It was like built on a cone and you'd get that hot, you know, that, that heat adhesive and put them on there. It was back in those days. I'm nodding. Like I remember, you gotta appreciate how old I am. It's getting, like, it's getting.

You're not old. No, well, here's the deal. I'm getting up there enough where I now, I now have like recollections about stuff that people are like, what? I'm like, I'm telling you, man. It was a very insane. That was like, yeah, I'm like, I'm telling you, dude.

That was like a thing, man, you know? Trying to call the cops'm like, I'm telling you, dude, that was like a thing, man. You know, trying to call it cops and like couldn't find the phone or like die. Have you seen the video of the kids who didn't know how to run one of those phones? Oh, no. Yeah, they have no, my kids would have no idea. When you see, they need to change the icon. The phone icon still has like the phone with the curly cord hooked to it.

Dude, I remember like deliberately thinking like, I wonder if someday, I remember getting a cell phone and being like, I wonder if someday you could just get rid of a landline and having like a revolutionary thought, you know? Should have patented it. Should have, and then I remember a lot of old bone arrow stuff, man.

I remember when flipper rest-Rest came out, and that was a big deal, because everybody shot off the shelf. The Flip-A-Rest were... Things I remember. I've lost dear to Flip-A-Rest, actually. Not working properly or whatever. No.

Yeah. Technologies. Do you remember Ben Ben Pearson Pearson Archery No No, I know I know I know I know I know of Pearson Archery. Yes, but I don't I've never met him Oh, no, I don't know. I don't know that. I know Ben Pearson never shook. I got to meet uh When I was a little kid I got to meet I had I remember Fred Bear bought me dinner one time. Oh, yeah, that was a good joke When I was a little kid I got to meet, I remember Fred Bear bought me dinner one time. Oh yeah, that was a good joke. Anyways, I ate lunch on time on Fred Bear's dime.

Wow. Was he pretty cool? Was he a pretty cool dude? Dude, I was so young. I was with my old man, who was, my dad was very big into like early bow hunting, like 50s, like trying to get bow seasons and all that. He was really big into archery in the 50s. When he come home from World War II, he got into archery.

So he's very involved in that early stage archery stuff. I remember we were at a thing, Fred Bear was there. I was with my old man. Fred Bear paid for lunch. I remember this dude name. There was a dude there. I remember his first name was Babe. And he had cowboy boots on.

And I remember him telling me the best thing about these boots is I can kill cockroaches that are in the corner those little details like it like it was yesterday man Wow you think that dude played baseball no no you know I just remembered his last name cuz my dad was buddies when was the last thing because my dad was buddies with him. His last name, his name was Babe Johnson. And my old man had a thing. He had a big sash.

You know, like a Girl Scout sash is. This is the goofiest thing. He belonged to this club where if you could kill something with a bow, you'd get a patch. Like a merit badge. Yeah, and he had everything on the planet. Frogs, freaking owls, whatever, you know, like, so I wish I had that sash and you'd get a patch and you'd sew it on there. And there's your like, it was like, cause they were so big into being like a bow can, you know, a bow can do anything.

A bow can kill an owl. Oh my God. I killed a frog with a bow can do anything. A bow can kill an owl. Oh my God! I killed a frog with a bow. I could kill my neighbor with this bow. I felt like it. It was just like all this kind of crazy 1950s archery shit, man. That's amazing. Yeah, I mean, I wasn't born yet,

but it was like I grew up in the aftermath of all that. The technology definitely has come a long ways, though, from wooden bows and wooden arrows and broadheads that you gotta glue and make. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but the mental game hasn't changed alright. No, mental game is still there. There's still a lot of people that suck at shit. There's a lot of people that panic. A lot of people. I had a, I don't want to call him out, but I have a buddy. I have a buddy who's a muscle.

He's like in a muscle building, so he's this big, huge muscle guy, and he loves to hunt. And I was shooting turkeys with him one day. I can think of a handful of. Me too. So, but when every time he would shoot, and if he would hit something, he would like,

go to gag him. You gag? Yeah, like I don't know, I think just from all the adrenaline or something. Oh, I got a body that pukes after he gets stuff. Yeah, just gets all just hyped up. He gets so hyped up, it's kind of funny, he's always like, shut the camera off, and I just keep it going. Yeah, just gets all just shh. I've seen it happen. He gets so hyped up, it's kind of funny, he's always like, shut the camera off,

and I just keep it going shh. Yeah, that's weird, man. Yeah, this one buddy I got, I've seen him do it. He'll get something and then puke, then he's fine. Yeah, yep, just fine right away afterwards. Hmm. I don't know. Huh.

Maybe just the excitement and the adrenaline just goes nuts. They don't know how to control it, maybe. Maybe they should shoot more target. I will say though that hunting has helped me be a better target archer and target archer has made me a better hunter. As far as, not hunting, but as far as shot placement and just being able to make the best decisions

while I was out in the woods. I imagine the competitive learning how to deal with the competition. Yeah. Just learning how to deal with, because you know there's a thing man, like part of what you mess up is that you want it so bad and you can't deal with the emotion.

Yeah. And you just shot under so much pressure so many times that a little pressure's not unusual to you. Yep, and I get hungry still. With an animal, it's, you know, you don't get lots of, usually it's like a one and done. You know, you sit there all day for one shot, and you gotta make it count, right?

Like you, for me, I've always, I always thought like shooting under pressure has helped me in that scenario to just, I've actually missed Bucks because I took too long to do my process. Not missed them, they just went out of range. Missed the chance. Yeah, missed the chance.

Yeah. Well man, thanks for coming on the show, dude. Hey, thanks for having me. This happened quick too, because someone sent us something, and I told Chris, man, let's get that guy, or she said we should get this guy, or whatever, and here we are.

Listen, I definitely appreciate it, because first of all, I've seen your episodes and then I My agent Scott, I think you were in touch with him. He he was telling me like just Everybody that you've had on the podcast. I was like this guy's this guy's not just a hunter and all this other stuff He's like really good at podcasting. Like he's like a legit guy. Good at podcasting. No, I mean he just, it's an honor that you wanted me

to be a part of it and I thought it was like this perfect way to just kind of launch my hunting stuff on social media and the next step of where Matt's going and not that I was using you for that, but hey. You can use it wherever you want, man. I definitely appreciate you guys having me on here for just, it's been awesome. Yeah, well plug it.

Where do people go to look at it? The Armless Archer. Just same place, okay. Yeah, and it's the same stuff, yeah. Excellent, thanks so much, man, I appreciate it. Congratulations on all those successes. Thanks. On the gold medal, on the appreciate it. Congratulations on all those successes. Thanks.

On the gold medal, on the retirement. On the 200 miles an hour. On the 200 miles an hour. Is that ever retired? No, I don't know. No. I don't know. Because I think I'm just retiring from the competition side.

That's it. I'm still going to shoot my bows. Now, I'm going to get to walk around and enjoy adventures in the woods and mountains. In fact, when I opened my window this morning, I looked up and saw the mountain. I was like, I probably should have stayed a couple days and spent a day up there. I'll go hiking now. Yeah, go hiking. That stuff is...

You can run that whole ridge. Run the whole ridge. I just want to come running down with people watching and I'm like, there's a bear. That's it. They got my arms. He's got my arms. Alright man, thanks again. Yup, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

I called up my cousin Joey, said he saw a good one day. And Joe, he said he saw a good one today Standing on the north side of the hay barn and the Pippin place He's probably bedding that big old seed patch see the patch. All he saw was a couple of doles in the morning, I bet he's back. Maybe I'll go slip down there and see what I can see. Might take dad's old 30-30 beat like he's back here with me on open unday Man, I can hardly wait, it's always the second Saturday in November It's my favorite time of year, ain't just about hunting deer Making memories that are gonna last forever forever and it's just icing on the cake if a big one walks my way

on opening day guitar plays softly and Aunt Betty always makes breakfast I love her homemade cinnamon rolls We'll sit around a table talking about where everybody's gonna go Five dollars gets you into the shortest big buck pot Only rule is if you win you buy the first round at the hub Now stop and see them old hicks boas down at the hunting shack Been the same way around here for years

Man, I can't wait to come back On open unday Yeah, I can hardly wait Always a second Saturday in November It's my favorite time of year, ain't just about hunting deer Making memories that are gonna last forever It's just icing on the cake If a big one walks my way

On opening day On opening day On open on day. Meat Eater Radio Live is the newest addition to the Meat Eater Podcast feed. Every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time, we'll be going live from Meat Eater HQ on the Meat Eater Podcast Network YouTube channel. This one-hour variety show will feature call-in guests, segments, and live feedback from the Meat Eater audience. variety show will feature call-in guests, segments and live feedback from the MeadEater audience. Then, on Friday morning, the episode will be available in audio form on the MeadEater podcast feed.

So come hang with me, Steve, Yanni, Cal and the rest of the MeadEater crew every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time on the MeadEater Podcast Network YouTube channel. And remember, it's live, so anything can happen. Well, almost anything.