The Sevan Podcast - #397 - Jared Halbert

Episode Date: May 13, 2022

Jared Halbert is a 7x Tactical Games Champion and Owner of the renowned fitness and shooting competition.  Sign Up for Our Newsletter: https://thesevanpodcast.com/ Partners: https://cahormones.com/ https://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK! https://thesevanpodcast.com/ - OUR WEBSITE https://sogosnacks.com/ - SAVE15 coupon code - the snacks my kids eat - tell them Sevan sent you! Support the show Partners: https://cahormones.com/ - CODE "SEVAN" FOR FREE CONSULTATION https://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK! https://asrx.com/collections/the-real... - OUR TSHIRTS ... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Pretend your parents are dead. It's pretty good one, right? Right. Don't snap at your parents. It's awesome. Whenever my kids act like jackasses to me, or even if I'm acting like the jackass and they like react like negative to me, like, you know, like, I mean, they're five and seven, but like push me or like, you know, do a temper tantrum. I'm like, Hey dude, remember you love me more than anything in the world.

Look past my, I was just guilty like that. Look past my shortcomings. I'm the greatest thing in your life. Your kids do the skateboarding stuff huh say it again your kids do the skateboarding stuff huh yeah the big the the big three are skateboarding jiu-jitsu and tennis and um it's kind of like try like to get something in like it's in my mind to get those things in every single day some aspect of that you know yeah um and in in i'd say 50 of the time i'm successful so four days a week there's some you know skateboarding four days a week there's some jiu-jitsu four days a week there's some tennis and then every day some some a little portion of schooling like seven days a week but it could be just you know 20 minutes and then hyper focused on math and um reading and writing they homeschooled or public yeah homeschooled homeschooled well it's it's kind of it's kind of funny because so they they're

actually in a they're in a public school program but we kind of took advantage of the fact that they don't have to uh because of the so-called pandemic they didn't have to go to school and so we just we've never taken to school we don't do any of the zoom stuff they just they send some work home but like every quarter we just take them to the school and the teacher talks to them the teacher always says i mean they're so young the teacher always says wow they have no peer and we do kumon do you know kumon a japanese program there's like 30 000 kumon centers around the globe invented in the 50s it's basically crossfit math and crossfit reading this guy invented it in the 50s you basically do these worksheets and they're timed and you do like 10 to 20 minutes every day

and it goes all the way up to calculus and all the way up to diagramming sentences. And it's pretty cool. It's pretty, it's good. Yeah. I'm super dyslexic. So I stayed away from school as much as I could. Yeah.

I don't blame you. You're doing good. Yeah. Hi, Mr. Jared Halbert. Yeah. Jared Halbert.

Um, seven times you've won the tactical games. Yeah, I think it's seven or eight. I knew I'd be wrong. I knew I'd be wrong if I tried. It might be nine now. I don't know. I think it's nine.

How many have there been? Let's see. There's probably been about 10 a year for the last two and a half years. There's probably been 20-something. How many have you gone to uh 12 and you won and you want oh so you know the so have you there's a time when a guy beat you yeah there was uh i i didn't get first three times is that your first three times? No, I won the first two.

Um, and then they actually turned, he turned into a pretty good friend of mine. Uh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry to hear that. He, uh, yeah, he beat me, uh, he beat me three times in a row. Um, and then I got a little bit better and started beating him after that. So what's his name? Anton. Anton. Yep. him after that so what's his name anton anton yep hey uh is there something that you changed in your training to to overcome him yeah i started running a lot more that was about it

so it was in the physical component where he was uh beating you not in the shooting uh component so uh when i first started i i've been doing CrossFit for like five or six years and I was the only one that was competing that was using CrossFit. Um, cause I'm not good at CrossFit at all, but, um, I was significantly stronger than everybody else. Uh, and they were mainly runners, I guess. So I would usually do really well in like three or four of the events and then get beat pretty bad on the runs and uh he was when when he when he showed up he was decently strong and he could run so that's why i had to fill i guess fill that gap and get better at running how tall are you uh six one okay in some of the pictures you look like a giant like in the

pictures when you're next to tim burke yeah oh tim tim's about five five five six okay well that makes sense then uh he might be five seven i don't know he's he's like an average crossfitter size i think so uh jared um oh i apologize for the presupposition i'm about to insert in this question but it's partially for comedic sake but but i am very curious about the answer what is there ever a time that being hooked up to the city sewage is worse than having a septic is a septic ever better uh no no no good okay so that's a fair presupposition yeah um it's it's only an option when there is no other options right is yeah um but it's i'm trying to think i mean is there a good septic system is there a septic system it's like i've lived here

10 years and never had a problem. Yeah. Most of them, you don't have problems for like seven, 10, 10 years right in there. Normally about, normally about seven to 10 years is when you start having your first issues. And there's, there's some that are better than others, but, um, ideally you have a gravity fed septic system septic system with a leach field. So a gravity septic is when all the components from the guy who's shitting his ass to the toilet to all the piping is higher. Exactly. And does it have to be significantly higher or an angle or just even a little bit higher is good? Even a little bit higher is good. Have you ever seen it where it's below, the shitter's below the septic? That't even be right you have yeah you have to install a grinder pump and pump it up to the septic tank and then you have a grinder pump for your deuces and then uh it goes that's the it's usually a three chamber

tank and then you pump it from the third chamber out to the field. All of a sudden your septic's like a cow's stomach. Yeah. Hey, why not? Why not have a grinder? Why not have a grinder? Even if you, if you have it installed properly, if you're higher, just to kind of expedite the decomposition and the leaching out into the field. And now I'm really in uncharted territory, by the way.

Yeah. It's not necessary. It's the. It's overkill. Just totally ridiculous. Yeah. I never did it. Like, so I started a septic company because I had an irrigation company, which is clean water.

And I made really sure. And I made really sure, I made sure, really sure that I had like, I was, I was at least seven to 10 employees away from having to touch the septic water. Uh, but the, when the water's in the last chamber, like there's two chamber tanks and there's three chamber tanks and then there's some different kinds of systems. But when it's in the final chamber chamber it's actually like relatively sanitary um i mean it doesn't smell good it doesn't look good but some people say you can drink it and you'd be fine but i'm not gonna i'm not gonna test that you just take a bucket of that but you know what a berkey is no oh it's it's a it's a it's a water filter i wish one of my guys in the back end was going to say, you just take the water from the last septic and just run it through the Berkey and you're good to go.

The Berkey claims it can clean anything. Hey, so what is the absolute – by the way, this is not planned at all. I just love – this is just fascinating to me. So I had a septic at my house yeah and i'm the last house before like it's just all country so i was the last house that could get hooked up to city water which i didn't do because i don't because i have a well but i did choose i paid the money and hooked up to the sewage yep and that was and and we've never had any problems but um but so that was smart that i did that, right. Keep the well, the water, the a hundred fruit trees for free. But, um,

during the California's worst droughts and I have just all the water I could possibly imagine. Yeah, that's definitely, definitely a way to go. And then give my shit to the city. What, what's a absolute no, no to put in the toilet. If you, if you, uh, have a septic? Feminine products and then a lot of people mostly get in trouble by putting stuff in their disposal like fruits. Because then the fruit seeds get out into the septic field and seeds don't decompose in the holding tanks. So then they push out into the field and then they clog up the uh holes in the pipe or the drip tubing and uh wow that's what that's what gets most people is the seeds from fruits wow

fucking brilliant wow yeah um um how come someone hasn't cracked the code on feminine products like like why don't we just you and i should put our heads together after the show and this tampon can be put it flushed anywhere. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of things that you can be really successful at in business. And that's just one thing. No, yeah, no, no. Why isn't it? Because they have wipes, right?

That you can flush. Yeah. Like, you know, the ones you wipe your kid's ass with when they're babies. Yeah. I mean, the, to be like a hundred percent safe, you go with the stuff that's like made for made for rvs you know what i mean because that's okay that decompose really quickly but i think just the nature of the feminine products i mean that and like diapers and stuff never decompose so like when aliens find us in 3 000 years we're just gonna be like tampons and diapers so um uh and is there

is there is there like a um um i don't know you know how like they say in your stomach you have like you have an eye look look at look at look at already i know jeremy it's fascinating right we're supposed to be talking about a guy who could like run you down and and he's he's the champion in the world of running you down and shooting you or running away from you with your guns. Instead, we're talking about practical shit day to day, country shit. So does that thing have its own – what's it called? Like your gut has its own biome? Is that the word? I should only use words i know

the meaning of but your gut has its own like shit it does to like consume anything you throw in your stomach does that septic tank have its own like hey this is the ideal makeup of shit in there that that breaks stuff down yeah it does it has uh there's a lot of bacteria that's working, that's breaking stuff down in there. And that's why a lot of people will use like, uh, that liquid plumber or whatever that goes down into the pipes. And actually when that gets out into your tanks, it kills all that bacteria and stuff.

And it, it's counterproductive to at a certain point, because it's not, you're killing everything in your tanks that are breaking down the organic matter. And you think you'd only want to put stuff down there that since it's going into your yard that I get, I mean, me personally, I'm into trees, fruit trees specifically. You'd only want to put stuff in there that the trees can use, right? Because that leaches into the field and the plants are consuming it then, right?

Yeah. Normally you can, a lot of times people won't know where their septic field is and you can walk around and it's the greenest grass and the biggest trees and stuff like that is around the field. Um, it's typically pretty good. I mean, you wouldn't want to like turn it into a garden, but, uh, it's, it's typically pretty good for the stuff that's around it and do you still own that business no i sold so i i actually i sold that and i sold my landscape and irrigation company all kind of at the same time and then about a year and a half after that's when i bought the tactical games from tim so um that um, that's what that was. That a good decision. Um,

as a competitor, absolutely not. You know, um, the, it's crazy. That's the first thing I thought when I thought I was confused. I'm like, there's no way this guy owns it and compete. I just, I was just tripping. Yeah, no, it's, uh, it was definitely a struggle for me to, cause I, you know, we had just had the first championship, right? So like I would say, so I've won the first two championships and, um, the first championship, I didn't own the tactical games. The second one I did, uh, but I would say it would kind of be like the tactical games was either going to continue or not continue and either I was going to take it over or it was going to

dissolve into nothing right so oh really that it was that's it that was kind of the trajectory it was on yeah I would so I got to be really good friends with the founder, Tim, who Tim Burke is one of the best men I've ever met in my life. He's a great guy. I met him once, by the way, like more than him. I went to Africa with him once. Yeah, he's. Do you go after maybe. Did you go hunting with him in Africa? No, no, no, no. Look at me, dude. I fucking don't hunt. know look at me do i fucking don't hunt oh i mean i i he was he was guarding me he was protecting greg yeah he didn't give a fuck i was the first thing he was going to put between greg and a bad guy yeah he was going to just pick me up and throw me he is 100 the guy you want with you if something is going on that is not safe um but, but he, so he probably didn't have like the best team

around him. Um, you know, uh, Tim was new to business ownership and it's a lot of people don't understand that just about every business turns into the same exact thing. If you're good enough or successful enough and you're behind a computer doing spreadsheets and accounting and all the stuff that he didn't want to be doing. And, uh, so after, you know, I had volunteered and helped with them and he called me and I started kind of helping him with the business side of things. And after a while, he was just like, Hey man, this isn't what I signed up for. Um, and it was about, I think almost two years now to the date that he had that conversation with me. And, uh, that's when we started talking about it, but I would say, and I'm not equating

myself, but like, obviously our audience is a CrossFit audience. So I would say it'd be like froning or Frazier after they had won once or twice, knowing that they can take over CrossFit and the sport continues, or they can not take it over the sports over, but they, you know, but then you throw in the factor of like, you still have a lot of good years left of competition in you. Yeah. Yeah. It's definitely a weird,

and I'm, I am separated by the programming process completely. But that's. Because you're a competitor. Yes. So when, when I'm competing, I am 100% separated from the programming process.

It's not hard to know, like competitors can pretty much guess, not, not guess, but like, it's like CrossFit, you know, you know, that you're going to have like cleaning jerks and snatches and, you know, all this other stuff going on. You just don't know how many, how heavy, how, you know, whatever it is. So but no there's there's jake mazell that works for me he actually um was like a equipment for lead at the crossfit games for quite a while okay oh that's nice okay so he's the one that programs all the events and he he he does like a couple weeks ago we had event in sawmill i had no idea what we were doing. I flew in Friday, took a look at everything, you know, said it was good. And then I left Sunday. Is that an issue?

Do you get accused of that? Is that, is that? Yes. A hundred percent. Okay. Cause, cause you brought it up. I would have never even thought of that. But so, so you just, that's like something you bring up because it's like, Hey, listen,

I'm not, isn't that crazy? On one hand, if it wasn't for you this thing fucking wouldn't be going on in the second hand it's like hey he shouldn't be competing he's on the inside yeah but i mean how old are you 36 oh okay um the the thing you kind of look like ben bergeron a little bit does anyone ever told you that in version you know who that is yeah i know all right um the you're like a version that didn't show you like the unshowered version of him unkempt. Like if he lost, like if he went camping, that's what you look like. If Ben went camping, if he grew like six inches and gained 50 pounds, the no, it's it.

But the thing about it is, even before I own the tactical games, I was friends with Tim just because I got to be friends with him. And I was, I'd volunteer when I wasn't competing and stuff like that. And there was accusations before that, that I'm sure it happens in CrossFit too. Like, Oh yeah, yeah,

yeah. There was this always, they were telling us that we, we were trying to make rich win every year. We were trying to make one, not win every year. It was like, it was kind of the opposite too.

Yeah. And the first, which is kind of crazy. The first championship there was, you know, me and Anton, who historically had, we had won every competition up until that point. I think either he or I that we were competing in together had won every competition up until that point. And they said that the, we were, he and i weren't doing well after the first day and a half or something and uh then a couple events came up we did really well and i'm and got back up on top and immediately the accusations of protecting the podium came up and they're just trying to get these guys back up to the top and all i mean it happens in every sport and you just

gotta look past it and keep going so right are you love are you loving this yeah i mean i i i love shooting i mainly love the the two-way community you know um what's that no no i don't know what that is what do you mean two-way community what's that uh second amendment community like oh okay firearms stuff like that and then i i started crossfit probably six seven years ago and i opened an affiliate about three months ago um i'm sorry i'm sorry no i love it dude okay good okay good um sorry that was just me that's just me being a baby over here so i guess you know it's just it's a good way to bring everything together because i mean the tactical game is really what it is, is fitness and shooting. I mean, if you like working out and you like shooting, it's a, it's combining those two things. So, but what is the, what is the second amendment?

I want to pull up the second amendment. Let me pull up the second. Do you know it off the top of your head? Like you have it memorized? It's for the people, the right for the people to own guns. In so many words. A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

It says REV 1992. Was it revised? I don't know. It's so short. Yeah. They should have spent a little bit more time on it probably. Uh-oh. What does the Second Amendment mean in simple terms? This is all just Google shit. Right. Right. To possess a firearm. That's a gun. Right. With bullets unconnected with service in a militia, meaning like just you and I can have one just like under our bed. Yes, I guess. I guess. And to use that arm for traditionally traditionally lawful purposes like competitions, shooting bears that are attacking your family and hunting.

Yep. And such as self-defense within the home. I mean, really like the overlook and I don't get into like the extremist side of really anything, but the overarching purpose of the second amendment is to protect you, to protect you from your government, government and tyranny. I mean, that's, everybody's like, oh, you know, it's for hunting and it's for target shooting. Really what it is, is to protect you from your government government and tyranny i mean that's everybody's like oh you know it's for hunting and it's for target shooting really what it is is to protect you from your government how come people um don't understand and you're talking to like i'm telling you you're talking to like just one of the most hardcore um

uh former liberals you've ever fucking met i mean i was fucking born and raised in oakland berkeley right yeah um i i i'm sorry that i mean it was even born and then i'm alive no man it's why the fuck can't these people understand what is the biggest like i i just think now after what we saw happen in the last two years after watching what happened in canada after watching what happened in australia i would think everyone or or the uk i would think everyone in the world would be like oh my god they did it right over there thank god they have guns over thank god the u.s had guns if we didn't have guns, the whole world might be fucked. It might all be just like Hong Kong. Maybe the I think Ukraine's a pretty good example.

They immediately started passing guns out to civilians. But too, too little, too late, too little. But I hear you. But I hear you. The it's the funny thing is, and I'm not going to. Yes, please do. I'm not going to mention names, but there's been a couple of CrossFitters come over and spend time with Heppner. One of them who previously hated firearms and didn't think anybody needed them and stuff like that. He went out and spent a day on the range, and he's like, man, I love this.

Because people don't realize how fun it is. It is super fun. It's like golf just with guns. You shooting targets i mean that's all it is but doing mdma is fun too i mean it's awesome mdma is is that yeah it's ecstasy it's like you get some you get a bag of that and five of your closest girlfriends and you just run out into a field but but but but but beyond, the guns are – they're so important. They're so important in terms of equalizing the field, making everyone think twice before you do something stupid, before you infringe on another man's rights. I would have never – my whole life I never thought I would hurt anyone and then not have kids. And you would have to die if you came in my house at night yeah i mean with my kids here you just i is it the there's a lot of people that say like a tackle games competition

weekend is a perfect example there's 200 250 men and women out there who are all super physically fit. There's, um, I mean, everybody is super nice, but from the outside looking in, you're looking at these guys like, Oh my God, you know, this guy's probably looks like an asshole. Nobody gets in arguments. Nobody, everybody has a good time. Everybody's joking around. Everything is 100%. Like the nicest, most welcoming community of people you could ever, like, you could walk up to them and say, I hate guns. I think that, you know, the right to have guns, you shouldn't have them, anything like that. I'm like, cool, man, sit down. Let's talk about it. Like it's the most welcoming group of people that you will, and people from all walks of life,

And people from all walks of life, there's liberals, there's conservatives, everything out there. And all that to say is that when you know that you're around armed people, you're a lot less likely to be an asshole and do something stupid. So I have a ton of liberal friends. They say they're liberal, but but they're not liberal and they just can't give up the label um by by that i mean um imagine imagine and i'm sorry to be so extreme but it's just it's just really easy imagine saying that you're a nazi but the only thing that you didn't like is that one part about loading the jews up in the trains and taking them over to that to the ovens other than that it's great and and and i feel like that like more and more liberals are like oh i i'm a democrat and i'll be like well what about this blm thing that's only that's only hurt black people for the last two years well i i didn't like that okay well what about

this part over here about um defund the police oh i didn't like that it's like hey when are you gonna realize that like hey um you're not that i don't get how and i'm not asking you to defend all liberals by the way but i don't get and i'm not i'm sorry for making it political but i don't get how someone could be for the um uh second amendment and claim to be a liberal i just i for some reason there's a there's a disconnect there like they need to rethink their there's there's a nuance there right it's like i used to watch football i used to think i was a football fan until i realized that i was really only a 49er and a raider fan i watched every 49er and raider game when i was in junior high but if they didn't go to the super bowl i didn't watch the super bowl because i didn't give a fuck i just like my team

and it's kind of like that i just feel like that there's some um i think it's just it's important to understand that like you know to look at everything you don't have to be on one side or the other about everything right okay you can you can believe in um high taxes for wealthy people and think that you should own a gun. Both of those things, you can have both of those things in your room. Absolutely. So like maybe you're a liberal cause you're more fiscally liberal. That doesn't mean that just because you're going to vote Democrat means you

have to hate people with guns too. Right. So that's very good, dude. You're a better man than me. You're the son my mom was. She had, but it's a, I think it's important not to just get blinded by a couple of things. Um, and then, and then say that now I have to believe in all of those things, right? That this is, that this is your team and no matter what they say, you're going to follow up blindly.

Exactly. Yes. These, um, the, have the tactical games always been both sexes? Yeah. The first,

I think it was the first two. Um, she actually still competes. She got third in the last, uh, so we have like seven to 10 events during the year that are kind of comparable to what like the regionals were probably. Okay. The championship.

So are these the. Okay. And I'm looking at them. It's on. It's the upcoming events. I'll pull them up. Sorry. Go on.

Her name is Carla Herzig. I think she competed in the first ever. And I want to say she was one. I want to say she was the only one in one of the first two. And then she was one of like one or two in the second or first one. But about a year. So when I bought the tactical games, the first thing we did is we implemented a women's only tactical games. University is what we called it.

But it was a weekend where we sent an instructor out. It was free for the women to come. I think up to 20 is what we called it but it was a weekend where we sent an instructor out it was free for the women to come i think up to 20 is what we allowed um they came they learned how to use they learned how to shoot guns they learned you know the different processes how to be safe how to unload the gun and make sure it's safe stuff like that um when we started doing that the conversion rate from the people that came to the tactical games universities to actual coming to the competition was almost 100%. So now we have between probably 15 and 20 women at each competition, which in the firearm, like the competitive shooting sphere is a pretty, that's a, it's about double of what you might see like a three-gun match per se. So it's kind of – it's a – recruiting program would be too hard, but basically it's a – Kind of like a familiarization or like confidence boosting like.

Yeah. What about – you should have another one on pussies from berkeley and so i could go like uh um but you could you don't you have to be that exclusive you could include boston yeah boston and berkeley that would be good one of the best competitors we have is from boston he's a chiropractor from boston. He has all the testosterone in the whole entire town. Well, okay. So I like that. And you do that every year?

That's an open course? Where is that held? All over the country. We actually had, I think we had three or four of them. We rented the range out, sent an instructor up there. It's Tess Salp. She's an amazing person in the like in the industry um really good shooter she's won several times um we send her around and um

it's between 15 and 20 people per and I think we had four last year and we're kind of revamping that programming or revamping that program and renaming it and putting it back out. And actually one of the guy that runs the program comes from CrossFit, Zach Forrest. Oh yeah. I love Zach. Yes.

Uh, former, um, seal out of, uh, he owned CrossFit Las Vegas. Yeah, I think it was CrossFit.

Oh, why am I? Yes. It was it was yes he had like four gents yeah he's one of the greatest movers i've ever seen by the way it's it's burned into my head like him and spieler and james hobart what great movers we always i've got i've got memes about him and james hobart. They look exactly the same. They should definitely have a kid together. I'm going to text both of them and tell them that after the show. I think I still have Zach's number. It's okay. 2022, they can do it. But he runs the whole training side.

So we have a training app that puts out daily programming. And then the Tackle Games University, we're rebranding it to something else, but he's the ones in charge of all that. Um, it's appropriate, right? I mean, he, he checks, he checks all the boxes and, um, he's incredibly knowledgeable in fitness. I mean, just, yeah. Yep. He's, he's a good dude. So, so this is such a cool program. So basically four times a year, there's a, there's a, is it a one day or two day course? How many days is the course? It's a two day course, Saturday and Sunday.

And it's in, it's in different places throughout the country. And it's basically women can come and sign up free. They're in an all woman environment and basically they get hands on with the guns. And do they do a little bit of fitness too, at the same time? Like, Hey, this is kind of the whole tactical. A little bit. To be 100% honest with you, there's not a whole lot of like world-class shooters like Tess around

and some of the other people. So we spend a whole lot of time on shooting. And when it comes to the fitness thing, we seriously just tell them like, hey, if you need to learn how to pick up a sandbag or an axle bar or all of these things, run over and pay a CrossFit coach like $50 for an hour of instruction and find a CrossFit gym. And they'll teach you how to do all this stuff. Because pretty much no matter where you're at in the country, you're always within like an hour of 10 CrossFit gyms. Right. That's true so but having access to a world-class shooter is not

always available so is this girl's name uh test shoot for gold is that her yep yep that's right isn't that crazy i just uh oh okay her account's private okay so she's on a whole not oh yeah six times tactical games winner competitive shooter crossf CrossFitter coach, Notre Dame alum. Okay, so she's top of the food chain for the ladies. One of the smartest people I know, too. Yeah. Well, that's good. You'd want the person to.

She was actually, she did with CrossFit. I think she was one of the people on the seminar staff, like, real early. was one of the people on the seminar staff like real early um i can't tell what she looks like by this picture too because you know she's got a gun in front of her face and the glasses and her hair's all pulled up the thing is about all the shooters and um we're all shadow banned like super seriously oh so um a lot of people have private accounts and stuff like that to try and prevent like getting kicked off at Instagram because it happens a lot so the second amendment protects you but Instagram

yeah like what a weird world we live in to find like a really good shooter yeah you would these are the shooters you would want to have out there so that you could um change the reputation of firearms because right now firearms is this

absolutely yeah right and and rap music why not have this um uh geeky girl who's showing like um you know she she's intelligent she trains she's probably got this job she does this she's probably raising kids and then and then on the side she's also like a professional showing her cleaning her gun i mean it's uh i think that it's nuts it would be like if they outlawed all physicists from from posting because they make nuclear bombs it's like wait a minute i think the the uh the community of people that compete in these would shock most people um most of it is like in the tactical games we're pretty much it's about 33 law enforcement 33 uh military and 33 civilian and from those

things a lot of it is retired military or previously, you know, just recently retired military. And in law enforcement, there's there's a lot of people that are definitely still SWAT cops that are doing it. But a lot of them are doctors and dentists and CPAs. And it's it's it's a lot of highly educated people that are there. Were you in law enforcement or in the military? No. How old were you when you first shot a gun? I shot my first deer when I was six.

Wow. For me, growing up, I had to learn that everybody didn't have guns around. Like my dad was not a gun fanatic at all. Like we just, we had guns to hunt with and that's it. And did you have one like just set by the door? Was it like that? I mean, did you live somewhere like that when my shotgun was behind the door? Yeah. I had guns in my closet since I was six or seven and then when my dad would go out of town he brought a shotgun upstairs and set it under my bed and i was the one like i knew how to use a gun and i was the one in the house so um but it wasn't it was never like uh i think people

have this perception in their mind that like this gun is just this elephant in the room. But for me growing up and for my kids, like I may have, you know, a gun in my office and they come in and it's just, it's like a computer screen sitting there. It's just something else that's sitting there. They don't like, they don't look at it. They don't touch it. They don't care about it. So yeah, it's just a lot of it's an education thing as well so it's it's so weird it's it's so interesting how perceptions are made

um my my my sister um coming from california and my sister married into a family in texas and the difference be. And so I made a few trips out to Texas. I met those people. They would come to California and they're like, you know, they're like, like real Texans. You know what I mean? Like people on ranches and shit and people in Dallas and business. And it was so, it was, it was so incredible how they were, they were like almost like a different,

they had a whole different breed of civility and kindness. And, you know, if someone, if you're, if you're having dinner and someone enters the room, especially a woman, everyone stands up, all the dudes stand up and just all of the, the way they would treat my mom. And it's, but, but you never hear any of that stuff. It's, it's, it's, it's fascinating the cultural differences and what you think, what you're being told by the media versus then when you experience it, it's, it's it's it's fascinating the cultural differences and what you think what you're being told by the media versus then when you experience it it's it's just that there's not even a small match right it's not even a um it's but the culture in texas is changing a lot yeah sure i could see that i mean is all the californians move out there yeah exactly yeah

and well hopefully they'll learn hopefully they won't change it hopefully they'll assimilate yeah i mean i uh i grew up here i was born about 30 minutes away from where i live so i haven't gone very far but uh it's uh it's there's been a huge cultural shift for sure um so we actually kind of moved out of kind of from Austin or North Austin Round Rock area. And we, we moved about 45 minutes further North to kind of get away from it. So even, even, even, um, Southern California is significantly different than Northern California. I went to school at UC Santa Barbara and I remember my friends in, um, who were from, who I made there from Southern California, they were always surprised when I said hi to people.

Yeah. Cause that's what you do in northern california you're walking down the sidewalk and you pass someone you would say hi to them like even if you don't know them like you just say hey make eye contact and they don't do that in la it's kind of like look away yeah and maybe it's because they have so many people right you just can't do it to like new york city you couldn't do it to everyone you'd be like hey hey hey hey hey hey you'd be fucked yeah yeah i i heard one time it's like the the healthy amount of people is like six people per square mile and whatever that means healthy and but in new york city it's like 440 000 people per square mile yeah that's i can't even get my head wrapped around that yeah it's a i've got a ranch in in West Texas and, and you can be out there for a week and not see anybody.

Yeah. That's what my, that's where my sister is now. She's in West Texas and she runs a ranch for some, for fancy people who, who have hunters come, who pay to come out and hunt the land. Yeah. That's a pretty common thing. So yeah, she loves it. Yeah. It, uh, it's a good way to live a low stress lifestyle that's for sure yeah my three nephews out there like it by the time they were like 10 they were already like men they knew it like they knew guns they knew how they're not afraid of rattlesnakes they ride motorcycles they drive cars i mean you know i mean they're like by 10 years old they're more competent than i was at now yeah it's a learning to drive really early and doing all that other stuff it's pretty common

yeah um i i heard you say in in in a video i was watching that uh you talked about the importance of grip strength yep did i hear that right okay why why grip strength in um in for the tactical games um it's one of the easiest ways to, um, a lot of the stuff that we do and that differs, I guess, from CrossFit is so you can, it's, it's mainly, it's a kind of fitness that you can always take one more step. Right. Um, and it's just making a mental decision on whether or not you're going to endure the pain that you're in. So a lot of stress carries. And then grip strength is one of the easiest ways to get into somebody's mind, right?

Because when your grip starts to go, you can always hang on to something, especially way longer than you think you can. It's just whether or not you're willing to keep hanging on. And then also it's one of the most overlooked aspects of fitness. Like in CrossFit, a lot of people get really used to hook gripping everything all the time. So they might be extremely strong, but their grip gets fatigued really quick. For those of you who don't know, hook grip is when you put your index finger over your thumb, right? As a kind of a lock. Is that what you're saying? Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so a lot of the implements that we use, like we use the fat axle bar and then farmers carries bars and, um, Jerry cans, the, uh, they're too, they're too big around to hook grip it. Um, so you just have to use just, I guess, a conventional grip. I don't know what you call it,

but, uh, that's, and it's important in everything from carrying sandbags, carrying yokes, lifting stuff, carrying stuff. Uh, it's more about carrying weight over distance than it is, uh, reps for time. That makes sense. Yeah. And so there's a lot of that you're saying in those events yes um do you have kids yeah i got two kids and how old are they uh six and eleven oh okay seven and eleven seven okay because i also heard you say that that your kid one of the reasons um i think if i heard right one of the reasons you sold your business and you sort of moved in the direction that you've moved is so that you could still spend time more time with them while they're at influential age yep yep um when i when i was running my landscape and irrigation company i was out of the house about five o'clock and i wasn't

back to probably 8 p.m and i i was missing out on i was missing out on a lot so um owning a business isn't all it's cracked up to be sometimes. So I, uh, one of the main reasons why I got out of that was not only that, but also the stress, um, dealing with huge contracts and people not paying you on time and stuff like that. It, it, uh, it definitely ages you early. Um, one of my good friends that is still in the construction industry always said that we'd come back home every day, 1% more of an asshole. So, um, I guess I had reached that breaking point.

So I needed to find a new direction. You were 110% asshole. I bring up the kids because from a, from before my kids were born, I hung rings in the living room. And so my kids have grown up hanging. Yeah. born, I hung rings in the living room. And so my kids have grown up hanging. And when they were about three years old, I saw, oh shit, my kids are totally different from all other kids and everything they do for two reasons. One, because their grip strength is just absolutely nuts and they have crazy confidence in their hands. And when you have confidence in your hands,

like until you have confidence in your hands or you don't have confidence in your hands, you can't even understand really what I'm saying. And I think you understand it changes the whole landscape. Everything's, everything's climbable, the biggest tree, the any chain link fence, fucking anything. Once you have confidence in your hands. And then the second thing, their core strength, they have crazy core awareness because as soon as you start hanging your feet come in front of you. And so, and I still have, you know, my kids are five and seven and they still hang every single day. And it's, it's made them just, I, I used to talk about it all the time. I don't talk about it so much

anymore, but I can't emphasize how it's just made them. They're not human. They're not, they're nothing like any other human being I've ever seen because they're like monkeys. They just hang. They can just hang. I think with especially my my daughter and my son, it's becoming important. But I always encourage her to do multiple things, not just get good at one thing. So, yes, she played. She was she did gymnastics, cheerleading, volleyball, basketball. She shoots a bow. She shoots guns. She paints her nails like she's a super girly girl um but she also can pick up a full-size pistol and load it and shoot targets with it um does she paint your nails no no she's never painted your toes she's never painted my toes

no she uh she paints her mom's nails. Awesome. But if she said, dad, could I paint your toes? You would be like, yes, ma'am. You could do what you want. Wouldn't you? I don't know. Probably not. Nah, I bet you she could do whatever she wants. You might run away, but she'd catch you. You pretend to run away. So you had a good story. I ran. She tackled me. Yeah thing I know, I had pink nails. When you sell a business like that, it changes everything. I mean, I guess the first thing I think of is like you have two kids.

Does your wife work? Yeah, she's a pharmacist. Oh, that's cool. That's nice. And are you basically a full-time dad now? No, I mean... Or do you try to be? Oh, yeah. Yeah, 100%. I mean, I'm here every day.

The most important thing to me is that I'm here every day when my kids get off the bus. I put them on the bus most mornings. And when I'm here, I'm present. And that's the main thing. Cause, uh, when, when I had a bunch of employees, when I had the irrigation company and they would call in septic company and they would call me, I got my first phone calls at four 15, 4 30 AM. And I got my last phone calls at like 10 PM. So I was never off the clock and, uh, it w it was never really a situation where we'd go on vacation and I had to step away for two or three times for an hour to make calls, make arrangements, you know, put out fires, stuff like that. So, I mean, not, not to say that owning

the tackle games, isn't a full-time job, but it's definitely compartmentalized. I can turn it off, you know, like four o'clock I can turn it off and I don't have to pay attention to it anymore. Um, until the next day, uh, then competition weekends, we have a really good team put together now. So I normally don't get there until about midday Friday. Um, and then I usually try and find a flight out late on Sunday. So I'm not I'm not gone, you know, but two days, three days. So what does that what does that mean to be present? Present. So not only like physically there, but mentally you're engaged with your kids. So you're not just sitting in the room, but you're spaced out thinking about what you have to do the next day at work.

Like you're you're not just sitting in the room, but you're spaced out thinking about what you have to do the next day at work. Like you're you're present with them. So anyway, that's important to me. It's interesting. I would always claim that I'm like hyper present with my kids, but but I but I'm always but I multitask like a mofo, too. You know what I mean? Like I take I take them to the skate park and then make phone calls yeah and then i and then i do laps around the skate park until one of them calls me and goes can you help me with this and then i get off the phone and go down there and help them do you do this do you do skateboarding too or no no okay i i'm i you know when they say i'm like you should never live your life vicariously through your kids you should never make your kids do the shit that you wish you had done i'm i am that okay like i'm my kids do jujitsu because i'm a pussy my kids do

skateboarding because i'm terrified of skateboards they do dancing because i'm terrified of dance you know i mean it's all the stuff they're they're i hope they thank me for it i hope everyone else is wrong and i'm right i played i played golf through college, and that's what one of them tried to start picking up golf clubs one day. I was like, no, we're going to – let's put those down. Let's not do that. Let's not – oh, and why is that? Man, golf is a – so – You think it's unhealthy?

You think golf is like a pathology? It's like it's a sickness. It's not a real. So there's no there. Golf is a 365 day a year sport and it's four to six hours a day. Every day you take a week off, you're a month behind when you get back. Oh, wow. And it's a mental illness like you to be good at golf. You have to have a mental illness for it. Um, like I would, I would say almost with certainty that just about everybody that's a touring pro has some sort of mental illness that keeps them able to do that for so

long. Um, I feel like tennis has a lot of wackadoodles in it. I mean, I think that that could be, I think it probably could be said to the same thing um with anybody at the top of any sport to a degree um but i think even the beginners at tennis like if you go to local courts everyone's a fucking freak like just an asshole yeah yeah just like even the old ladies are talking shit to you you can't have more than 10 balls on the court okay okay have more than 10 balls on the court. Okay, okay. Have more than 10 balls on the court.

Or what, like they got all these rules, yeah. Like, so I'll show up there with like a whole bucket of balls, and they're like, are you giving lessons? And I'm like, no. They're like, well, then why do you need so many balls? I'm like, just because it's how I carry my balls. She's like, well, you can't have that many balls out here. I'm like, okay, ma'am, I'll only pull four out.

Like, you know what I mean? Oh, it's nuts. It's a savage it's the exact opposite of what you said about the shooting community at the tactical games no one is nice you'll show up to someone you'll show up at the tennis courts 20 minutes before the next guy waiting for a court and a court will open and someone behind you will try to take it and like literally you will have to and this is regular you'll have to say i was here 20 minutes before you and then they'll be like well how long are you going to be out there and you'll be like well

the sign says i have 90 minutes but i'm not in very good shape so i'm guessing 35 i mean it is nuts so they don't want you to litter the whole court with the balls that's who even knows what the reason is i think they're just looking for a reason just to be an asshole to you like who knows yeah i just can't wait till my kids are old enough to beat up these old ladies so like grown men will try and kick kids off of a tennis court oh they'll try to kick you off it's nuts it's nuts it is a it is a and i and i didn't know this about it about that community that community is not. The jiu-jitsu community kind of feels like – the jiu-jitsu gym feels more like how tactical games feel. I go there, and 99% of the people there are so fucking cool.

There's always some weirdo there who's got a chip on his shoulder. But, like, that's a nice group of men. No posturing. Help your kids. Like, if your car broke down somewhere, you wouldn't want it to be at the tennis courts. You want it to be at the jiu-jitsuitsu gym someone would run over with a pair of jumper cables like that that's 100 how it's actual games is like yeah i think uh but but the public perception of that is different right you would think that oh tennis is a high you know high profile proper

sport and this and that and for jiu-jitsu is just a bunch of aggressive men. But when you actually get to know the people that are doing it, you would much rather assimilate yourself with somebody in a jujitsu gym or a competitive shooter or something like that than a guy off a golf course because there's a lot of assholes in golf too. Yeah, I would guess. Yeah, it's funny you say that um you could go to the jiu-jitsu gym and someone would share their water with you at tennis they never would

or um i mean the jiu-jitsu gym stayed open through the pandemic yeah like no one like everyone there's like has personal responsibility and personal accountability and would look out for themselves or all the other shit's like shutting down even though they were supposed to shut down they just don't they're like fuck you a lot of the i think a lot of the undertone is also a mutual respect for somebody else that can like really hurt you right um so like you don't want to be a jerk to somebody that you know let's all just be nice we don't have to prove anything right um i think that probably has a lot to do with it um how so it. So how long have you owned the tactical games? I took over January 1st of 2021.

Oh, okay. So it's new. When you sell your business and you move to this, how does that affect your relationship with your wife? I'm assuming this is like a big discussion. She was 100% about me getting out of construction um because i mean i i don't do really construction or landscape in septic tanks or that's kind of you lump it all up and yeah so when you say i was a lance i owned a landscaping company people their perception their mind is like you're planning tulips. Yeah. You're building fences and brick walls and stuff. We're doing like, uh, 300,000 to $1.5 million jobs. So I, we're doing concrete leveling site prep, uh,

all from a to B the whole, the whole deal. Um, but, uh, it was just, it was one, it was really dangerous. Um, there's always a risk of somebody getting hurt on the job sites. Uh, it was very stressful. There's a lot of hard to deal with people in that industry. And, um, she was 100% ready for me to get out of it. It was more so like I have a lot of energy and I have to direct that energy towards things or it can become unhealthy. FanDuel Casino's exclusive live dealer studio has your chance at the number one feeling, winning. Which beats even the 27th best feeling, saying I do. Who wants this last parachute? I do.

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This whole concert, it's a trap. Trap, directed by M. Night Shyamalan, only in theaters August 2nd. And I had been out of it for probably like four or five months, and I needed something to do. So I was already, it kind of, it just, it honestly just lined up really well

with timing for me, because I was definitely going to start doing something. I just didn't know what it was at the time. And it just lined up and it worked out. Why did you start your landscape business? I graduated with a degree in psychology in 2008. No shit. You went to college for psychology? wow okay well we have to circle

back around you you don't like attention you you're hate you hate podcasts right um it's a necessary thing for me to do yeah i wouldn't and i'm not saying this about like smoke up your skirt i i get asked to go on a lot of podcasts and i say no most of the time i mean it's it's very i mean i like you a lot like if you were my neighbor i would make it a project to bug the shit out of you i'd visit you like once a week just like at dinner time when i know it hated you just because i would just need to just see your reaction but you yeah you're very very – you're not – I mean you're far from rude. You're clearly a gentleman, but you are extremely reserved. Yeah.

For the front man of the tactical games. I think I've never had a boss. My dad was – Look at – someone said this right here here look at this he he hates it ah he's humble as fuck i agree i agree i get both those vibes okay sorry so you had a boss say it again i've i've never had a boss well i guess in college i did um but so in college i worked for an irrigation company in abilene, which is like kind of West Texas. Uh-huh. I bet my, my, my, my sister lived there. Okay. Yeah. At one point

she ran a ranch outside of Abilene. Okay. Yeah. So I played, that's where our ranch is just outside of Abilene. Um, but I played golf at Abilene Christian university and then I got kicked out of Abilene Christian university, um, after two years. Cause of grades? Uh, no. Girls? I, it was, uh, I was there on a golf scholarship and you have to really, really behave yourself. And I wasn't used to really behaving myself. Um, I didn't do anything crazy.

I was just being a normal person, but, uh. Like drinking and driving the golf cart? Not the driving part, but the drinking part, definitely. So the, uh, God college was fun. Yeah. So 2008 was the middle of like that recession. And I tried to get a job just about everywhere around Austin. And the only thing that I knew how to do was fix sprinkler systems and mow grass. So I started doing repairs for a local maintenance company that mows a bunch of grass. I started doing a bunch of repair. I got licensed for it in Texas and started doing a bunch of repairs. And I kept looking for good jobs.

And then next thing you know, I had 50 employees and built a life around it. And that's how that happened. How do you get your first employee? You're doing it. And one of your homeboys is like, dude, I don't got a job. And you're like, hey, dude, I'll pay you 10 bucks an hour. Fucking trape around with me and do whatever I say. It was one of the most humbling things I've ever done in my life.

Because I think a lot of people take it lightly when they hire somebody. But when I, saw was the first guy that i hired and canelo alvarez huh did you say saul saul yeah yeah that's canelo alvarez's real name okay oh you know who that is right the greatest the redhead okay okay so we got a you almost ruined my joke go on so um i i got to where I was doing like two sprinkler systems a week by myself. And it's really hard to install a sprinkler system, a lot of digging trenches and stuff. And, uh, I was doing it all by myself. And then when I got to where I was doing about three a week, I hired Saul to help me like on Thursdays and Fridays to finish up the last one. Is your body hurting doing about three a week i hired seoul to help me like on thursdays and

fridays to finish up the last one is your body hurting to do three a week yeah like you're just sore and beat up even as a young man it's just fucking too much yeah and hands hurt and in texas it's like 110 degrees outside but uh anyway so do you have your wife at this point this is 2008 do you have your you have your wife yeah okay yep and uh anyway i he asked me about just him coming and doing it and him bringing a friend and um initially i didn't realize how big of an like undertaking it is to hire somebody but when you're hiring somebody like he had a kid he had a wife like now i'm responsible the the decisions that i make when i wake up in the morning are affecting three people's livelihoods you're hiring somebody, like he had a kid, he had a wife, like now I'm responsible. The decisions that I make when I wake up in the morning are affecting three people's livelihoods. And then

next thing you know, I had 30 employees, then 50, then 60. And like, I sat down one day and figured it out to make sure I was keeping myself accountable when I woke up every morning. And I was responsible for the livelihood of like 360, 380 people, um, you know, from their kids getting shoes to go to school, um, to the food that was going on their table to the kids' soccer games that they're paying for to be part of a league. Like all of that depended on me waking up in the morning and making good decisions and being responsible. And, uh, yeah, yeah, that's a, uh, an undertaking and a responsibility that I think a lot of business owners miss early in their career. The reason why they're not successful is that it's a lot

easier to do your job when you sit around and think about all the kids that are out there that want the, the dress for their dance and stuff. And that, that depends on you doing your job really well. So, uh, but, uh, yeah, that's how I, I also, I started my hours and training. I graduated from the university of Oklahoma and, uh, I started my hours and training for my, uh uh what do they call it to become a counselor and a kid came in and was telling me about what was going on at his house and I decided I was going to take the problem into my own hands with his dad and oh shit what wait how did we get to this what year is this it's 2008 but that's so

you're doing that and the sprinkler thing no no no this was right right when i was graduating from college okay okay okay sorry okay that's when i decided that i couldn't be a counselor because i almost i almost beat the guy up in the parking lot i called the cops instead but uh that's when i realized that Can you. What did this kid tell you that happened? He was being abused at home. Sexually or physically? Both.

And so you went over and you went and you found out where his dad is and you went and talked to him. His dad was out in the waiting room and the. Oh, shit. The protocol. Shit. Oh, shit. This is crazy. This is like some movie shit so the the protocol is is

you just contact the authorities and you sit and wait until you get there but i had seen what happened a few times and you know that like they're just back out doing the same shit two weeks two weeks later and so that's when that that whole structure of events is how I decided that wasn't for me, that I, you know, my, both my sisters do it and they're absolutely saints for what they do. Like everybody in that profession, it's the amount of mental fortitude that you have to have to be able to listen to some of that stuff and not react is unbelievable. So. Oh man, I know better than to go here, but here we go. Isn't it weird kind of what's happening in society in terms of, so if I told you like, if I told you I had a problem with like, I don't know, some mental disorder, let's go with just something really easy.

Let's say I was just anorexic. Right. And I was I don't know exactly what that is. But if I'm wrong, if I'm saying this wrong, I apologize. Let's say I ate and then make myself throw up. Whatever that is, bulimia or anorexia. And I do that and I'm doing that every meal. And then I come to you, my counselor, I'm Jared Halbert. And I'm like, yeah, I have anorexia. You would somehow try to work, put me in some sort of protocol that would address that issue. And we would make the assumption or we would be clear that the issue is, is that, hey, Sevalon, you need to find a way to eat, keep your food down and move on with your life. Whatever's causing you to eat and then throw up, this is an unhealthy behavior.

You wouldn't say, hey, dude, I have an idea. Why don't we fucking – so you never have to do that again. Why don't we wire your jaw shut and give you liposuction and make you even skinnier? But that is some of the stuff that we're seeing in the media now now now i'm super thankful and i don't mean to pass judgment anyone i'm super thankful that um i'm just happy with who i am yeah whatever that means and so when i look when i take a piss i just assume biologically i'm a man because i got those parts but like i don't have like all these things like about gender and all the shit i don't have any of those i'm never like hey i should walk

like this so i appear to be man i don't do any of that the only man should i do i think is like pee and hump and other than that i don't really care like i i don't care yeah and um so uh but but if you but if i thought i was a woman and I went to a doctor and I showed him I have a penis but I think I'm a woman, instead of trying to help me get back to being a man, now they're like, okay, well, should we remove your penis or start you on some therapy? It's the opposite of how you would treat anorexia or other – like if you went with with some so and here's the scary one and this is kind of i don't know why we're going here but except that i'm a wackadoodle if i went to someone and said that hey i i i'm a pedophile i would want them to try to fix me not fucking normalized pedophilia yeah do you see i'm going with? And we have this world that's like we shouldn't be – we should be helping people, not normalizing people's derangements, right? Yeah.

I'm more – I just – my opinion on it is I don't care what people do in their own house as long as you're not affecting anybody else. Well, and hurting kids, right? I don't care what you do in your own house either. as you're not affecting anybody else well and hurting kids right i don't care what you do in your own house either yeah yeah you can't hurt kids the uh i don't know i stay i stay 100 away from all the gender stuff and like if if if you feel like you're a guy and you're a girl currently you you do you right I don't care um but but as a psych but as a psych but you were a psychology major is this like I mean as a counselor you were you weren't there to like I mean what if you would have talked that kid into like oh it's totally normal don't don't worry it's okay for you that that's the way I feel like the world sometimes is going like instead of like trying to help people we're trying to normalize everything like no waking up and eating drinking a six pack of coke should never

be normal it's not no yeah no it's it's like it's like what you said in the beginning it's like it's not no what's that shit you said you're not supposed to put in your septic tank um the liquid plumber. Yeah. Yeah. The, uh, I, and I, I think that, you know, there's probably a perception around, you know, being an owner of a gun stuff, but like, I am a hundred percent a proponent of what you're doing in your own home is your thing as long as you're not hurting somebody else. And I stay away from it. And we actually, we had a, we've had a couple of women that were born men compete in the tactical games.

And nobody knew, nobody noticed. And honestly, they didn't do very well. I didn't say anything about it. And when they contacted me about it, I just said, hey, look, if you're a woman now, I don't care. Like, I don't even know

why you're telling me this. Just show up and compete. And if my stance on it was, is that if there is a unfair advantage that's being gained, I am pulling you out of the competition like fair enough yeah if i'm standing back there i'm like hey man um you joined this competition this weekend and you made the decision to be a female three days ago but you were like

pumping roids five days ago as a gym bro. Like, I'm going to take issue with that. And when they contacted me through email, I was like, listen, I don't remember things very well. And I'm not going to make it a habit to know your name. So sign up under the division that you feel like you feel you need to sign up under. But I'm just warning you if you show up and I immediately recognize something that is not equitable, I'm stopping it immediately. And like, that seems fair. That seems fair, open, fair and open of you.

Yeah. And I was like, you can't get mad at me for it. I was like, you're the one that's putting yourself in this situation. And you also don't want to get sued, though, either. Right. I don't give a shit about that. But you don't want to get sued. I don't give a shit about that. You don't want to get sued. I don't give a shit about that.

Texas. It's just, you know, why should I give a shit? If somebody shows up, and I still don't. There's been two of them that sent me emails. I don't know if they signed up or not. I think one of them ended up signing up, but I couldn't tell you what their name was, and I couldn't point at them to tell you which one it was. Um, so my thing, you should've got that doctor's business card. That's amazing. Yeah. Well, my thing is that if, if I'm sitting there and I can't tell,

why is it, it's none of my business. And the other thing is why did they even contact me? Like if, if they feel like they're a woman, they're a woman sign up and be a woman. I don't care. But if I agree with that too, we had that at CrossFit too. Someone wanted to sign someone ask, I remember. And it was just like, Greg was like, Hey dude, I do whatever the fuck you want. Yeah. Well, I mean, the thing is, is like, if, if you walk up to the men's elite bar, right.

And it's got 245 pounds on it and you clean and jerk it 10 times to warm up for your female event that's coming up and like we're gonna have a fucking conversation about you not competing in that division anymore because that's you guys test you guys test uh not we're not big enough to test right now um and to be honest with you the shooting component of the sport really levels things out um to where do you even care if someone was doing like is that is that even like there's 100 people on steroids right now uh that are competing and i know who they are and and do you even care though i mean does it bother you i'm not on steroids and i win i don't get a shit like i want to do not i want to do

i'm going to throw an event that's like the crossfit games here and it's going to be called the california hormone games and there's going to be no testing but i it's funny you say because i still think in the prize money is going to be massive and i still think justin madaris is going to come out there and just win it so like just totally natural just hi guys you know all sweet and shit where's the events and just dominate so steroids don't turn you into an athlete they may make you stronger they may make you recover faster and they may make you bald but they don't make you move better they don't help your mobility they don't help your mindset they don't turn you into an athlete so if you couldn't throw a ball before you're not going to be able to throw a ball after you do steroids i do think that they kind of help your mindset though i mean i've never done them but i've i'm just hearing like that

everyone i know who's done them no i i from outside looking in on a couple of guys that there's a couple of guys i don't know for sure but there's a couple of guys that I don't know for sure, but there's a couple of guys I do know for sure that did it. Um, they, they lost their, um, their marbles, their mind. And it's with, with a shooting aspect, um, you have to stay completely level headed. Um, because you know, if you're, if you're way too intense and you've gotten way too deep into the workout portion of it, um, you're not going to be able to hit any targets. And so if you're, if you're that focused on the physical aspect of it, or you're going that hard on the physical aspect of it, you're,

you're not going to be able to hit anything. Um, so, uh, I, I don't, I watched that frowning documentary where he's like, I don't think it's an advantage. I in CrossFit, absolutely. It's an advantage. Um, but I don't think it's your, if you put me on steroids and let me be on steroids for three years, I'm not going to come and beat Justin Medeiros at CrossFit. Right. Right. I'm still going to suck at CrossFit. Do you have any tattoos? No, no. Yeah. Me neither. You don't seem like a tattoo guy i would have guessed that it would have been hard to guess it because everyone has one yeah and why don't you have any do you know my mom would have beat the shit out of me if i right right and still

like to this if i showed up at home with a tattoo uh i'd get my mom would beat the hell out of me for it so yeah no and have you ever had the desire to get one no yeah i don't have anything against them i don't know my wife has one uh but where's hers the typical stamp oh and and do you like it? Well, I mean, I graduated from OU and it's a longhorn, so not really, but it is. Why did you start CrossFit? I broke my back in an ATV accident. Oh, my God. You're so Texas. Yeah.

Albulene, broken back from ATV. And let me guess in, in, is your girlfriend from, is your wife from high school? We went to the same high school, but I didn't know her. I did not know her in high school. Um, she actually graduated with my sister. Wow. Um, she's five years older than I am. So she was out of high school before I got in. Um, She's five years older than I am. So she was out of high school before I got in. But I broke my back. I gained like 30 or 40 pounds.

How'd you break your back? What year was that? It's probably seven, eight years ago now. It was seven years ago because my son was, my wife was pregnant with my son. Your first kid uh second kid second um can you tell me the story before you tell me like can you tell me the atv story yeah so i uh that's a three wheel that's a three wheel thing no it was the utv like the razors that they do in the desert and stuff and so it has like a cage and shit. The cage is where it broke my back. I wasn't seat buckled, and I was driving to a deer stand, and the shock tower broke on the front right, and it locked up the suspension, and it flipped the UTV, and it rolled on top of me.

I got pinned underneath it. Okay, sorry, sorry. Hold on. Hold on one second here this thing you were in this yeah but the four-seater version of that and and and that that red um that red shock right there snapped yeah so where that red shock connects to the frame at the top of it there's a tab right there and that tab broke. So the shock went through the plastic hood and, uh, the tire collapsed down into the frame.

Like the tire hit the fender and it made it flip when it did that. A total freak accident or were you like jumping off like a six foot? No, I was doing something. I was going like 20 miles an hour with my foot hanging off the side with no seatbelt. So, so a total one in a million. Oh, yeah. I was on an oil-filled road, so it was like a completely manicured dirt road.

It wasn't like I wasn't doing anything dumb when it happened. Nuts. Nuts, nuts, nuts. The doctors kept giving me pain pills and stuff. Which vertebrae did you break? I had eight fractures in my thoracic spine, so upper back. So like towards your neck. Yeah, so I went because I thought I broke my leg.

And I went in, and they're asking me questions like, yeah, my neck's kind of stiff, but my leg really hurts. And I went to the hospital the next day, uh, cause the ranch is kind of real far out. Um, and next thing I knew they're like, well, let's do an MRI or CAT scan, whichever one it is. And, uh, they came immediately came back in and put me in a neck brace and told me I couldn't move. And they gave me an option of either surgery or I couldn't lift over five pounds for six months or seven months. So I went with the not lifting weight over five pounds for seven months and basically basically had to lay in bed not do much uh were you so stiff every morning i broke my back once and uh it was my lower back two vertebrae

came in and smashed one i jumped off a roof um and when i woke up in the morning i was just stuck i was like what the fuck is going on i was just stuck it was i separated my quad two or like the inside muscle of your quad i forgot what the name of that specific muscle is but uh that hurt a lot worse than my back did what do you mean separated like it came off the bone no like it the roll cage smashed on top of my femur and it pushed the muscle away from each other so if you had one muscle now you had two like it kind of split open your quadricep muscle yeah so i still have a little like a section of my quad that is like a divot wow so um but anyway i that's what i started

crossfit against the doctor's wishes about a year after that accident. And I would say after I was very careful in the gym that I started at, like the owner, thankfully, was like a really laid back guy. And we became good friends after that. But he he got me started on it. I strengthened all the muscles around my back and leg and stuff like that. And then about six months after I started CrossFit, I was a hundred percent pain-free. So,

wow. And you had never done CrossFit before that? No, I thought it was stupid. Yeah. That makes sense. I mean, I played golf and we,

in the college, when I was, when I was in college and the weight room, there is a specific way you worked out and it was the gym bro stuff. Like, yeah. You know, three sets of five, whatever, and then go run three miles type stuff. You'll go back to that when you're old. Trust me. I started doing, I'm 50. I'm going back to, I've started going back to the gym bro stuff.

I like, uh, there's that functional uh bodybuilding oh yeah like marcus philly's doing yeah yeah i've seen i've seen several people go to kind of that style and they say that they like that pretty well yeah i've i've slowed way down but like i hadn't done bench press i mean like i like probably in years and i've started doing some of that i started fooling around with skull crushers i don't do curls so much, but instead of doing cleans, you know, like hang cleans, I'll sort of cheat it a little bit and bring it up like this and then slow it down on the way down. And I really, I mean,

I still try to get some intensity in a couple of days a week, but, but nothing, you know, nothing like just like, okay, I have 15 minutes. I'm going to run out into the garage and do Fran. You started in CrossFit. You started at the, you were part of the media team, right? Yeah. Early, early, like before they, I was, how old did you see you are? 36?

Yeah. So I started with CrossFit when I was 34 and that was in 2006, the end of 2006. And they hardly had any even, they barely had pictures on the website, let alone videos. And then they did have a couple videos, and that's when I emailed Greg and Lauren. So the guy that I just hired to be the president of Tactical Games, he is fascinating to me. The businesses that I've owned before, like media and stuff like that, wasn't important. It's just getting the job done on time and building a reputation for yourself through that.

But media is at first I didn't like it, but I guess my eyes have been open to, you know, six months ago I could look at two pictures and I didn't know the difference between the two pictures. Now you look at two pictures and I'm like, this is total hack job. And this guy's a professional.

Yeah. The value of it is unbelievable. I, I, I had no idea um but it's fascinating to me in the depth of you know i thought it was just a camera you point it and take pictures and stuff uh the depth of all that stuff is it's another world to be in it's crazy do you have any media on those on those events those like kind of um uh the the women's events where um you introduce sort of people to the tactical games do you have media around that uh so we try to keep it as low stress as possible um but we do um there is shooting gallery it's a uh tv show with michael bain he came out and he did a whole TV show on it. Um, uh, I think it airs on outdoor

channel. Uh, but anyway, they did a whole episode on it and tests, you know, they interviewed tests and a bunch of the people that were there, which is funny enough. The first shooting match I ever entered, um, me and tests were on the same squad. And then Heather Miller was at that TGU as well and she was actually on that squad too um is she one of your good shooters also Heather Miller no she's a I know her pretty well from shooting just over the last 10 years or so but uh she works for um Staccato a gun company okay you're wearing their hat yeah i've shopped for them for a while so um because i think that would be interesting it'd be interesting to hear from those people you know how we used to do the media in the beginning of in the when i first

started working at cross but basically what i would do is and i it was super duper effective i would just go to a level one. Did you take your level one? Yep. I took the online level one. Oh, you did. Oh, um, why'd you do that? Just because it was during the pandemic. Yeah. It was actually, it was pretty good. Yeah. I've heard it's good. I could see how people would think that it's not as legitimate or whatever, but it's, uh, it was a good class. I learned a lot. Yeah. I just, um, the, the part that's cool about going in person is you really get, and you already went to a, an affiliate, but you really get soaked in the culture. Like you basically show up there with like 40 to 60 people you've

never met before. And everyone's kind of standoffish and like to themselves. And by the end you're cheering everyone on. and it's just nuts in those two days these people become kind of your best friends and you can't believe how much energy the level one instructors have they have so much energy yeah um but but uh one of the things we would do is we would show up to level one and we would just walk up to like i would walk up to the participants with my camera and i would introduce myself and then slowly throughout the weekend i would talk to them so why did you come here do you kids? What does your family think about you being here? And then I would shoot what we call B roll. Are you familiar with that term? And, and then I would

cut it together with their interview. And we used to make tons of those. And that caused, I think that really was one of the, the, I mean, besides the methodology is amazing. I think that was one of the core components that caused it to explode. And I would be curious to hear, um, uh, you know, like see a five minute video on a, on one of these women's take on, on this two day course, you know, that she takes and that the fact that it's free and, and, you know, what she thinks it's cool. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's definitely something we could do or we should do for sure.

So, so when you, when you, you got, you got in this accident and, and they, they immediately put you on what, like Vicodin and Oxycontin and that kind of stuff. They just I wasn't about that. And they kept giving it to me. And so I stopped taking it because I'd rather just be in like pain, but be able to work and stuff. If those mix nice with beer, I used to like taking a Vicodin and drinking a beer, two Vicodin and a beer.

The good old days. That sounds like something you can get addicted to. And a good sporting event on TV and a nice couch. Yeah. I try to, I try to stay away from stuff like that. But the, uh, it's like, I think, uh, Frazier talks about it a lot. A, uh, successful people have addiction personalities, you know? And luckily my dad was telling me when he was, his addiction has always been business and that's what he focused on. That's why I work so hard all

the time and stuff like that. And I think I, I, I don't have really an addictive personality, but I a hundred percent buy into things and I would not want to focus that energy on something that is going to be a detriment to myself i totally i i couldn't agree more yeah you don't want to you don't want to like be like like if you did heroin in two months you'd have your own um opium field in pop yeah you're like i'm not just going to do the drugs i'm going to i'm going to yeah i know i have like a fleet of planes flying all over the country yeah yeah yeah i totally get it all right hey that being said is any part of you interested in making guns or making bullets or i'm getting and i don't just mean with the those are bullet makers behind you right yeah but but i mean actually like um uh starting your own business where you actually sell bullets or sell guns.

Is that something that interests you? I had an ammunition company for a little while. Oh, you did? Yeah. My dad actually, he started it, and I took it over, and then I sold it about the same time I sold everything else. What do you do? So when you have these companies and you sell them, what is the plan? Is it to make sure you take that money and make it last as long as you can or make it last forever? Or like so I worked at CrossFit for 15 years and then I was fired. And then as soon as you're fired, you see this runway appear in front of you, right?

fired, you see this runway appear in front of you, right? Yeah. And at the end of the runway is a cliff that falls off into the abyss. And you and your family are now just like, Oh fuck, what am I going to do? And that runway is made of dollar bills, right? So, so when you have your business, by the way, I really respect the fact about this. I would like to talk about that again, the stress you felt having all those employees. Cause Greg used to talk about that all the time. That was the greatest thing about selling crossfit you could finally sleep at night without thinking about the employees but um you have this runway and um and then if you don't make money you can't lay out more runway that's like the horizon timeline the horizon line um when you sold this company are you like okay have you ever seen that um skit it's

from that movie matt damon's in where it's like if you have three million dollars you have fuck you money yeah so is it was it kind of like that you're like okay i'm gonna sell these three businesses i need to have this amount of money i need to have this much in bitcoin this much in the stocks this much from a rent that i'm getting from a house and then my wife as long as my wife keeps her job i can keep laying out more runway like is that is that the process of. And then you're like, oh, fuck, I'm going to buy the tactical games that ruins everything. I just shorten my runway in half.

No, the the it only took about five months to turn the tactical games around and get it profitable and to where it's very sustaining. OK, OK. I mean, it's, it's more than sustaining. It's, it's very successful and awesome. Awesome. The, I've never worried about it, to be honest with you. I just, I know that I'm always going to do something and figure something out. So I just keep on keeping on. Is that faith? Oh yeah. A hundred percent. Are you religious, man? Oh yeah. So I don't talk about it. I'm not like going to go knock on your front door and ask you if you know Jesus, but, um, yeah, absolutely. A hundred percent. How did that happen? Uh, I mean, I wouldn't say that I didn't have a choice, but like I definitely had a choice. I just, my dad was an amazing guy and I always wanted to be like him.

So he was a deacon in the church and he, everything that he did was guided by the values from church. And I liked that about him and I wanted to be like that. from church. And I liked that about him and I wanted to be like that. So, um, it's, it's so nice to hear this story because you know, uh, the typical story is, is your dad was a priest or a deacon or whatever. And at some point you rebel and you're like, fuck this. Um, and my dad did a really good job of he's, he's always been a very good man. And, uh, but he also did a really good job of making sure that I know, I knew that he was, he wasn't always perfect. And he would give me examples of, you know, earlier in his life when he messed something up and the ramifications of that and why he wished he wouldn't have done it when he saw me going down a road that was going to, you know, land me in the same spot that he was.

So he never he never pretended to be perfect in front of me. And I try to do the same thing with my kids. So, yeah, me too. But it's a life's a lot easier when you just, you know, make good decisions, be a good person. So, um, when, when you say your dad had, um, good, um, or you let you not like good values, you liked his values. Can you give me an example of like what a value is? Um, I mean, his, he was a CPA, um, and people trusted him with their finances. And one of the things that he did as a CPA is, you know, an older lady that had a bunch of wealth come to him. And it was his job to help separate out the estate and make sure that everybody was getting equal shares and stuff.

And there were several times in business where he would come home and talk about it. And he talked about business a lot at home and he would say, you know, these are the decisions that I have to make. And this decision would bring me a lot of money, but it's an unethical decision and I can't do it. And, uh, so I think going, hearing those things, like, and I mean, perfect example is, uh, uh, Hefner, right? So Hefner's doing the tackle games now. And when you- Great dude, by the way, have you had a chance to hang out with him?

Yes, I have. And that's like- He's dope. Whenever you start figuring out what you really figure out who somebody is when you're exposed to the finances side of them right and heppner's doing some training uh on our platform and stuff like that and there's other things that financially we've had you know if sponsors come in and stuff my main thing is helping the athletes right and the way he's conducted himself and that um like he has good values um money

doesn't guide his decisions and he uh he's an amazing guy like i i don't know if you how well you know him but i just i i couldn't stand him and then i interviewed him on my podcast i i kind of like to do that like face the people that i have like judgments about if he he fucking he he i was swooning in his presence he's i thought he was the a gentleman and a loving kind soul i loved him yeah he he's definitely he's one of those people that when you're around them um he i wouldn't say like forces you to be a better person he makes you want to be a better person right i could totally see that and then how about that girl who gets to train with them olivia kerstetter what a great team they are huh yes and how strong she is so that's a lot of people she's crazy a lot of people

in the tackle games have been at one point or another we we just the the sport advances right so like things get heavier the runs get longer the and we started hitting weights that people were saying like hey guys this is unrealistic weights and stuff like it's like there's this 14 year old girl in kansas right in a 205 so like if lifting 150 pounds over your head is too heavy, you're admitting that a 14 year old girl lifting 205 pounds over her head, you know. And you have different divisions. Really what those people are coming trying to come to terms with is like, hey, you're not you need to stay in your division. Yeah. And the other thing is, I think that people tie their success in the tactical games with how well they do their profession. If they're coming from the military and law enforcement and they have to realize it's called the tactical games because that's what Tim Burke named it.

Right. And Tim Burke has a resume that he can name anything that he wants to tactical because, I mean, you've known him from the past. And but it's a shooting and it's a shooting and fitness competition. And we test those two things shooting and fitness and when you show up and like somebody like heppner is there who has focused a ton of energy over the last year and a half into becoming the best shooter he possibly can and he's an athlete just straight act right right right totally not just a crossfitter but can do it all right athletes are frustrating people because you can work for years to be good at something and uh like corinna i forgot what her last name is she came kind of from the ocr world um she like she came and just

naturally started picking stuff up that had taken other people years to do it and that's what i think there's some frustration on that front from you know some of the people that do those kind of things for a living is you have to realize some of these people are professional shooters coming in that have a little bit of fitness but they're a professional shooter a world-class shooter and you have a world-class athletes coming in that guy is going to learn how to shoot so fast. And those, those, the, in the body awareness that CrossFitters have stuff like that. Um, it just promote, you can't stop an athlete from doing athlete stuff, right? It's going to happen and you just have to accept it. Right. Um,

but it's, uh, it's definitely, it's, it's, it's cool to see Hefner progress. I couldn't – we were blessed that he was the first guy that really stepped over. There had been a couple of other CrossFitters come over. I don't think there were like nine-foot-nine-something. nine foot nine something um anyway he runs one of the sanctionals or one of the use the ones with the swords when they won who is anyway i can't remember the name i can't remember i yeah i can't remember 12 wait 12 laborers 10 9 laborers oh that guy oh oh there's a guy. I don't know what his name is, but anyway, he came and he competed and, uh, but Jacob was really the first one. And then Zach Forrest competed two or three times before that.

But, uh, how did Zach do? He did well. Um, that's actually how I got to know him as we competed in the, and it was probably my fourth or fifth event that we, we competed against each other and, uh, he, he did well, but it's a different kind of fitness also. Um, and, but he, you know, he's a good athlete too. Like you're not going to stop him from doing well. And, uh, uh, but yeah, we're definitely blessed that Heppner was one of the first ones to come over and he's, he's a great guy. He's helped us further the sport as well.

So can anyone just show up to the, to the world championships like that and compete? Is it like the, like the CrossFit games in the early days? No, no, you have to, you have to qualify regular season. Like, I guess we started naming them regionals a little while ago um but you have to come to one of the regular events throughout the year and qualify for the championship because the the championship increases in difficulty and it's an extra day so it wouldn't really be like some of the stuff we do is just it physically would be dangerous to somebody who hasn't shown that they are competent athletes.

So are these the regionals? Yeah. Yeah. The national bottom right of the screen is the, the championship. Okay. So, um, and, um, how much money does it cost to have the, How much money does it cost to have the, on the lowest end, to have all the gear to participate? Aside from the firearms, the belt that I use costs $14. The pouches are probably like $10 each, and there's five of them. I would say like $250 in gear. and then you have two guns right you have a rifle and a pistol yeah and to get a good rifle is about a thousand dollars nine hundred to a thousand dollars and then a pistol is probably 700 bucks right in there um i was um i can't remember what event it was but um uh my friend um dave castro who he was doing a

partner event with someone somewhere i won't say it's in florida on the east coast somewhere i think it was in the united states and they were doing the partner event and his friend on day one and he was super excited he'd been training i remember david been training for it and yeah i'm so excited pardon me man a sniper challenge is that what it was yeah and um and this is a couple years ago and then his his the guy he was with dropped his gun yeah and that was an automatic disqual and i remember dave like like calling me like like you know i could tell something like didn't sit well with him you know and i think they went back like two years later and he said he would never compete with this guy again and he was just fucking pissed right of course he went back with the exact same guy and uh and they did it again

and i think they did well um but uh they're they're shit like that right like like that's part of the whole even when he told me the story i'm like what's the big deal but but it all is there weird stuff like that that those of us who don't do guns um all over the place like safety shit like that that's a safety thing right yeah i mean because the the consequences are literally deadly um dropping your gun like it discharges and shoot someone yeah and we just changed one of the rules so like in a lot of the pictures and videos you see people running around and like their rifles are swinging everywhere and stuff but we go through a very strict clearing procedure um so the athlete that just finished the event that you're doing is standing behind you um

and then there's a judge standing behind you so there's yourself and two other people that are confirming that the gun is clear and that you have cleared the gun and it's empty before you can turn around um that still wasn't like sitting super well with me so we just implemented a new rule where you leave the rifle at the firing line and you don't put it back on your sling and go running around and stuff um one you know okay but does that make it too sanitized then is that like at the l1 how they stopped doing the Fran? Like you're supposed to run. We're still going to have probably two events that you keep your gun on you,

but it's going to be the single-person launch. So like, you know, on CrossFit, everybody's in lanes next to each other going back and forth. We also do single-person launch events because the shooting is more difficult, and you can only have one person at a time shooting the course okay um so they will sling their guns because it's just one person that you can okay and there's not five people going at the same time um but there's no one being like oh man jared's really pussified this event like taking okay i i thought we were running the risk of doing that and then when we announced it uh 99 of people were like thank god you know it's just you don't it's never a good feeling uh like

even when i have a gun completely taken apart and the barrel is removed from the gun right so it's just a barrel without the rest of the gun attached to it um cleaning just a barrel that's not attached to a gun is still an unsettling feeling, like looking down the barrel. Right. And then you can imagine we're, we're attracting all kinds of people that may have just learned how to shoot like two months ago. And the, you start playing like the law of averages and probability and stuff like that. And that just wasn't okay with me anymore. You know, like, and for the, to secure the future of the sport, we had to make a change. Yeah. Even one accident's unacceptable.

Yeah. And I mean, cause the thing is, is when I took over, um, as the owner, I made a commitment to the people that are still around in the sport that like, this is going to be a, even CrossFit, right? Like you have to be one of the main CrossFitters to make a around in the sport that like, this is going to be a, even CrossFit, right? Like you have to be one of the main CrossFitters to make a living in the sport. And that it wasn't okay with me that like people were losing money and doing really well at this work. And, uh, so one of the first things that I did was change that and start helping the athletes, uh, was change that and start helping the athletes, uh, work their contracts with sponsors and make it at least, you know, for a lot of them and that zero thing to where it's not costing them any more money to come compete anymore. Um, and then now I would say most of the people in the top 10 are

making money doing it. And my goal is to have everybody making money um you know everybody that's good making money you know if you're sitting in last place you probably don't deserve to make very much money but uh that's that's ultimately the goal and i think that's a unique thing and people get a little bit butthurt about me competing and it's not, it's not the guys in the top 10, the guys in the top 10, 100% want me to compete because if I'm not there competing, there's an asterisk next to their name. If they win.

Right. Right. Right. Like you, you won, but it's because froning wasn't there. Right. You know,

like there's always that cloud over like, cause who was it that like Ben Smith that won right after Froning? It's like, well, did he win because he was the best or did he win because Froning didn't compete? Right, right. Yeah, it's the same thing. So no one beat Matt and Matt left. And the same thing, like the women really need – when Tia leaves, if no one beat her, it's kind of like that movie Highlander. Do you know that movie?

Yeah. You kill the guy and you get his power. So, I mean, yeah. If the champion leaves without anyone beating them, like there's a missed opportunity for sure. And I made a, I made a commitment that I would stay until I got beat. Oh, wow. No shit. Good on you. I think that's cool. People always say it's cool that people leave before they get beat. I think it's cool that you said that the other way.

But they, then it started, you know, the, the people, and it's cool that people leave before they get beat. I think it's cool that you said that the other way. But they, then it started, you know, the, the people, and it's never, it's never people that are in the top 10, but it's,

there's always people out there. And then the people that are just following the sports, like, Oh, you know, of course he wants, you know, he owns it. Of course he's,

it's like, bitch, I was winning. I want everything before I owned it. And just like, but, uh, like, but, uh, the,

uh, so that's kind of frustrating. So I have to make a decision on what's best for the organization and then what's best as an athlete and what's best for the other athletes. And like, I think there's some brand value to you just saying, fuck you. I'm competing.

Do you know what I mean by brand value? And I think that's a lot of what CrossFit has lost over like two years. Yes, yes. There's total brand value in whether you like guns or don't like guns. The fact that Dave Castro was an operator in the Navy for 12 years and a seal team, six guy and makes bullets and a shooting competitions. And like the, that's the guy, I don't care how much you like or don't like that. That's the guy, the ethos, the, the brand you want of the guy making the workouts kind of like, like in the, in the documentary in 2008, every second counts, someone

says, well, what would they do in the Olympics? He says, fuck the Olympics. Yeah. That's that's the brand value and so it's like that guy's cheating well then go out there and beat him fuck you it's like so what by the way tennis is full of cheating i've never seen such cheating by the way even at the little kids level that's another problem sport the cheating is just rampant and everyone knows it but okay go on sorry so i mean that's kind of the, but I feel like I owe it, especially like I don't pretend to be something I'm not like. Hefner more than likely, if I compete in the championship this year is going to beat me. Speaking of cheaters, fucking Hefner. And he, he's going to beat me. You know,

obviously I can't keep up with his fitness, but, uh, like the, the, the shooting advantage I have on him, um, is, is exiting the realm of like the, the difficulty that we experienced in the tactical games. And while I would still be able to beat him in a shooting competition, uh, he's getting too good at shooting to where his fitness where I can't overcome it. Right. And, uh, but I feel like, I feel like, and I don't fault anybody for leaving a sport before they lose. Cause like, there's also other things like priorities you have in life that you want to move on to. And, uh, but I feel like you kind of owe it to a sport to stick around until you lose so that that next guy carries that torch. Right. So, uh, anyway, that's kind of the predicament that I'm in. Even so, even, even if you had, um, uh, a problem with the programming, you would overcompensate

and you wouldn't say anything, right? Like, like a month later the programming you would overcompensate you wouldn't say anything right like like a month later like you would still be like you'd be like hey it's inappropriate like i've i've made my bed and i'm not even gonna say shit yeah so like during the competition during the championship last year several people walked up to me like hey man uh they're making this call against me i'm like whoa bro no like i can't say anything to you yeah if you want to talk to me about your wife cheating on you you know i'm a psychology major but this fucking gun shit like yeah yeah like i have to tell him like hey man like i have to stay completely out of this i can't even though i know like i have an opinion i'll tell you my opinion in three months um but no, and I have opinions of the programming, like Wednesday after the championship,

I called Jake, who essentially is like the Castro of our sport, right? He's the one that programs everything. And what's his last name? Mizzell. Okay. And I called Jake and I was like, Hey man. Uh, so you totally fucked up like two events. That was cool.

Um, let's talk about how you you said that you said that to him yeah it was after the competition was over and does he say fuck you and hangs up on you that's so but we did i mean i'm honest with him about it and then being a competitor also keeps you present uh in it's easy um like i didn't compete for probably six or eight months because i was running the events and stuff and it's easy to build a callus and just be like man these people are just complaining about this and it's not that big of a deal it's different when it's affecting you as a competitor um oh so keeping a foot in it um to where you remind yourself like as a match director it's easy to build a callus and say, well, it's just a little deal.

I don't really care about it. But as a competitor, you have a whole it's from a whole different looking glass. Right. Yeah. So it helps it helps keep perspective when you're making decisions as an owner and a match director when you're out there competing sometimes. So I have to I have to do this really quick. Let's see. Let's see how this plays out here real quick. Just sorry. I apologize. Everyone listening. I'm supposed to be taking my boys to skateboarding right now, but I have one more question before I let you go before you let me go. Let's see if my wife answers. She's not going to answer. She got the kids in the car waiting because when this podcast ends i just jump in the car and i drive them over the hill to the skate park it's like oh all right okay here's the question you ready yep i could go to church every single day and want to be a christian

so fucking bad but i've heard that it doesn't you have to be invited that there has to be a calling from the lord from jesus from god and then then then when you've called and not all men are are called does this make any sense to you what i'm saying so, um, do you think that not only you, the reason you gave for sort of your foundation in your religious beliefs was, um, you wanted to emulate your dad because of your love for him and your admiration for him. And you saw the way he, um, carried himself on the planet. Um, but have you also been called and, and, and how did you know, what was that? How did that happen? Hmm. Uh, there were definitely just events throughout my life that led me to it.

Um, and I, I guess more so confirmed my belief in it. Um, you know, making it through that, uh, UTV accident, a hundred, I should have died a hundred percent. Um, there were things that happened, uh happened after I woke up because I was knocked unconscious for however long I was there. I was by myself. So for several hours, and I was trapped underneath it. You came to, and you were underneath that thing? Yeah.

And were you like, oh, fuck. Are you just doing the thing, like take it and assess that that like oh fuck yeah so it had me pinned to the ground by my leg um and i couldn't get it off and for a while like so blood was in my eyes i had a gash on my head and so like it's super hard to get blood out of your eyes by the way but uh i was trying to get the blood out my eyes i finally got out of my eyes i could see pretty well and i was trying to figure out like how i'm gonna get my leg out before like the pain hit and the adrenaline went away and uh i couldn't do it and i was probably there for like 45 minutes struggling under this thing and uh i just finally was like well you know no cell phone around no no there's no cell phone service out at our ranch. Uh, so I was like, well, my dad's going to leave his deer stand in about

five hours. So when I don't get back to camp, he's going to notice I'm not there. He's going to, how bad is the pain at this point? It hadn't hit yet. I wasn't in pain. Are you, are you talking to God at that point? God, don't let me die. I have kids, shit like that. to God at that point? God, don't let me die. I have kids, shit like that. No, I was thinking about it. That's for sure. But so I decided that, you know, I was just going to try and get as comfortable as I could before, because I was kind of coming in, I was starting to go back out of it. I was about to pass out again. And I was like, I'm going to adjust this way and see if I can kind of like get somewhat comfortable. Um, that way when the pain sets in, at least I'm somewhat in a comfortable situation. And, uh, I looked up in the, the bar that was crushing my leg had lifted up and I slipped,

slipped my leg out from underneath it. And they, uh, why, why did it lift up? I don't know so that's i mean that's one of the things that has confirmed it for me um was the second i my leg got out of the way it crashed back down on the ground and i got up and i walked to my friend um that was probably a mile away and uh he was asleep in his deer blind and i threw a rock you know i threw a rock at it and it hit the rock and as soon as we as soon as i saw him look at me that's the last thing that i remember oh you surrendered okay homeboys got it

from here on out yep so but that, but that's definitely, there's, and I think everybody has, um, things in their life that they can't explain. And you try to justify it as something else, or, you know, I've told a couple of people that story and they're like, man, you're out of it. Like you're hallucinating and you probably thought it was really hard, but it wasn't really hard to get it off. And when you adjust it, it went up. Like my, my leg says a different story. Like my quad separated, it was, it hurt. Um, so, but yeah, that's, uh, that's definitely what's done it for me. So it's one of those things that. Did you, did you ask for help before that happened?

No. Um, I, I do remember thinking that, uh, I was, I was sitting there and I was like, there's no way, like, at least right now that there is no way that this situation could get any worse. Like I've hit the apex of this situation. I've hit that. And from here on out, I'm either going to pass back out and my dad's going to wake me back up or, you know, whatever. And then like 35 cows walked up. And I don't know if you've seen like, I don't know if you've seen a cow pee before, but it's like. Yeah, yeah. This morning.

That's how I feel like I feel. I've seen a donkey pee every morning when I pee. I'm like, man, you're built like a donkey, Simon. You like dump this water out. Oh, that's like how fast? Okay. Oh, and is it near you, like near your head even? I was laying there, and it started peeing pretty close to me.

And like the splash, like the splatter, you know, just like when you know, like when you're sitting, when you're peeing in the toilet, a little bit hits your leg. Like, yes. I was like, man, I'm sitting here. I was like, I thought it couldn't be any worse. And there it is. Oh, it's so good. Yeah. There's a, there's a lot of lessons and I think a lot of appreciation for the little

things in life. Still to this day that I remind myself that I was laying there thinking about just wanting to read books with my son and stuff like that. So anyway, but it's definitely good. It's definitely a good reminder. Every time I start getting a little ahead of myself, I always think back to those things. Here's the thing, man, that people don't get. So, so I'll just tell the quick story. Um, I've told a million times on there, but basically my senior year, I got called by the counselor into the office. She's like, Hey, you're not going to graduate from high school. I go, why? She goes, you don't have enough credits because you, you haven't gone to like four of your classes this

year. I'm like, Oh fuck. And she goes in, here's your transcript. And I'm like, fucking, like, I feel like tears starting to well up. You know what I mean? I'm a senior high school. I can't believe I'm not going to graduate. It's a week till school gets out. And she goes, do you want me to check your main transcript? And I said, yeah, please. And she goes, okay, I'll go get the file. And I fucking, I'm like, dear God, I'm sorry. I've never fucking prayed to you, but I can't remember the deal I even made with God. It was like, I'll never fuck up or be an asshole or something ever again i promise i'll do this this and this you got to get me to fucking graduate yeah and she comes in and she opens the fucking transcript and she says to me oh shit you did every high school play from your freshman

year sophomore year junior senior year and you stayed after school so you get credits for that you're gonna fucking graduate and the reason why i did that is my freshman year was i saw there were girls doing drama. So I walked in there. I'm like, oh, if I can hang out with girls who are like older than me, that'd be great. That would talk to me. And and someone would be like, well, then that has nothing to do with God. That has to do with the fact that you did.

It's like, no, you're fucking missing the point, man. I think it's like the same thing if someone said, well, maybe the dirt sunk and below one side of this ATV and it wasn't. What? Like, are you not are you not fucking listening? Like, do you always have an excuse for everything about what to see the truth? It's just it's fascinating to me. And I'm not a believer, but I'm but I'm but I'm like, there's a main there's a main principle. And like what you're talking about earlier, that's hard for people to justify in their minds. Once they understand that I'm a Christian and largely a conservative and I like guns. So there's a stigma that goes with all of those things.

And it's to love the sinner but hate the sin. So you can love the person. You can also not exactly love what they do or their lifestyle or style or whatever. And you can also not agree with it, but you can still love the person. Right. So there's several, I worked in a home with developmentally disabled adults. And that was one of the greatest things I learned. Do not address their behaviors, address them. Yeah. And when I realized that, like, like I could forgive anyone. I didn't hold it.

Like you didn't pay me back a thousand bucks. You owe me. That's okay. That's separate from my love for you. Yeah, totally. I totally feel that in my day-to-day life. So that's why, that's how, you know, a lot of people don't understand when, you know, there's somebody that lives a lifestyle that's contract contrary to, you know, what I believe. And, um, they don't understand why I'm really good friends with them., they don't understand why I'm really good friends with them. It's like, well, I'm really good friends with them because they're a good person. Like, I don't agree with 15% of their life, but the other 85% of their life, like they're a cool person. They're good people. Like I want to be around them. They're a nice person. Um,

and I love people because I want to love people. I don't love people based on the fucking love they earn from me. I'm not letting them dictate my love for them. Fuck you. I am who I am. Yeah. I'm put here to love on people and give people attention. So that's how, I mean, I know it's kind of like, it's hard for a lot of the people that I'm around to understand sometimes that, you know, there might be somebody that's living

an alternate lifestyle and I'm friends with them and they don't, they can't put those things together. And it's cause I don't care about what they're doing at their house and the decisions that they made, like that's between them. And you know, what, what it is for me is I love them as a person. They're a good friend. Um, so that's how, Hey hey no one wants to be addicted to alcohol no one wants to be shooting meth no one wants to be addicted to heroin there's not someone out there who's like oh this is this this is what i want exactly like dude be thankful you're you and not them yeah that shit ain't fun no definitely not well i i think think that we kind of built a little bit of a friendship. You and I have like a bit of a rapport.

Yeah. Yeah, I think. I'm going to drive for an hour and I'll be thinking about this. I really enjoyed speaking with you, Jared. You remind me you're the kind of man that people have to. There's a hazing and a learning period. And my dearest friend in the world, Dave Castro, also has that. There's a learning period to getting to know him.

And it's been worth every second. Thanks for coming on. If there's anything I can ever do for you, let me know. I'd love to – I'm going to um search um uh some through your list of champions i'd like to have one of the women on and talk to one of the women yeah man let me know i'll make sure you get in contact with one of them all right dude have a have a great day and i'm off to the skate park all right we'll see you okay bye