Brandon Powell: The who, how, when, why and NOW

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[00:01:23] The question I'm often asked is how to break a bad habit. Breaking a bad habit generally boils down to consciously repeating the correct process or the correct skill set. So when someone has a bad habit, their subconscious is ingrained into doing something that is incorrect.

[00:01:45] Whether that be throwing the gun at the end of the shot or taking your head off the stock or getting your stance wrong, leaning too far forward or mounting the gun too low.

[00:01:53] Anything that's considered a bad habit that's become done over and over has been ingrained into the subconscious. What we need to do is consciously override that. So often people will say, why do I keep doing that wrong?

[00:02:08] We keep doing that wrong because if you don't think about it, the skill set that comes out subconsciously is a poor skill or a wrong skill.

[00:02:18] So what we need you to do is shoot with repetition and we need you to consciously do the correct thing over and over again. The difficult part with this is it needs to take place in practice

[00:02:32] and it's something that when you're consciously doing things correctly, your mind is engaged. And if you're consciously doing things correctly, you might be missing because you're overthinking. So the prerequisite is initially some form of conscious thought, often considered overthinking.

[00:02:51] When done repeatedly, we will now redevelop our subconscious to do the right thing. So it's going to take some hard work, but we need you to get out there into the range and get this done.

[00:03:02] My guest today is undeniably one of the most gifted shotgun shooters to ever step onto the Sporting Plays course. I think naming the tournaments that he did not win this year would probably be easier than calling out all the ones he did win.

[00:03:38] He is now the 2023 National Champion and he's here to talk about everything that you want to hear. Yes, everything. The good, the bad, the ugly, the coming back to the sport and where he wants to be now. It's all coming out in this episode.

[00:03:54] Welcome to the show for the first time anywhere, Brandon Powell. Are you nervous? No. You're not nervous at all? No. Are you nervous about what I'm going to ask you? No. Do you care what I ask you? No, go ahead.

[00:04:27] All right. Well, I guess welcome to the show. Good to be here. So we've been talking about this for a long time, right? I don't know, probably a year, would you say? At least.

[00:04:41] And you said, look, I'm not ready to do this yet, but I'll let you know what I am. Right. I just quit bothering you about it. I mean, every other month I'd probably text you.

[00:04:53] Yeah, you reached out here and there and we talked and I just didn't feel like the timing was right. Do you think time is right now? Definitely. I don't think there'd be a better time than now.

[00:05:03] All right. So I talked to you on your way back from Nationals. That's how we got caught up in this and congratulated you on the win. You said, hey, let's get it going. So here we are three days later sitting here doing this.

[00:05:20] The National Championship you just won is the only one you've won, right? Correct. All right. How many times have you podiumed that shoot? This was my 12th Nationals that I've attended. Six runner-ups. One win and three-thirds, I think it is. Long overdue. And it's the biggest Nationals ever.

[00:05:46] I saw that on Facebook the other day. I think the NSCA posted that. 2350 people competitors now. 49 states and 16 countries. So a little bit of everybody got to see you. Yeah. So it was, you know, couldn't have been a better one to win. Yeah, that's right.

[00:06:03] It seems like that place just every year things are going well. That's right. It seems like that place just every year that that event gets bigger and bigger and bigger. So how was Nationals? I wasn't there. I wanted to go, but I wasn't there.

[00:06:17] It was great as always. I love shooting out there. Other than all the wind and the rain, it was good. Well, you know there's going to be wind. Always. What about the rain? I saw it like people were knee-deep in some stations.

[00:06:31] You know, I got lucky every day that we shot. And I missed it by 20 or 30 minutes, give or take. Before I started or ended the only event that I actually shot in the rain was the K-Cup. And that lasted maybe 30 minutes. First three or four stations.

[00:06:49] Yeah. Does it affect you at all shooting in the rain? Other than being wet? I mean not really, but it sucks when you can't see. Yeah. You had to wipe your glasses off. Yeah. Yeah. I had to work. I had football games where to go to.

[00:07:02] Family to me is more important than going to a shoot in Texas. Even though I still wanted to go. My wife could still tell that I wanted to go. I know Chris Claxton videoed the whole thing. That should be coming out shortly.

[00:07:18] At least I get to see that. How was the final day video? Was it nice? Yeah. We had those guys right on us the whole way. There was a lot of people. I think it's going to turn out really good.

[00:07:30] They moved the course too from last year to this year, right? And it was good that they did that. I was wondering how that was going to work out. But we had a lot more room out there. So that was normally the yellow course? I think so. Okay.

[00:07:47] So tell me about the targets. I thought that the targets were better than they've ever been. I don't know that they were necessarily harder. They were pretty consistent throughout all four days. Yeah. So there wasn't the hardest course, what in the last one?

[00:08:05] I'd say that green definitely had a couple of stations on it that were harder than the other courses. But the targets were just kind of across the board, consistent all week. You didn't go from a bunch of easy stuff to a bunch of really hard stuff.

[00:08:21] They were just steady the whole way. What set you apart? What station worried you the most out of the whole tournament? Was there one station that you were like, oh my God. Not really. From day one when we started, or actually let me back up.

[00:08:37] On the way out there I had already made my mind up that I was going to approach this Nationals completely different than I had all of the other Nationals that I'd been to. And was saying that more so probably mindset related.

[00:08:53] Not doing anything different as far as the way I shot the birds. But mentally I told myself before every pair, shoot the target, don't think about it, don't be careful. So I went out there with the mindset to shoot offensively instead of defensively.

[00:09:11] And that's something that I've never done, I guess because I've wanted to win that shoot so bad. And that made a huge difference. Why? Well I was able to just let all of my natural talent and ability be itself.

[00:09:27] There's a lot to be said about trying to put the gun where you think it needs to be versus letting your eyes put your hands where they need to be. Yeah, so you weren't thinking about it, you were just letting it rip. Every station.

[00:09:42] And it cost me a couple here and there. But it cost you that many. Correct. And I've been back over all the stuff I've won since I've come back. And when I trust myself and I just let it happen, it costs me targets along the way,

[00:09:58] but it allows me also to kill a lot more than the rest of the field along the way. So it works itself out. Speaking of that, what have you won this year? This year alone? Wait, when did you come back?

[00:10:12] Well, last year, 2022 US Open at Backwoods Quail Club. All right. So since then, what have you won? Well, last year we shot, I left there, won Georgia State 2022, the Northeast Regional. It's such a long list of stuff. I honestly can't even think back.

[00:10:35] Is that like a bragging statement? Not really. A lot. I know it's been a lot. A lot of stuff. A lot. I've been at the winnings from nationals, and it's the largest payout ever. And I thought, holy cow. I mean, anybody can go look.

[00:10:56] Just go look at what he won just at nationals. I mean, not everybody can make a living shooting and winning. Right. But you could have done it for sure. Yeah, this year for sure. All right. So on this episode, I plan to cover everything that I believe

[00:11:13] everyone is wanting to hear. Right. We're going to get into the highs, the lows, the challenges, and then we're going to kind of transition into the present, discussing who you want to be in the shooting world

[00:11:27] and the steps you're taking to evolve as a person and a shooter. And I think that that's fair to say. That's what you're trying to do. 100%. So, all right. You brought this up a second ago, and I don't think that anyone listening would argue

[00:11:45] that you're one of the best natural talents in the world of shotgun shooting. Right. Explain that to me. Explain to me in your words what a natural talent is. Well, I mean, I think you could talk about a lot of different things that it could be.

[00:12:05] My perception of that is, and always has been, is to do what we do, it's a lot of hand-eye coordination. So, maybe that means that I have better hand-eye coordination than most. I think a lot of it at the level that a lot of the top guys,

[00:12:25] the pros are on, I really believe that 100% of it is mental. On the level that we're on, I used to think, you hear people talk, they say, oh, it's 80%, 85% of it's mental. I think 100% of it's mental. Yeah, why? Well, I mean, it's all about mindset.

[00:12:45] It's about being able to go into that station and know that you're good enough to kill all eight of them. I walk into every station with a mindset if there's eight targets on that station, say four report pair, four true pair, three report pair, whatever it is,

[00:13:03] I don't walk in there with the mindset to try to kill eight targets. I go in there trying to figure out how hard I can hit them. So, you know, you already know you're going to hit them. I mean, in your mind, that's the mindset. Yeah.

[00:13:18] Is the setup, all the other stuff, is that just as important to you as the mindset? As far as your body? Yeah, 100%. You know, all that stuff, you've got to have sound fundamentals to be able to repeat and do the same thing four times in a row.

[00:13:38] So, you know, yes, stance is probably one of the most important things because if you're out of position and you can't rotate, the gun's going to slow, you're going to miss the bird. Yeah. I see you when you're shooting. I can tell that you wind up

[00:13:54] and you kind of release, so to speak, when you pull the trigger. Right, yeah. I mean, rule of thumb is if you start comfortable, when you pull the trigger, we want to reverse that. You need to, if anything, you want to be a little tight when you start

[00:14:07] and as you move the gun, you know, you want to get to that point to where you're comfortable as you pull the trigger. Yeah, I see a lot of people that don't do it right. Oh, that's probably one of the least talked about things

[00:14:20] among all of the people that coach in the industry is stance. Now, how do you coach stance? Well, you know, I watch people when I'm coaching and you can always tell. You can pick up on it, you know, right when somebody stands in the box,

[00:14:36] how they're going to perform based off of their body posture and the way they're standing. And it's something that, you know, if people don't know to look for that, they can't correct it. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, I tell people that, you know,

[00:14:51] you've got to make sure if you're going to break the target here, you've got to be able to make sure your body doesn't get up and rotate to that point. Yeah, it's comfortable when you pull the trigger. Right. All right, so let's talk about the start.

[00:15:02] Let's back all the way up to the beginning. How did you get started in this? Well, I like to hunt. Big deer hunter. We moved to Georgia when I was a kid, bought a chicken farm, went over to a gun club, you know,

[00:15:17] right down the road, which is actually Elberton, Elbert County Gun and Archery Club. And they had a rifle range, sighted my gun in. Is that the one with the big rock quarry? The big granite quarries. Okay, yeah. And we went to the clubhouse, joined a membership.

[00:15:33] There were some guys out there shooting skeet. And I told dad, I said, man, that looks fun, you know. So we went and come back a couple of days later and I shot a little bit of skeet, start shooting with those guys.

[00:15:44] They told me how good I was and it kind of evolved from there. So you'd never shot? Never shot before. And they said you're good. That was kind of crazy. I mean, if you don't. I don't. It's been a long time ago. That's how old were you then?

[00:16:02] About 13, 13 and a half, almost 14. Yeah. So I was going to ask, did your parents have some sort of an influence on you in getting started? I guess so. Well, yeah, they did. My grandparents, you know, they, you know, supported me throughout traveling and starting up on the road

[00:16:19] and, you know, working on the farm. You know, I worked on the farm and whenever there was a shoot that I wanted to go to, they, you know, made sure I got there. Yeah. So you started, when did you start competing? Probably 14, 14 and a half, somewhere in there.

[00:16:36] That was when I started. How good were you when you started competing? It was actually kind of scary. I look back on it, you know, shooting skeet and I think I've got one of my first ever, you know, back when I started, we shot on hand machines

[00:16:51] where you had to take a trapper and they had to cock the machine. So that's changed in the sport and in the industry since I started. Yeah. I think the first score I ever shot was like an 87 or something. Really? So you're, how old are you now? 36.

[00:17:09] 36, you started when you were 13. You've been doing it a while for sure. Not as long as Zach, but. Zach's just old. He's got a head start on me. Yeah. So how did you feel about your parents being around you

[00:17:22] at all these shoots and being with you at all these shoots? I know they had to be there when you were young, but they continued on into. They did. They, you know, they were there pretty much throughout my entire career up to the point

[00:17:36] where I took a break, you know, for five years before I came back to the 2022 US Open. And the support was great. You know, looking back on of it, all of it along the way, I think that, I think there were some goods to that

[00:17:54] and I think there were some bads. Bad stuff that came with it. Yeah. Did they expect you to win all the time? Every single time. So is that kind of pressure, was that good for you or bad for you? Well, I think that

[00:18:12] it helped me at a young age develop and I think that's part of the reason why I'm so good today is some of the stuff that I dealt with at a younger age in life turned me into what I am now. Yeah. It's kind of crazy,

[00:18:29] but I think I got, I learned to get hard mentally at a really young age. You had to. I had no choice. Yeah. So who did you shoot with back then? Was there anybody that we know now? Well, I traveled a lot with,

[00:18:47] I shot with John Kruger at the time. I met him actually at the first sporting clay shoot that I ever shot and that happened to be the Georgia State Championship at Elberton that year. Shot with Kruger, beat him on the make or break.

[00:19:01] I've actually got this cool photo that he signed and he signed it, John Kruger, lucky shit. So it was pretty cool. I still got that photo at home on a stand with my trophies and I traveled with John. John kind of tucked me under his wing

[00:19:19] and we traveled. He got me to Krieghoff. I bought my first Krieghoff. Mom and dad bought a Krieghoff from him. Shot that for a while and then years later down the road and ended up getting sponsored by Krieghoff. Now Anthony mentioned to me, I don't know,

[00:19:37] back before I asked you to come on the show that he may have given you some lessons at some point. Did you receive any formal coaching from anyone else or did you just shoot with people? Where did you learn from? We didn't do a lot of it.

[00:19:53] So that's the only lesson you really had? Ever, yeah. Really? So you've more or less just taken experience and developed your style? Just practicing along the way and shooting, learning and failing the whole way. All right, we'll talk about that for a second. Practice when you're younger

[00:20:14] and we're still when you're young. I shot a lot because I really, really loved it. I didn't know what I wanted to do. It was either hunting or wanting to go shoot my shotgun and pull the trigger. So I shot a ton of ammo,

[00:20:27] a ton, a lot of it when I was younger. And that means all I wanted to do, I'd go to Elberton over there, we were members and I'd cut the lights on and shoot until three o'clock in the morning. Some days I'd go over there

[00:20:41] and I'd burn 10 flats. In a day? In a day. Not a lot of people can do that or do do that. Right. And now I'm so busy now, it's crazy looking back at how much I practiced and shot to where I am now. Now going into this

[00:21:03] 2023 National Championship, I actually didn't touch my gun for 14 days before the shoot. Did not touch it. Put it down, I shot. The Frazier 500 was the last tournament that I shot at Cherokee Rose and I put my gun down, didn't touch it. I went and climbed a tree,

[00:21:23] did a little bit of hunting, gave some lessons and I even laid off of that about a week before and we showed up early out there, took the kids to SeaWorld. It was fun. Did you get in with Shamu? No. How old were you

[00:21:44] when you shot your first 100? Honestly, I can't remember. Probably 16. Yeah. So you were a registered shooter at that time. When were you master class? Do you remember? I believe I made master class from the time I started from the very first NSCA shoot

[00:22:08] and I actually started in C class if I remember correctly. I don't know if they changed over the years, but I went from either D or C class to master in about 6 months time. Shooting a Krigov. Shooting a Krigov. That's all I've ever shot.

[00:22:26] So you've never shot the automatic. You've always shot a Krigov. Well, I started with a Brown and Gold sporting glaze, but when I started shooting NSCA way back, I was shooting a K gun. I shot a sporter barrel forever and I came out with

[00:22:43] the park horse barrel back and I can't remember 14 or 15. I popped one of those on there. It was kind of crazy because I got the first one sent to me actually at Big Red Oak plantation when they had the North American Fee Task.

[00:22:57] Popped it on them in the parking lot with an old friend of mine, Shane Atkinson, and we take sandpaper to the stock and I sanded it down because it needed to be lower and I pop it on the gun sanded it down and shot. Brand new barrel,

[00:23:15] fixed choke. I think it was I-mod full. You may have been the first one to ever thread a park horse barrel too. You think so? Possibly. For chokes. Yeah, I remember seeing the first time I saw you had probably the same barrel. Who knows?

[00:23:39] I don't know what gun it was. I don't remember that. Some Rhino chokes were in it. So, the competitive state that you're very competitive. Have you been that way the whole time? Your whole life? Yeah, I think it's something that you're born with. It's either in your blood

[00:24:01] or it's not. It's something that it takes to be good. I don't care what you're doing in life. You've got to be passionate about it. You've got to love it and a crowd or whatever, a crowd, a bunch of negative talk, it always drives you to love it.

[00:24:23] I love it. It's great. You don't care if everybody behind you is talking trash about you. You can still shoot good. Yeah, we go back to when we were talking about it being so mental. That's the mental part of that. When people want to see you fail,

[00:24:39] if you can't in your mind that they're standing there watching it, that's when it's time to grab another gear and put a show on for them. Yeah, well you like doing that. You like putting a show on. It's great. When did you realize that you could

[00:24:56] beat anybody that was shooting? Was it 16, 17 years old? Yeah, somewhere around in there. I've always shot really good. I think the best thing that ever happened to me was taking the five years off that I took off and I didn't want to go into the sport

[00:25:13] as bad as I didn't want to do that. I really didn't have a choice. I became a father and got full custody of my child. That right there forced me to grow up and change my whole life. It changed a lot of things for me.

[00:25:27] It calmed me down a lot. Being back and looking where I was at just say 10 years ago, 15 years ago to where I'm at now, it's 100% difference. Not just the way that I act, the demeanor, but it's helped my shooting tremendously. I'm still able to get amped up

[00:25:45] when I need to be and I shoot with a lot of adrenaline. I'm real upbeat, but in the mental aspect of it, of getting older, I've gotten a lot calmer with how I handle things and it's helped me tremendously. When you took this break,

[00:26:03] you said you were doing it because you had a daughter. You got custody. You got a lot of scores. At all? At all. I didn't keep up with it. I actually had this conversation with Mike Luongo a couple days ago. We were talking about it

[00:26:23] because people don't want to believe that there's no way he put his gun down. I literally stayed away from it. I love the game so much that the only way that I could not shoot and it didn't completely eat me up is I didn't even look at scores.

[00:26:37] I totally just blocked it out. I didn't keep up with any of it. I didn't know who was doing what, when, where, or how. What made you get back into it? I started giving some lessons. I had a couple of people, friends of mine,

[00:26:54] ask me to give some people some lessons and started doing a little bit of coaching on the side. I got asked to shoot one day by one individual in particular. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. It was kind of funny.

[00:27:07] I was coaching for four or five days over. You're going to the US Open. I'm like, I'm not going. You're going. No, I'm not. Day five, he's like, you don't have a choice. It's paid for. You got a hotel room. Here's 10 flats of ammunition.

[00:27:26] You're going to shoot the US Open. You can win. I said, I've got to practice a little bit. I got with Jasper. I had actually let Jasper Copeland know my gun. He had my gun. He was shooting it. I didn't need it.

[00:27:40] I gave it to him as a backup. He's shooting the gun. We get over there. We get everything set up. Did a little bit of practice. Shot some skeet and off we went. That was it? That was it. You just right back into it.

[00:27:58] Do you remember how you shot when you went to get practice that first time? I hadn't stopped. That's crazy. Did you think when you quit that you would be coming back? 100%. You knew you would, just didn't know when. Before that break, what were some of your biggest accomplishments?

[00:28:25] Of course, all the runner-ups at nationals. I was always short there. Couldn't get it done. Runner-up in the world championships. Georgia State wins. North Carolina State, South Carolina State, Nevada State, California State. Browning-Bradley World Open. Runner-up in the World Compact when we had it here in the States

[00:28:50] for the first time. Did you think that you would be making a career out of this sport? Not really. Not when I came back. I was mainly doing it. I was doing the athletic aspect of it. Not really, no. Not at all. Not at all, but after taking

[00:29:11] all the time off and coming back and turning things around from the way they used to be when I was younger, I see now that I have a big opportunity to be an ambassador for the sport and the game, and I love it. So why not?

[00:29:27] When you came back, you noticed that there were some clubs that were not as successful. I don't know what reasons they are. I don't care what reasons they are. What do you have to say to them? We've pretty much worked all that out through most of them,

[00:29:43] and stuff has straightened out now. Talking about the past, I think that everybody in life deserves a second chance. For some reason, it was hard to get people convinced to give me that second chance. But I think a lot of them have made it to that point.

[00:30:01] I did a lot of stupid shit when I was a kid, and just wide open. I don't know that I was any different than any other kid, but I was in a sport that was primarily made up of a lot of wealthy, older people,

[00:30:17] and they didn't want to deal with that crap. So I was wide open. Like I said, would I change it if I could go back and do it? I don't know that I necessarily because that's what makes me who I am today.

[00:30:35] I feel like that's a big part of mentally why I'm as strong as I am, because I had to be. You play stupid games, you win stupid prizes type deal. I don't know that I would change it, but like I said, I think that people

[00:30:56] are finally starting to see that people can change, and I honestly didn't know being back from when in the open last year in 2022 to now, I kind of was starting to lose hope and was thinking they're just never going to accept me.

[00:31:11] I've turned a lot of that around, and like I said, I'm a different person. To any of the people out there at a younger age that were there to witness any of that stupid stuff that happened, all I can say is that I'm sorry and I'm older now.

[00:31:28] We can move forward. That's the only thing you can do is own it. I feel like the worst thing to do is to say it didn't happen, because hell, a lot of it happened, a lot of it didn't. I was accused of some of it.

[00:31:43] Some of it happened though. Let's talk about that for a second. Let's talk about one that didn't happen that everybody says did happen. There's been talk of, well, Brandon shot a machine. That didn't happen. I'm not a sports fan. I think everybody knows that.

[00:32:00] There's some jokesters and whatnot. What people got to understand is we were all young, and the things that we have dealt with in life and went through mold us into what we become when we're older. Like I said, I don't think that I would change anything

[00:32:22] if I could do it differently. I might have done some stuff differently. But like I said, it is what it is. The only thing that I can do is say, hey, I'm sorry. I'm getting old. I'm 37 almost in two weeks. We got to look into the future

[00:32:40] and forget about the past. You and I didn't get along. We had our moments. We'd see each other and we'd look the other way. I think I talked to you at Georgia State, the one you won Latin in 22. We kind of squashed all that and here we are.

[00:32:58] Yeah, I think it's just part of life. People go through phases in life and people are quick to form opinions. It's unfortunate that that kind of stuff happens, but it's part of life. When you sign up for a tournament, I think a lot of people listening to this

[00:33:16] are like, hey man, when are you going to get into talking about how he shoots? When you sign up for a tournament, how do you prepare for that tournament? I mean, not really. I sign up for shoots just like anybody else. I've got score chaser pro

[00:33:34] and I've got my list of tournaments that I want to shoot. That's funny. For the year, they squad me up and I leave from one shoot or leave from doing this and go there. You let them schedule it for you?

[00:33:52] Yeah, I put down what I want to do. They squad me for the event and I get this person that wants to shoot that person and that's fine. It doesn't matter. It's actually kind of cool sometimes to not squad with people you know and to meet other people.

[00:34:11] That's been really good for me also, shooting with different people since I've come back. That's helped me tremendously by getting out of the little circle and meeting this guy at this shoot or that woman here and then they go tell the world Brandon, you shot with that guy?

[00:34:28] They're like, yeah, he was great. It's got a snowball effect so it's been really good. You've met some good people. I have, 100%. Here recently, I know. Shooting with people you don't know, do you think that helps you shoot better? Honestly, for me,

[00:34:49] I don't think it matters either way. I think the only thing that sometimes bothers me and this is going to sound crazy to a lot of people that listen to this, but to me, there's nothing worse than shooting with a squad of people that have trouble staying focused

[00:35:06] and want everything dead quiet. There's no communication. I'm there to talk and hang out and have a good time. I can carry on a conversation. We can talk about whatever and as soon as you step in the box, that's the moment to cut it all off

[00:35:22] and get out. Then you just go back to it. You've got to be having fun. Do you have to stand back there and watch several pairs before you shoot it? You'll see the videos from nationals and I bring up nationals because it was videoed out there

[00:35:40] and you'll see me getting up on the guy, kind of watching, looking down the barrel a little bit and typically, maybe that's something because of the pressure, the shoot. You see me focus a little more on it and maybe I'll look at the pair

[00:35:54] and when it's my turn, I jump in the box and go with it. I have noticed that you look down the barrel behind people. Do you do that to see, they hit it, they got about that much lead on it? I'm definitely looking down the barrel

[00:36:10] looking at the gap. If they miss, you don't have to put it back. I look down the barrel. I like to do it just as a reference. I don't know that it helps though because the way that I shoot, they see a lot bigger gap

[00:36:24] than the gap I'm going to see because I'm going to come through it with the barrel from behind with gun speed. It kind of defeats the purpose. I think it's just, I'm looking down and just kind of using it as a reference to see what the bird's doing.

[00:36:40] A lot of the targets that are missed, people just, they're not reading the line of the bird. It's very important to read what the target is doing. I think a lot of people walk up and say, oh, it's an orange bird going this way.

[00:36:54] It's an orange one going that. You got to look and see what's that bird doing? Is it rising? Is it transitioning? Where is it transitioning? How far is it? Is it quartering to quartering out, crossing? All that stuff is a determining factor at the end of the day

[00:37:14] with how you're going to shoot it and where you're going to shoot it and what result you're going to get. You just said you come through the birds. Nothing can go wrong if you don't have the line of the target. The bigger the gap is on the bird,

[00:37:28] the more chance you have of missing the line. When you got to mount eight, nine feet out in front of a bird, when you figure out, somebody lets me know how you can make sure your barrel is in line with that, I'd like to know.

[00:37:46] I think that's why some of your other guys, Anthony, I think primarily pulls away from the target. He's pretty good at mounting on the bird, when I have to. When do you have to, though? Give me an example. Just a good example of that is

[00:38:00] say we got a true pair and you've got to shoot the first bird quick so the second bird hasn't closed up and on edge or too far gone out of the sweet spot, whatever you want to call it. That would be one where you're going to start

[00:38:14] and you're going to kill the first one as quick as you can to move to the second bird. You're going to stay in front of that first one. That's 100% of the targets that I shoot. You do that solely for the line? For the line. Yeah.

[00:38:29] Do you pay attention to the barrel? Well, yeah. You've got to be aware of where the muzzle is. If you don't know where the muzzle is, then how do you know what you're doing? It's kind of funny over the years, all the articles and all the magazines

[00:38:43] and stuff that you see, that's something that is just recently being talked about is muzzle awareness. If you go back 10, 15 years, you look and you don't want to see your barrel at all. You shouldn't be aware of your muzzle. I don't believe that. I think that there's proof

[00:39:02] that certain targets require more muzzle awareness than others. But you always have to see it. As in, we throw a little incomer right here that's hanging in your face at 10 yards. You basically can rifle shoot that bird. When I step in there, I'm making sure that I'm putting

[00:39:20] my finger on it and I pull the trigger. You get a 40-yard screaming crosser, that's a bird where you can't have all that because your eyes can't bounce back and forth from barrel to bird, bird to barrel, and you keep the gun moving. When people say,

[00:39:36] look at the target, can you see the rings and all the stuff on the target or do you just see a target? I've got really good vision, 2013 in my left, 2015 in my right, but I don't know that you can literally see the rings 40, 50 yards.

[00:39:52] You're looking at the target as hard as you can look at the target when you go to make your move, whatever move that may be. Everybody's got a theory and they've got an opinion. So you just see the bird? You've got to see the bird. Period.

[00:40:10] Tell me how you, let's just go over a few targets or how you shoot them. I know it all depends, but just a quarter in target, I'm going to shoot the front edge. What about a rabbit? Rabbit, I always run on the back edge of a rabbit

[00:40:28] and I stay with it that way. If it hops, I'm there and I can go up and pull the trigger with it. I'm still going to come through a rabbit. Are you going to wait until it hops? If it's going to hop.

[00:40:40] A target that I've always had trouble with is an incomer. It just gets up there and it just hangs. You shoot it at the top, how do you shoot it when it drops? It just depends on what it's paired with.

[00:40:54] True pair, if you've got to shoot it quicker or later. Usually I'm going to let that bird peak and then I'm going to mount just on the bottom edge and I'm going to pull away from that target as it starts to drop. Main reason for that is

[00:41:08] letting the target transition from stopping and transitioning to a fall on a straight line. The line is important. That just reminded me. You were on the PSCA and there's a video. I'm sure you've seen it on YouTube. I guess you're shooting the speed round. Speed round, yeah.

[00:41:28] One gets way out there. I think you shot twice. However many times you shot, you missed it. You reloaded, shot again, and hit it right before it hit the ground. I've never seen somebody shoot targets falling like you. I think a lot of that is

[00:41:44] I loved doing that when I was a kid. I stuck with it and I think it's cool. I also think that it's a part of your game. It's a part of the game that you've got to be good at. You think about how many shoots we go to

[00:41:58] to where the target setter throws something to where you've got to shoot the second bird falling. It's a tool that you've definitely got to have in your bag. Yeah, you'll shoot the make or break sometime and it's like, why hadn't he shot that yet?

[00:42:14] I was following somebody in the background and he's just showing off. Eye dominance. I'm shooting right-handed. How successful can I really be? I really don't know that much about the eye dominance stuff. Anthony seems to have a lot of knowledge about all of that.

[00:42:32] It's something that I'm starting to run into, though, the more coaching that I'm doing. I think that the toughest thing that you've got with somebody being right-handed their entire life and figuring out, hey, I'm going to start shooting. I'm going to figure out their left eye dominant

[00:42:54] is everything that they do left-handed is awkward. I think that kids, younger age, that are just beginning, say they're right, they do everything right-handed, they're left eye dominant, vice versa, they're left-handed, right eye dominant. I think at a young age it's okay to switch them up

[00:43:20] and say, hey, I've been shooting doves for 40 years and you want to tell them to shoot left-handed? Yeah, that's not going to work. Do you think that you can work out of the eye dominance issue? Do you even know the answer to that? I don't know.

[00:43:37] I think that you can. There again, though, I think some of that relates back to when you start and how you learn. You've got to be doing something different than everybody else. What's he doing? What's the secret? Back to mental. I think a lot of it's mental.

[00:43:58] I think a lot of it, though, also is how I shoot. Swing through, coming through the target, back to being able to have the line. That's one of the most important things that there are is having the line of the target. If you don't come through the bird,

[00:44:16] there's so many different things that you can do. Should they try shooting your style and see how it works? The problem you have, I think that the reason why nobody teaches swing through and it's not talked about a lot is it's probably one of the hardest methods

[00:44:34] to shoot in the stance of it takes a lot of gun control. There's more to it than call and pull and just ripping through the bird at this unbelievable speed. With this unbelievable rate of gun speed just pulling the trigger. It's a very controlled process.

[00:44:54] I was going to ask that next. You hear everybody say match the speed of the bird. Right. The first little bit of flight time with me, I'm running with the bird and then I can make my move here, here, here, anywhere in the flight of the target

[00:45:12] and make that transition on through the bird to pull the trigger. The problem you have with that is if you're going to shoot a deep quarter and bird, you're going to come through and pull the trigger when you hit the nose of the bird.

[00:45:28] You come through a 50-yard, 60-yard crosser that way, you're not pulling the trigger on the nose. We're stretching on out to a gap and when we get there and we get comfortable, it's more of a feel than it is a sight picture. Every bit of this game

[00:45:46] boils down to a feel. I do this and 100% of me will always say and believe that shooting is a feel. It's not a sight picture and some people just catch on quicker than others. Do you think people either have it or don't have it

[00:46:04] or do you think everybody has it? I think it boils down to hand-eye coordination. I think we all have hand-eye coordination but it's a proven fact some people have more hand-eye coordination than other people. I don't understand. I don't either. I haven't really studied into it.

[00:46:24] I haven't looked into it. I don't know. You're not like David. You don't have something in your brain, your doula oblongata. 100% no. We've determined you pull through the target. I got a question. You don't wear a vest. You wear a shell pouch. What's up with that?

[00:46:48] I wore a vest when the PSCA I shot that way for a little while and it was okay. They're hot and it just adds extra stuff. I want the gun to feel like it's a part of me. Yeah. I know you're about to say

[00:47:09] you're always wearing Magellan shirts. They're thin, they're light, they breathe and I have contact with the gun I feel like through my shirt to my shoulder it feels like it's a part of me and I feel like that's important. Do you plan on ever wearing a vest?

[00:47:26] I've tried. I actually tried one on at Nationals again this year and I was going to try to shoot in the offseason with one. I just don't think I can do it. You're going to carry around that little cheap old pouch you got? Probably.

[00:47:39] Maybe we'll upgrade to some elephant skin or alligator skin down the road somewhere. Was it now canvas Velcro? Yeah, I think so. You got to reach down to your knees Alright, so tell me about the shells you shoot. I don't care about the brand.

[00:47:56] I'm talking about what speed. What do you like to shoot? Nitro bombs. Remington Nitro Bombs. That's what we're calling them. The 1235 ounce and eighth. Okay, so I've been up in the air about ounce and eighth versus one ounce. We shot over in Europe.

[00:48:16] We shot one ounce over there. It's all they allow you to shoot and I think they pattern great. They're easier on your shoulder, but I think as long as they will allow us to shoot an ounce and eighth load over here, that's what I'm going to shoot.

[00:48:30] It's kind of like going to a pigeon shoot and knowing you can shoot a seven and a half ounce and a quarter at any speed, but you choose to shoot a seven eighths ounce. Doesn't make any sense. You might as well send the biggest payload out there.

[00:48:44] Yeah, so switching over to the 1235. And for PTAs, that doesn't bother you. It doesn't bother me. I mean, that's where I was going with it. We shoot one ounce in PTAs and shoot 70, 80 yard stuff, sometimes bigger than that overseas and it breaks just as hard.

[00:49:00] I think a lot of it at the end of the day boils down to what we talked about at the beginning of the show and it's all mental. It's in your head. It's what you're comfortable with, what you're confident with, and what you trust.

[00:49:16] I've been shooting back and forth over the years, but primarily ounce and eighth when I can shoot it in one ounce in PTAs. And it's always been 1250, 1235, whatever? 1250 has always been the magic number for me. I love that one ounce, about 1290. What chokes?

[00:49:34] I don't like asking these questions because I think it's very generic. Like, hey, what do you shoot? What do you use? Nobody's ever heard from you. Well, I mean, Briley's. I have a 22,000 in my parkour barrel. They're the 22,000s, both barrels.

[00:49:51] For some reason, I like in between a mod and an I-mod. And that's all I ever shoot. You won't take them out, put skeet choking and shoot a rabbit? Tried to take them out at nationals on one of the stations and they were rusted in the gun.

[00:50:07] So it was pretty funny. Did you take it to Craig off and get them out yet? No, I got it broke loose. So you don't clean your gun? Not really. I'm shooting the best gun in the world. Things built like a tank. It has to be.

[00:50:25] I looked at that gun. I don't know where I was at. You said, here, open my gun. And I opened it and I thought it was going to fall apart. He said, that's perfect. That's how I love it. And you do that a lot when you get up

[00:50:41] and shoot like you're thinking and you're down, open and breathing a little bit. That's where I've that adrenaline has hit a high and I'm really ready to go there. You got to channel that. You got to calm it down for a second and it's crazy over the years

[00:50:58] how I've gotten older. I know when I've got control of it and I can close the gun and call pull. But you've got to have all that under control. Then you'll start doing crazy stuff. Do you ever get in a spot to where you miss a target

[00:51:12] and you're like, oh, never. Never. That's one thing in this game you can't do. You'll see me get aggravated with the best of them and I get pissed off. It's not at the trapper. It's not at the guy behind me. It's not at the guy on the cart

[00:51:30] that rode by. It's none of their fault. That's me being hard on myself. But no, by the time I leave that station it's done, it's over with and we're on to the next. 73, 73, 60. Eight. How many targets on the last course? 75. So you dropped more on that one

[00:51:52] than you did on the other three. I did, 100%. It was weather. The wind was blowing. My goal, like I said, from the first day to the last day, I knew that I didn't have to shoot 73 on the last day. I just needed to put pressure on everybody

[00:52:10] and hammer them and hit them and I gave a couple up here and there but a lot less than the rest of the field. Did you think about that though? Did you think, oh my god, I'm dropping more than I have been? No, no.

[00:52:24] When we arrived at the curve I think I had made it up to six, seven, eight targets ahead of everybody. Bainhorn, he's something else. What a cool guy. Who is that guy? He's a farmer and really cool guy. That was awesome to shoot with him

[00:52:42] and that day he was shaking a little bit but he managed to hang in there. I was impressed. I've never seen his name. I haven't either. Super nice guy though. Super, super cool guy. He's a farmer. He's like, I'm just going to go shoot national championship today

[00:53:02] or this weekend. Where did he finish? Second? Second, yeah. That's crazy. That's what all the pro guys do. Myself. He's definitely a talented guy. It was pretty cool to see somebody just an everyday working guy out there shooting out of care in the world. That's probably why,

[00:53:26] back to the mental part of it, the guy finished where he did. Probably didn't care. Wasn't thinking about it. Like I said, we rounded that curve and I get over there and I missed three targets. Anthony jumps in there and makes three up on me.

[00:53:42] I got in there and was going to shoot it on the way down. I was like, nah, just shoot the damn thing. I gave up three there. We went into the next station. I ran it and I knew when everybody dropped

[00:53:54] and gave that lead back to me again, a good comfortable lead. I went from being three ahead back to six ahead. I knew I was like, if I run this station right here, it's over. All we got to do is get in there

[00:54:10] and break the first single shot target and it's a pretty awesome feeling. How do you like the Super Squad? I think it's great. I enjoy it. It's fun. The only thing that I don't like about it is we shoot all year and we get out there

[00:54:28] and for a lot of people, that's the last shoot of the year and they want to shoot with their friends. They want to shoot with their buddies. They want to have a good time. When they auction these spots off and they force us elite group of shooters

[00:54:42] that doesn't necessarily take us out of our comfort zone, I feel like there's probably a good many of them out there that get squatted with each other that don't want to watch what the other guys do while they're standing in the box.

[00:54:58] I think that creates a lot of extra pressure on some of them. It doesn't bother me. I think that's the only downside to the Super Squads at Nationals not being able to shoot with your buddies for the last time, if you want to shoot with them

[00:55:14] just don't get in the Super Squad. I'm never going to shoot with my buddies. You're not going to suck, are you? You went overseas this year, right? Right. How did you do? Shot really good. Ended up Super Final over there. Was the only American to make it.

[00:55:32] Finished runner-up in the World Championship. Sporting. I didn't know you shot VTASC, honestly. I thought you just shot sporting. I didn't shoot it a lot last year or this year because when I came back I really didn't know I was going to shoot this much this year.

[00:55:49] With ScoreChaser, everything being new like it is where you pre-register everything was full. I got into a few of them this year. I think I won the big one in Chicago where they gave you a ring. I forget what they call it

[00:56:03] but it was a big 200 bird deal. I enjoy VTASC. It's fun. As far as being the captain for Team USA for 2022, did you think that would ever happen? You come back your first year and you're captain of Team USA. Was that sporting and VTASC? Just sporting.

[00:56:27] Didn't shoot enough VTASC tournaments to make the VTASC team, unfortunately. Have you been the captain before? I have never been the captain of sporting. I've been the captain of VTASC What do you like better? I enjoy both of them. VTASC is fun. You get all the singles.

[00:56:46] I feel like VTASC is a lot easier game than sporting. You've got singles. 70% of your targets are singles. You get two barrels to kill them you ought to kill it. Sporting, you step in the cage you better be ready to go because if you miss, you miss.

[00:57:06] You don't get to fire two shots at it to figure out where you're at. I will sometimes. We call that staying on the first target. Is that what it is? Have you done that before? 100%. When you step in there, your mind's got to work that way.

[00:57:26] At the level we're on with all the talent there is there's more talent nowadays than there ever has been in this sport. You have got to be smart when you're out there shooting. If the next one is 45 yards away you better double barrel the first one

[00:57:42] and put one X on that card because missing pairs you're not going to win much. If you had to pick one team an elite team to be on who would you pick? If you had a five man squad and you were going to beat everybody there was

[00:57:58] who would be on your team? I think the team we had together this year probably, I don't know you could build a team any stronger than that. Me, Anthony, Zach, we were all it was there. It would be those guys. Same guys. You wouldn't pick nobody from England?

[00:58:18] Well, I mean if we could throw George on there of course. People say you may be the best in the world. You've heard it. I've heard it a bunch. I do. I hear people talk. What do you say to that? George has got 26-7 world championships. 30.

[00:58:36] Is it 30 now? He's definitely the GOAT. Oh, 100%. But I guess being a natural shot being the best in the world one of the best what do you say to that? It's got to make you feel pretty cool. It is when you sit and think about it.

[00:58:56] I don't think it's really sunk in. I'm still running off all the adrenaline from nationals. It's starting to hit a little bit. Driving over here tonight I knew this podcast with you. I was thinking about it. People have commented and sent all these text messages.

[00:59:17] Looking back on it I guess I really have had one heck of an impressive year. Take last year completely away. Don't even put that in the picture. Coming back, one in the US Open honestly it's pretty amazing. Honestly, I don't know that anybody has ever had

[00:59:34] a year in sporting clays over here as successful as I have. I didn't even pay any attention to it. It just kind of hit me because people have been texting me saying what an amazing year. I'm sitting there going yeah, I won the nationals

[00:59:50] but then one person will be like you won just about everything you shot. I'm like, I did. Do you think it would be easier to call out the ones you didn't win versus the ones you did win? Probably. 100%. I think it would be South Central Regional

[01:00:06] or no, South Central Regional the Southeast Regional and the Northeast Regional. I think everything outside of that we went RC Cup, won that. We went from there to Caribbean. Didn't shoot Caribbean, actually missed that one. Won Seminole. Won the Gator Cup. Boy, that's a big shoot.

[01:00:31] A ton of people there. Great shoot over there at Backwoods Quail Club. Then we went to Bradford shot the small little Florida Challenge. Won that. Georgia State. I think Georgia State now is probably one of the hardest shoots in the country to win.

[01:00:48] We got so much talent in Georgia now, it's crazy. That shoot gets bigger and bigger and bigger every year. Yeah, the kids in Georgia. 100%. They're crazy. Just on and on and on. You go look at score chaser. Who won this? It's pretty impressive for sure. Because of that,

[01:01:10] your performance at the end of last year and this year has got you some people standing behind you now. Yeah, 100%. Like we started out talking about, a lot of stuff has just changed in the industry. Me getting older and taking some time off

[01:01:32] I think was probably one of the best things that could happen. What's the industry looking for now? Well, we just as of pretty much the Nationals working a big deal with Krieghoff International and Phil Krieghoff overseas at the factory there in Germany. Remington. We got Remington on board.

[01:01:55] I actually stopped by Briley on the way home and we're looking at putting together my own line of chokes. So I've got some really big players in the industry backing me now and behind me and it feels good to finally have some support. Yeah, when you started

[01:02:10] you didn't think you was going to have any did you? I honestly never knew how any of that stuff was going to work itself out. Yeah, acting right. I guess so. 100%. But I think that the good thing about this is not just for me but for the game

[01:02:30] and just for people in general in life is to remember that when you see somebody do something or you form an opinion of somebody it doesn't mean that person's always going to be that way. I mean, you can see somebody at their worst at their highest of highs

[01:02:44] and their lowest of lows and they could do something completely out of character and you could think, damn, it could be the first time you've ever seen that person and you just happen to catch them at the wrong moment and you think, damn, what an idiot.

[01:02:58] Look at that guy, I can't believe he did that. You hold on to that and you formed an opinion to somebody and you're just having a bad day. And while we're on that topic, that's like shooting. The amount of energy that I bring to the cage,

[01:03:12] that's something you've got to have. I mean, I'm 100% convinced and I'll always believe that to win in this game, I think to win at anything, it's like Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods, when he's out there, he don't want to win by one.

[01:03:29] He wants to beat the rest of the field by 10. And I have that same mindset mentality and I always thought that aside from the stuff that I did at a younger age to get the name and the reputation of being the bad boy of sporting clays,

[01:03:43] that a lot of that too, since I've come back, I hear people talk and they see me and I shoot with all that intensity in the cage. You'll see me sling some shells. That's just part of being a champion and being a winner.

[01:03:59] That's part of letting a little bit of that adrenaline off. And that's me striving as a competitor and as an athlete to do better. I think I was misunderstood. Yeah, well, I mean, you throw shells. I saw videos of you throwing shells this weekend,

[01:04:21] but you're not throwing them being mad. No, it's out of being pumped up and fired up. You've got to have that drive. You've got to get those people off. I think some people are always going to get pissed off about that.

[01:04:33] I don't think there's any way around that, but it is what it is. I've watched all the pros since I've been back. I'm not going to name any names, but people just look around and watch. I've watched every single person out there

[01:04:47] at some point in time sling a hole. Some worse than others. Yeah. It's part of being a winner. If you can stand there and be that calm you're never going to win in this game. It's never going to happen. Do you think the sport needs

[01:05:05] what do you think it needs? Would you change anything about it right now? Yeah, I'd get rid of all the drama. It's a very fun game. I think 99% of the people in the sport are great. I think that there are some things that need to change, though,

[01:05:24] for it to move along and grow and get even bigger than what it is. How cool would it be to have shotgun sports shooting on TV like golf? I think there are some things that need to change. I think some of the drama

[01:05:41] and the petty stuff in the sport and in the industry itself has got to go away in order for that to happen. Why is there so much drama? I really don't know. I've thought about that for years. It's been talked about.

[01:05:55] It's been talked about with a lot of people. I've gotten a lot of phone calls and I don't know. I really don't have an answer for that. I told somebody the other day, I said at the end of the day we're shooting clay blowing through the air.

[01:06:09] Why are we so dramatic about it? I don't know either. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense. You're getting to kill shit. You're blowing shit up with a shotgun. It ought to be a good time. I guess the competitiveness is... It probably is.

[01:06:25] People get upset about stuff and that's part of life and that's part of life. What lifetime targets do you have? I think this year I broke over 100,000 registered. I was talking to Zach the other day and he said 200,000. Zach's been shooting quite a bit longer than I have.

[01:06:44] When you're 60 years old what do you expect? Don't you have to go to the eye doctor when you go out to Texas? From what I've heard and tell me if I'm wrong but you have a documentary series coming out about you. I think it's going to cover

[01:07:01] some of the stuff that I went through from a younger age to where I'm at now with Devin Anderson, Mr. British. They just filmed a big series called The Back Edge with me. Can you go into what it's about? When you were young, what do you mean?

[01:07:17] Some of the stuff that I did that caused me some of the trouble along the way with my attitude and things that happened that I didn't want to talk about. You're bringing it right out in front of everybody. I might as well. I don't have anything to hide

[01:07:35] as part of where I'm at today like we discussed earlier. I know there's not a date of release yet but it's coming quick. It should be here pretty soon. We filmed that up at Northbrook when we shot the North Central. Who's in charge of that?

[01:07:51] Devin and Steve, Mr. British. This is his YouTube channel. I'm sure they'll listen to this. You send it to me when it comes out. We'll post it up and let everybody know where to go to listen to it. Watch it, whatever it is. Sounds good.

[01:08:07] A lot of these, I look at the stats of the show and a lot of people will stop listening to a podcast 30 to 40 minutes. They'll cut it off unless they're really into it which I can't be into nothing. 30 or 40 minutes, I'm done. We've got it pretty long here

[01:08:27] but I know I missed something. I had to miss something. There's a lot of stuff to cover. I don't know. Maybe once everybody hears this and they can reach out to you and any other questions that they might have about shooting style, things of the past,

[01:08:45] shoot you an email on it and we'll get back on and we'll do another one. Hit me up on Facebook or wherever. Email, website, email me. Send them in and we'll get him back on and ask them. There's just so many questions you can ask.

[01:09:05] Everybody's got a different perspective. Everybody wants to know different things. We could talk from now until this time next year about shooting. I think we're going to wrap it up but we will get him back on when we get enough questions to make it worth your time

[01:09:23] driving 20 minutes. Sounds good. Enjoyed it. Thanks for listening. Remember to visit us online at ShotgunSportsUSA.com Check out the products that our sponsors have to offer and we'll see you on the next one.