“Dude… you have a year”

This was it. The post that started my journey into archery. A video posted by my good friend, teammate, BUD/s classmate and amazing author Jack Carr of him shooting a partially occluded target at 118 yards. I texted him that it looked like he another teammate of mine, Jocko Willink looked like they had an absolute blast at the Total Archery Challenge in Park City. He said simply… “Well… you have a year. Get a bow, practice, get good and come shoot it with me next year” I accepted it as a challenge.

My buddy Ian Blomgren went one step further after driving 1500 miles with me offroad and overland on amazing adventure through Idaho. After I mentioned the challenge, he went a generous step further and actually gave me his killer Xpedition Archery XCentric 7 bow to get started with. EPIC first bow. I would need to earn that gift. Not sure I would have gotten into the sport without both of these key events taking place.

I took the bit in my mouth and started practicing hard. I listened to Bruce and the folks at the Bow N Arrow shop here in Lakeside and I took lots of lessons from Ernest Kent, and learned a hell of a lot. For most of late 2020 and early 2021 I was shooting over 100 arrows a day.

About this time, I re-listened to John Dudley on Joe Rogan’s Podcast and was reminded of the “School of Nock” series he created on YouTube. This is the moment where everything started coming together. From the first lesson I felt really, REALLY confident in the information and just started accepting it as gospel. It changed quite a lot of things that I had been reinforcing a bit incorrectly. From grip, stance, anchor point and many other elements, I was drinking from a fire hose. John is a gift to archery, and I was committed to doing well shooting his Nock On course last year. Most importantly, he taught me how to properly maintain my own bow. From tying D-loops to sight adjustments… it’s all in there. I just studied his videos and started working on my own bow. I even built my own bow press… something it was clear I would need.

Ernest started coming over for lessons once a week, and it turned into a party, where every Sunday I would have quite a few friends who were either into archery already or getting into it coming over to take lessons. We ALL got better. I’m not a coach, but I’m better than nothing, and I was paying attention closely to what Ernest was teaching me. So, I started helping my buddies dial in their rigs and practice a little smarter too… Straight to the School of Nock, and figure out how to resolve setup issues and get shooting perfectly.

I got better, and before I knew it I got my buddy Josh Patterson from Off The Grid Surplus into it, and actually paid that first bow forward by putting it into Josh’s hands and got my second Xpedition Archery bow, an XCursion 6HD. I must have shot this XCursion 10,000 times in those next six months.

For me, archery was capturing what I love most about really long distance precision rifle shooting. I’m talking about shooting over a mile. You need great control, breathing, muscle support, form, the ability and understanding to make precision calculations and huge payoff for attention to detail. And, I could do it in my yard, in California. With ammo costs rising out of control during Covid, I was able to shoot thousands of arrows for the cost of 12. It also didn’t hurt that during the height of the pandemic, we had an amazing family hobby that we could put time into right here at the house.

In order to shoot the 120+ yards needed for TAC, I would step up again to an even more powerful setup, another XPedition bow, this time a 72# DLX. Totally awesome rig, but big, and rigged a little heavy with a Garmin Xero bow sight. I put a lot of reps gaining strength, experience and accuracy. This would become my backup bow… It had a lot of advantages over many bows, and at only 72# still shot a 410 gn arrow at 297 fps.

I was starting to get my chops down. I joined the Bear State Archery club and started shooting there in Lake Henshaw once a week. I improved not just shooting at 3D targets, but on doing higher angle shots, uneven footing and moving myself around to make the shots even more challenging.

Xpedition Archery again shook the industry with their release of the X series bows in February… the Magnite alloy is as light as carbon, but stronger than aluminum. Plus, the draw force curve is just epic, allowing me to run less draw weight but still keep a staggering 285 fps speed at only 69#. Of course I had to have the newest and coolest, so I ordered a new custom X33 in the same custom color as the DLX, (which not coincidentally matches the race car)… As cool as the other four bows I had owned by this point were… the X33 just felt next level to me. A truly amazing piece of flagship hardware that is my #1 Varsity player today.

By this point I’d become a total Nock On nerd. One of the things about Dudley that I appreciate is that he has curated an amazing collection of high quality, extremely well considered accessories for archery… and almost specifically as it applies to shooting things like TAC and challenging hunts. He has tailored some of the best components in the industry and branded them as Nock On. The manufacturers are the big names, but John has made substantive changes to many of the components to dial them in for his purposes the best. As such, my bow is almost completely decked out in Nock On hardware. One of my favorite aspects of the series is that he remains almost completely brand agnostic with regard to his advice… never disparaging other brands, while being very proud of what he has created himself. I’m stoked to run his gear. On all of my bows I’m running his Elevate rest, his Nock 2 It (another recommendation from Jack Carr) and his stabilizers. On my X33 I’m running his Fast Eddie NE sight as well.

I went into the TAC at Park City really well prepared, and extremely well equipped. I was confident in how far I had come and felt that I shot really well for a first year shooter. I hit my share of challenging 10’s and 12’s, including where many didn’t. This video is a 123 yard shot on a full male moose target, something that hundreds of people shot at, twice, but only 27 total 10 rings, and I was one of them.

I also missed “easy” shots that I should have dimed. That’s what I’m hoping more experience will get me… Consistency.

Highlight of my year in archery, and an awesome high point was my family and I getting to shoot with Quinton, Chris, Gwen and Dave from Xpedition. Josh and I had the time of our lives, and really got to learn a ton from real professionals. My wife Audrey and daughter Carly both shot great, and we all vowed to shoot four events next year. We will practice in earnest, and be better than this year!