Listener Q&A Extravaganza! 🎯 Ricky, Zach & Jon Take Your Questions! Trap Talk E149 #trapshooting

Summary

Trap Talk From The Back Fence

Hosts: Zach Nannini & Richard Marshall Jr.

Guest/Producer: Jon

Episode: Listener Q&A Extravaganza! 🎯 (Episode 149)

Original Air Date: November 7, 2025

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Episode Overview

This special episode is a Listener Q&A Extravaganza where hosts Zach, Ricky, and producer Jon answer real-time audience questions submitted via Facebook and email. Covering topics from off-season training, eye dominance, gun choices, to options and purses in trapshooting, the squad delivers candid, useful advice and some good-natured banter. This episode is packed with practical tips for trapshooters of all backgrounds, with the hosts' decades of experience shining through.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Staying Competitive in the Off-Season ([00:50]–[11:45])

• Trey Wilburn asks how to keep the “competitive juices flowing” during the off-season.
• Zach: Prefers to rest and let himself miss the game rather than burn out:

“From December to February, if there’s nothing going on, I’m not particularly keeping myself sharp. If anything, I’m letting myself rest… redevelop that hunger for the game.” (04:06)

• Ricky: Still teaches or attends events but doesn’t force competition; nature drives his competitiveness when he has a shotgun in hand:

“If I got a shotgun in my hand, I’m competitive. That’s just my nature.” (05:57)

• Advice: For year-round practice, join winter leagues or local club shoots, even if just for bragging rights.

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2. Eye Dominance Issues & Shooting Two-Eyes ([11:49]–[15:01])

• Jay Matthews asks for help shooting with no clear eye dominance.
• Ricky: Recommends the “sight tube” (a small, slotted straw-like accessory) to help ensure only the shooting eye is aligned with the bead.
• Zach: Emphasizes proper gun fit and head mount to avoid dominance confusion:

“Make sure the gun fit is right… If you’re mounting wrong, your off eye can take over.” (12:58)

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3. What Happens to Old Guns When You Upgrade? ([15:18]–[19:22])

• Oliver Patton wonders if top shooters keep or sell older guns after upgrades.
• Ricky: Sells almost everything, keeps only what he shoots and a couple others.
• Zach: Has sentimental “keepers” but usually needed to sell old gear to fund the new:

“If I wanted a different gun, I needed to sell the old gun… I wasn’t Bruce Millions!” (16:19)

• Both agree: If it’s not being shot and has no sentimental value, “move it along.”

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4. Dealing with Distracting Trap Workers & Scorekeepers ([21:14]–[31:42])

• Alana Paulson asks: How to manage disruptive trap help or sideline distractions—without being rude.
• Ricky: Direct, polite communication works best:

“There’s the nice polite way: ‘Hey folks, we’re shooting, can you get off the phone?’ Or there’s the Rich Bullard method: ‘Hey, stupid!’ But seriously, it’s usually just lack of training or awareness.” (22:36)

• Zach: Expects distractions and stresses mental resilience:

“When I go out there, I literally expect… things to go wrong. If you expect it, it won’t bother you. But if you’re easily rattled, you’re done.” (24:00)

• Tip: Never antagonize scorekeepers—always address issues politely or through management.

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5. Helping Shooters Deal with Frustration ([32:14]–[36:16])

• Jay Gox asks: How to help shooters who get upset after a missed bird.
• Ricky: “It’s experience and maturity. Patience is key. Acting out just makes you look like an idiot. Control your nerves—break more targets.” (32:14)
• Zach: Let them process on their own, be supportive, don’t rush their learning, and try to model mature responses.
• Both: Stay positive as a coach/parent—tough love doesn’t work on the line.

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6. Gun Reviews & Choices

a. Browning 725 Combo via Guns International ([37:04]–[38:52])

• Hosts don’t buy online but say there are no “bad guns”; gun fit and personal preference are more important than brand, especially for newer shooters.

b. Top Single vs. Unsingle Barrels ([39:48]–[42:25])

• Jim Wimmer asks: Why so many shoot unsingles?
• Ricky: Better visibility of target—barrel is pushed down/out of the sight path.
• Zach: Same, but cautions about canting the gun and how style/fitting matters for stability.

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7. Shot Size: 7½ vs. 8 for Handicap ([42:46]–[45:41])

• Connor Brooks asks: “7½ or 8s for handicap?”
• Ricky: “Depends on yardage. 19 to 23-yard line, 8 shot is fine. From 24 back, I go 7½.”
• Zach: Prefers simplicity:

“Just give me the damn 7½. It’s one less thing to think about.” (44:18)

• Rule of thumb: Adjust for yardage and avoid making gear decisions too complicated.

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8. Trapshooting Options & Purses: Lewis, Great Eastern, etc. ([53:49]–[63:15])

• Kurt Grilling wants clarity on Lewis, Great Eastern, “skins” games.
• Ricky: Explains added money, Lewis class (divided payouts), Great Eastern/Western (top 6 scores paid).
• Zach: When clubs seed option pots with added money, always play them for value.
• Tip: Payment splits in options depend on total entries; know the math.

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9. Addressing Eye Tape & One-Eyed Shooting ([64:54]–[68:12])

• Andy Podnar struggles with cloudiness from taping left eye.
• Ricky: Try blackout dots or “shooter’s helper” grids instead of tape; electrical tape works better than scotch.
• Zach: Make sure not to focus on the tape; your gaze should always be on the target, not the occlusion device.

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10. Advice for Youth Shooters ([69:00]–[71:18])

• Josh Vons Prekin asks: Most important thing for new youth shooters?
• Ricky: “Gun safety number one. Then gun fit.”
• Zach: “Fun comes first—kids need to enjoy it.”
• Jon: If gun doesn’t fit, it won’t be fun. Start with safety, then immediate success (targets straightaway, closer distance), fun, then technique.

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11. Chokes: OEM vs. Aftermarket? ([71:47]–[75:25])

• Leni Mayfield asks: Factory Krieghoff chokes or aftermarket?
• Both prefer factory Krieghoff titanium chokes, but speak highly of Briley and effective custom work (like the late Tom Wilkinson’s barrels).

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12. Barrel Length for Smaller Shooters ([76:01]–[80:55])

• Mitch from CA asks: Should a smaller shooter use a 32-inch barrel?
• Ricky: Barrel length is about preference and swing:

“If you want to try a 32, go try a 32. If it’s too barrel-heavy, add weight to the stock to balance.”

• Zach: “Barrel weight, brand, and balance matter more than length alone.”
• Testing tip: Add (removable) golf tape weights to the forend to experiment with the swing.

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13. Music While Shooting ([48:48]–[53:38])

• Aaron asks: If you had to listen to one song on repeat while shooting, what would it be?
• Neither host listens to music while competing anymore.
• Zach: If music helps, select for mood and song structure—something with no downtime between loops.

“Music controls your mood… singles, maybe Nirvana; for handicap, something with more pop, like Judas Priest.” (52:25)

• Notable Mention: Matt Bartholow listens to “the hardest, fastest stuff” he can find.

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Notable Quotes

• Zach ([04:06]):
  “I use the off season as a good time to start to miss the game a little bit more again… That’s the most honest answer I can give.”
• Ricky ([05:57]):
  “If I got a shotgun in my hand, I’m competitive. That’s just my nature.”
• Zach ([24:00]):
  “It’s all Murphy’s Law. If it can go bad, it will. … If you expect all of that and you’re just cool with it, it won’t bother you.”
• Ricky ([32:14]):
  “It’s experience and maturity. Patience is key. Control your nerves—break more targets.”
• Zach ([44:18]):
  “Just give me the damn 7½. It’s one less thing to think about.”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Off-season Competition Motivation: [00:50]–[11:45]
• Eye Dominance Advice: [11:49]–[15:01]
• Guns: Keep or Sell? [15:18]–[19:22]
• Distracting Trap Help: [21:14]–[31:42]
• Dealing with Frustration: [32:14]–[36:16]
• Browning 725/Gun Choices: [37:04]–[38:52]
• Unsingles vs. Top Singles: [39:48]–[42:25]
• 7½ vs 8s for Handicap: [42:46]–[45:41]
• Trapshooting Options Explained: [53:49]–[63:15]
• Shooting with Tape/Eye Issues: [64:54]–[68:12]
• Youth Shooter Fundamentals: [69:00]–[71:18]
• Choke Tubes: [71:47]–[75:25]
• Barrel Length Guide: [76:01]–[80:55]
• Music & Mood: [48:48]–[53:38]

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Episode Tone & Style

Chatty and good-natured, with a blend of expert-level knowledge, stories from the line, and approachable explanations for newer shooters. The hosts maintain their straightforward, “from the back fence” style—direct, practical, with plenty of humor and on-the-line wisdom.

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Conclusion

This Listener Q&A episode stands out as a trove of practical advice and stories from seasoned trapshooters. From technical discussions about gear to broader insights about mindset and sportsmanship, Zach and Ricky keep the conversation lively, honest, and relatable—making it a must-listen for anyone looking to step up their trap game.

Transcript

[A]

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to trap talk. It is another listener question extravaganza. We've got a special one for you today. We actually had you guys write into facebook. So comments are coming in right now with questions. We're basically going to go in real time, guys. We're going to go to facebook and see what the fans are writing in for us and get you guys to answer them. So on the spot, we also have some other questions that were sent in to our email address. If you want to submit a question, send it to ask us traptalkpodcast.com and. And again, I'll get these guys to answer them for you. With that being said, to steal Zach's line, I'm going to go right into our facebook here. If you're not following us on facebook, why you need to be following us on Facebook? Post a lot of awesome content on here. So you definitely have to check that out. But let's go ahead and open up the comment section here, guys. And bear with us, folks.

[B]

This is.

[A]

This is live. So we're going in hot. Just as you guys are seeing them. We're seeing them. So we're going to start at the top here. Hey, guys, friend of the show squad mate Trey wilburn has submitted a question for you. I want to know how you guys keep your competitive juices flowing through the off season. We shoot a ton of calcuttas through the winter here in Kentucky and Ohio and Indiana. But how do you guys do it? Great question, Trey. Guys, I'll turn that over to you to answer Trey's question.

[C]

Welcome to season three of trap talk.

[B]

Brought to you by kragoff, the choice of champions.

[C]

All right, folks, we got to take a quick second and give a huge shout out to our title sponsor, Craig off. Me and Ricky. Bullshit him. We both love them.

[B]

Yep. Best gun in the industry. I shoot them, I sell them. Nothing better, folks. Get yourself a craig off. Your scores will increase.

[C]

Yeah, I mean, Ricky's got hundreds and hundreds of hundreds with his. I mean, I've got a few hundreds, but. But I'm always working to get a little bit better and they definitely help me, that's for sure. So on top of that, we also got to thank winig. I'm wearing the shirt today. We love this shirt. If you're down at the grand, pick one up.

[B]

Yeah, Winning. Like I said, Zach, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds with my winning stock. You know, get a hold of Bobby, Luke, bill, get an appointment set up. They will make you a better shooter.

[C]

With that winning stock. Of course. Yeah. The Grand's a great place to do it. Give them a call, get on their book. It's worth your time.

[B]

Just remember, winners shoot winnings.

[C]

With that being said, let's get back to the show. My secret is go somewhere where it's warm. So I, I, I, I despise, I, I despise shooting in the cold. I, I've shot in the cold so much for so many years, you know, I guess, I don't know, 20, 23 years in shooting now. And I remember there was times when I was shooting in Nevada County, California, where there was, like, snow coming down. And you're shooting and it's cold and it's raining, you're shaking and you're. And you, you do that and, And I will do it if I have to do it. But when I get to this time of the year, honestly, I don't get really jazzed up about competing. I'm more thinking, okay, I'm gonna go duck hunting with Don Bud, or I'm gonna go, you know, work on this or work on that. And that's where my mind's at. And then if I, you know, like, Las Vegas is coming up next week, and then Tucson's coming up the week after that. Well, now, I haven't shot in a minute. It's been a couple weeks, and I'm like, okay, I'm excited, and I've already started thinking about when am I going to start training. So this weekend I'm going to go shoot some doubles. I'm probably going to get down to Vegas early and shoot some practice there on Sunday before. So, like, coming into the shoot, because I know it's going to be a great time. Lots of gold, lots of silver. You got to be there. Like, all these things. I'm going to prepare for that. But from December to February, if there's nothing, if there's nothing going on, I'm not particularly keeping myself sharp. If anything, I'm letting myself rest. I'm letting myself kind of redevelop that hunger for the game and that competitive drive so that when I get back into it, I can give it 100% effort. Because I will tell you that I have experienced burnout, you know, especially in the middle of the summer when you're going week in, week out. Week in, week out. I just got off the phone with Jason Crouzley the other day, and I said, you know, congratulations on the clay target. We'd love to have you on the show.

[B]

And.

[C]

And I'm like, how did it feel shooting all summer long. And he told me, he said it was great. Other than the fact that there were certain periods of the summer where I was feeling a little burnt out and I was like wishing that I had a week off or two weeks off in between. And I think Rick can attest to that. I think a lot of top shooters can attest to, you know, when you're going all the time and you're giving it 100% effort, you have to let the body recover at some point in time. And I use, I use the off season as a good time to start to miss the game a little bit more again. And that's the most honest answer I can give.

[B]

Yeah, I would, I would say, Zach, I mean, to be real honest, you should just say you have to work. That's why you can't shoot so many times. I mean, you know.

[C]

Well, yeah, but I mean, I think now recovery was.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

When are you going to. When are you really shooting right now, Rick? I mean, it's not, there's not a lot really.

[B]

Yeah, I, you know, I was at the Missouri Fall Handicap for I guess what, five days I was there. Four days I was there. Never fired a shot. Told everybody I was retired. I just hung out. I. I couldn't compete in the overall of the all around because I was teaching over the weekend. So I was just down there to support Tyler and, and his Lindenwood team. You know, you're Alma Water that was there shooting. So then I left to go, you know, teach. But this time of the year I usually teach quite a bit. And then rolling up into, you know, Nevada State Shoot. And then, you know, Tucson.

[A]

I'll.

[B]

I'll be at Tucson just for the prelim week and then a couple days in the main week and then I'm heading out of town for a private event and then I'll fly back and. And shoot the pita. Arizona State shoot. But as far as, you know, like trade that be competitive juices and stuff. I mean, if I got a shotgun in my hand, I. I'm competitive.

[C]

Exactly.

[B]

I mean, that's just my nature. And you know, Trey as a, you know, pro athlete himself and other disciplines, you know, baseball. And Trey can hit a golf ball out of the universe too. You know, he understands that. But there's a lot of shooters that don't. And it's one of those that you gotta love it. And if you love it, you'll. You'll keep striving to get better because even at, you know, my level there, there's no perfect no one averages a hundred. And we've talked about this before, Zach. No one averages a hundred. And I don't think anybody ever will average a hundred. If you shoot all year, all year, like we do.

[C]

If somebody, if somebody decided one day, okay, I want to get, get that 100 straight average in singles, and it's a thousand single minimum. I mean, could it be done?

[B]

Oh, absolutely.

[C]

Probably be done. But, you know, you just start the year every year and shoot the first thousand out in Spanish or somewhere that you think you can get a shot at it. And if you break all thousand, hey.

[B]

So what you're telling Poll is Stu Welton. Yeah. I mean, that's another story.

[C]

But you got it. You gotta, you gotta look at it and you gotta say, you know, what am I doing it for? I mean, I never go into a season and, and like Rick said, I don't think that it could ever be done through the 12 months. If you truly shot all the shoots that you were wanting to shoot. I think that, that if you shoot.

[B]

All the major shoots from coast to coast. Absolutely not.

[C]

Yeah, I. I just don't. I don't see it happening. I mean, but. But if you, you know, you start to tighten that window up, obviously the less targets you shoot, the better opportunity you have for that average. If you have a ton of targets out there, you know, you're going to deal with more weather, you're going to deal with more issues, you're going to deal with more terrain.

[B]

Well, it depends. Everything, it depends if you just shoot the summertime, like if, if you just shot May to August, you know, is there an opportunity there? Yeah, could be. But the, it's like, you know, in the words of Daga Voigtman, you know, David says the more you shoot, the closer you are to missing.

[C]

The closer you are to missing.

[B]

That's what he says now. And here's the one thing is I believe that an average doesn't solidify who you are. I mean, because, I mean, look, I mean, Zach fought all year to get his average over 99, and he did. And why? Because, you know, we shot the spring grand and it was sporty, you know, I mean, you know, Ryan Glow stood right next to me at the spring grand, broke a 181. I mean, you know, and in it. So I know in Kentucky, Indiana, you know, Ohio, and I don't know if Illinois does, but I know those three, they have a ton of Calcuttas every weekend. Or they might have Calcutta's on a Thursday night or a Friday night. And A Saturday and a Saturday night and a Sunday so you could shoot. And there's some good money to be won because I just was at Harrison, you know, gun club. Shout out to them guys, great time, you know, thanks for all the hospitality. You know, it, it was just an awesome shoot. And it was, I think we had just under 20 squads, so just under a hundred people, you know, some good money to be won. Absolutely.

[C]

And, and if you, if, if I was in Ohio and there was a Calcutta every couple weeks and there was some good money in it and I was going, I would probably want to win. I mean, I'm not saying like, just because it's the winter time, you don't want to win or you don't want to be competitive. I'm just saying if I'm not at the, you know, for me, there's just not a lot going on this time of year around Missouri other than the fall handicap. And I did shoot that. You finished that one. And unless you're hopping on a plane and going to Florida or Arizona or California or Nevada, it's just not a lot. Unless I want to go to Ohio and shoot Calcutta shoots and.

[B]

Well, it's not feasible to do that.

[C]

Correct.

[B]

You know, I mean, we can, I mean, you know, and it's one of those things, but like here in Nebraska they don't really have it all winter long. So like right now we have a five stand league. I'd be out there shooting tonight, but we had a, you know, do a podcast. So I told my buddy Predmore, I said, hey man, I got a podcast to do. Sorry, you know, so. And that's one of the things is, yes, I think more clubs need to put in some shoots or try to grow a shoot, you know, I mean, honestly. And if you want to try to grow a shoot, just get a hold of John Slicker, he can help you out as we're doing here with the Nevada, I'm here for you.

[C]

I know he could do that. And I think, you know, for people that aren't going around and shooting all the shoots in the summer and shooting thousands and thousands of ata, I think the best thing you can do to stay competitive is the winter leagues. I mean, get in a league, get your local gun club and keep shooting consistently. We have one at Gateway every Thursday night here in St. Louis. And you know, it has 10 to 15 squads pretty much every time they, they run it. And it's not like this crazy win millions of dollars type of situation, but it's a bunch of guys fighting over 20 bucks a night and fighting over bragging rights. And I think.

[B]

But it's still competitive.

[C]

It's competitive and everybody wants to win. And you want the bragging rights to, at the end of the 10 weeks to be like, yep, my team was the team that won. And I think that as long as you have some competitive nature, that keeps the sport fun. And if, you know, just going out there and you're like, I got to get done and I'm done with this and I don't care and I want to go home, well, then what the heck are you even doing?

[B]

Right?

[C]

Like, if you're going out there, give it effort. Give it 100% well.

[B]

And that's the one thing. So, Trey, great question.

[A]

Yeah, Trey, thank you for that. That was awesome, guys. Thank you for the in depth answer on that. All right, we're going to keep it moving here. We're staying on Facebook. Next one comes in from Jay Matthews. And Jay Matthews says, any advice for shooters with no eye dominance to be able to shoot two eyes. So is Jay saying he doesn't have eye dominance? Shooters with no eye dominance to be able to shoot two eyed?

[C]

Yeah, there's people that don't have a right eye or left eye dominant.

[B]

They're just.

[C]

They just are basically right down the middle.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. And you should be able to. That's one of those things. So my best advice for that is to get the sight tube. Not the sight blinder that goes on the side of the rib or whatever.

[A]

The one that looks like a straw. Right, Rick?

[B]

That looks exactly. And it'll be about. Oh, I think they're about 3 inches long. 2 to 3 inches long, and it's slotted. And then the, like the last inch and a half, it's a solid tube. So only your eye, you're looking down the rib can see the dot. You know, your beads, so to speak.

[C]

That's what I would recommend. The only thing I would add to that is just make sure the gun fit is right, because I find a lot of people. I just did a lesson the other day and I looked at the guy's gun and his eyes were buried behind the rib. And he'd been shooting it that way for a long time. And he'd been like, yeah, I'm having a problem on my left hand side. And I'm like, well, duh. Because the barrel is pushed up into his right eye, and whenever he goes left, his left eye sees it. So if you were in a dominant situation where they're both equally you would really want to make sure that you give your right eye, if you're shooting on the right side, a better chance to. So make sure you put the comb up high enough that you're not obstructing the, you know, the ocular vision of that eye that you're shooting off of.

[B]

Yep.

[C]

And on top of that, just, just make sure that you're getting your eyes set before you call pole. Like a lot of the times that dominancy issue can happen or that crossover happens when you mount the gun and you don't get your eyes set. I think it's really.

[B]

And Zach, that's what I was saying with that tube. So that slotted part, the only way to see that bead is to be level and be able to look down it. If you're too low or you're off to the side, you, you won't see the, the white dot or I think they make them in, you know, fluorescent to orange or green.

[C]

And that, that helps a lot. And even with the, with the mount with your head, like, if you think about it, if you mount like Ricky does, where he mounts that gun and he's straight on, his eyes are pretty level. And now there's other people that shoot across their body and then they're looking over the bridge of their nose. Like I'm turning in the camera right now. And if you get to a position where you're really turning your body or shooting across your body, especially on the left hand side, you're just making it harder for your eye to see on the right. Like it would be opposite for a left handed shooter on five. Right. It would just flip. But for me, if I'm shooting across my body on post one, I'm giving my left eye every opportunity to jump in and say I want to play. Right. So you gotta, you gotta not give it opportunities to want to get into the punch bowl. You have to allow that right eye to see.

[A]

Perfect. Yeah, no, that, that's great advice, guys. So Jay, give it a try. Try the tube. Check your gun mount, check your, you know, your setup on the gun there and let us know how it goes. All right, guys, we're keeping it moving here. The listener extravaganza continues. All right, our next one comes in from Oliver Patton. Again, we're on Facebook here. I know everyone has different levels of guns along their trap shoot journey, but how many did you guys hang on to after upgrad? Is it out with the old when you get something new? Thanks, Oliver. Rick, what about you? You got a, A Big safe, full of the old ones, or I got.

[B]

A couple, but no, everything is gondy.

[A]

All right, so I. I have. Is the one you have.

[B]

I. I shoot my. My Craig off trap special combo. I do have other Craig Offs in there, so.

[A]

But you got your Sporter in the safe, right?

[B]

Oh, yeah, I got my. I got my sporter. I got a couple other guns in there, Craig off and stuff, and another couple trap specials. But honestly, I'm a fan of. Listen, this is gun you're shooting. If you keep the other guns, you go back. Unless you're shooting them, get rid of them. Personal opinion.

[C]

I mean, I agree with Rick. My reason was much more monetary than that. If I wanted a different gun, I needed to sell the old gun to get to the new gun. So it wasn't like I was, you know, Bruce millions, where I could just have all these guns in the same millions I had. You know, I said, okay, if I want to go from this gun to this gun, you know, I said, daddy, what do you think? And he's like, okay, well, we got to sell this one. We're going to get this one.

[B]

We're gonna move on with me.

[C]

And, and so, you know, not to be, you know, like, oh, if you have an unlimited amount of money and you have some, you know, personal relationship with your gun and you want to keep it, then, yeah, I'm fine with that. I've got two guns that I still have that I shot the 1100 that I started with. I still have that because my uncle gave it to me for sentimental reasons. I was never going to sell it anyway. And then I have a parazi Grand America 88 and the. And I have that one because that was when I started shooting for Ludic and they gave me the gun. So I didn't need to buy a gun at that point in time. It was the first free gun that I got. And because it was a free gun, I'm like, well, I really don't need to sell this barazi. But every other gun before that, if I was changing, I had to sell one to get one. So sometimes you'd sell one and get one and then it wouldn't work. You'd have to sell that one and get a different one. So it was like playing musical chairs.

[B]

That's exactly what I had to do. On my mike, had my first Prozzi and MX3 special and. And shot it like six months and shot really good with it. But I came upon a Grand American one, which is the same as a Grand American 88 except for the Grand American, the unsingle version. Basically it's an M. The Grand American 88 is an MX8 is what it is.

[C]

It's an MX3 with MX MX8 with MX3 barrels, basically.

[B]

Exactly.

[C]

So it's, it's a good mixture.

[B]

Yeah. And so we had to sell the MX3 to get the grand American one, you know, and such. But yeah, every other gun, I mean, I've, you know, parted ways with and, and didn't really, you know, regret it. I know my, my Parazi that I shot really well that Wilkinson did the barrels on and I broke the 700 straight with. The barrels are currently on Garrett Scroggin's side plate Prozzi. So if I wanted to get the barrels back, I could and by buying them and trading them out with him or something. But yeah, there's no.

[C]

You could probably arm wrestle it out.

[A]

Of him or something.

[B]

Yeah. You know, but you know, and like, you know, Zach said, you know, I mean, he's got his Craig Offs and you're, you know, his one Craig off is because his other Craig off he had to give to his dad that. I was there. I, I witnessed it. So yeah, I mean he, he does like Big Daddy's got a free Katie.

[C]

He, he grabs stuff every once in a while, you know, just kind of how shells go missing, guns go missing. You just, you know, it is what it is.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I'm just over here wondering that why the producer of Trap Talk is shooting a Parazi while, while Rick's got, you know, tons of K80s in that safe.

[B]

I really don't have tons. I, I've got mine that are. Yeah, I might break a new one out for the 2026 season. We'll see. I got.

[C]

Nice.

[A]

That'll be, that'll be exciting to see.

[B]

Nice and grave gun. We'll see. I don't know.

[A]

We'll see. Well, Oliver, good question. We appreciate it. We appreciate everybody writing in here. Let's keep it moving here.

[C]

Hey, Trap Talk listeners, we got to take a real quick break and we got to thank Ron Prescott from Mid State Precious Metals for everything they do for the trap shooting community coast to coast for all, all your gold and silver buying needs. And on top of that new announcement, they're a sponsor of the 126 grand American.

[B]

Finally he said it right, folks. Grand American. Yeah, Ron is a great guy. He's a sponsor of the Back Fence Shootout at Nevada State Shoot and Ohio State Shoot. And also we got our gold for our Trap Talk event. At nevada state shoot and the 77th annual Nevada State shoot. They bought all theirs from it. 680 ounces of silver to be exact. Folks, you're missing out if you're not there.

[C]

That's a lot of silver. And honestly, if you're not buying from Ron, you're probably overpaying. So whether you're buying it for your gun clubs or your shoots or for your personal use, you got to give them a try because they're big supporters of the trap shooting nation. So it's awesome. With that being said, let's get back to the show. All right, trap talk listeners, we got to take a quick break and we got to welcome a new sponsor to the show. RGS bore stripper.

[A]

It's a great product.

[C]

Ricky. Tell them how they can find it.

[B]

Go to their website, rgsguncleaner.com you can get the 18 ounce bottle, free shipping, 28 ounce bottle and you get the 2 ounces travel bottle and it's free shipping also. Or just get the little 2oz bottle for travel.

[C]

Yeah, they sent me some of this product and I used it on my craig off choke tubes the other day and it got the plastic out like in a minute and it was super cool and super good. So if you like cleaning your gun, you like eliminating plastic and you like shiny bores, give them a try for sure. Thank you so much for supporting the show.

[B]

Yeah, we'd really like to thank John Weber, the owner, for the support. He's doing an awesome job.

[C]

Yeah, we really want to thank John. We appreciate the support of the show. Anybody that supports trap talk, you guys need to support them and get this stuff because it's awesome.

[B]

And with that, let's get back to the show.

[A]

Next question comes in from a top fan of ours on Facebook. That's Alana Paulson, friend of the show, obviously student of mine. Yep. And her question is, what is the best way to deal with workers who are behind? Okay, let me. Let me do Alana a little bit better than this. Let me, let me read for her a little bit better. Okay. What is the best way to deal with workers who are being distracting, walking alongside the trap line, talking to the scorekeeper on a phone call at the score stand, throwing boxes and clays while shooting is in session, et cetera? I feel your pain, Alana, without being rude, question mark. And now, other supporter of the show, sponsor of the show, Randy freston wrote in a quick response here. I don't know, Alana, have Matt Paulson handle that for you, that is, that is dad, right? Yeah, yeah, obviously, dad handle that for you. Stand, stand on guard. Matt behind Alana. But hey, I just want to shout out to Alana here really quick. We did see them at the Grand American. Obviously they came by the studio. And, and I also, I deal with this too. For some reason I can't hear anything if Tish asked me a question. But if I'm shooting handicap on the 27 yard line, I can hear a pin drop. So I'm very interested to hear how you guys handled this situation. So how should we instruct Alana here on this one, guys?

[B]

Well, I mean, there's two ways to handle it. There's the, the nice, polite way of saying, hey, folks were shooting, you know, get off the phone. Or there's the rich Bullard method with hey, stupid. But, you know, but in all seriousness, honestly, if there's people coming up the score stand, and everybody on my squad, Zach knows this, someone's come to the score stand, anybody in the squad will tell them to leave. But if I'm there or I will stop and I will walk over and say, what do you need? We're trying to shoot. Yeah, most time they're like, well, I'm just talking. You can do that after the event's over or whatnot. I mean, I've talked to management before. Honestly, my opinion of this whole deal is the workers are not trained properly. Right.

[A]

They don't have the situational awareness. Right, Rick? They don't understand what, what's happening. And so they're not doing it from a malicious. It's not standpoint. No, it's, it's more just. They just don't know. Right.

[B]

They don't understand.

[C]

You have to look at it this way. I mean, really, people break this down. You know, these are, these are part time workers coming in for one week doing a shoot. And these are people that are available, which means they don't really have a job that requires them to be there that week.

[B]

Right.

[C]

Like, how many people have that luxury other than, you know, maybe people that are a little bit hard on their luck or retirees or younger people. So, you know, the pool of, of employees that are doing what we're asking them to do isn't necessarily the greatest pool where I would go get talent, first of all. But, but my, my thing, my thing is when I shoot, it's all Murphy's Law. And Murphy's Law is if it can go bad, it will go bad. So whenever, whenever I go out there, I'm not Thinking, oh, this guy popped out of the house, and now my day is ruining. I literally expect. Expect score sheets to go flying. I expect, you know, I expect people to make noise. I expect cars to go off. I expect the house to run out. I expect the trap to break. I expect broken targets everywhere. I expect all of that. And if you expect all of that and you're just cool with it, it won't bother you. But if you go out there and you're the kind of person that's like, oh, my God, the traps out. And now I'm, you know, I'm 80 straight, and I'm. You're done. You're done. So you got to change your attitude on. On what's happening, and. Because it's going to happen. So. So you can only control.

[B]

You.

[C]

You can't control outside forces. You can control how those outside forces affect you and your mentality and how you present yourself, or you can let other people win and get in your head and mess with you. Now, I would be of the group of people that would just say, you know, politely, and I don't think Rick's ever seen me blow up on. On anybody but on the line, but I would say politely. You know, I probably go up to him and say, hey, you know, we're trying to shoot here. Could you please take it behind there? Could you, you know, something along the lines or educate them, pull them off to the side after you're done and just say, hey, this is. This is what we're doing, and this is where we're at, and try to help them and educate them not to embarrass them. I think when you embarrass people, especially in a crowd, they don't respond to that well. They're probably not going to learn, and they're probably not going to do a better job later. And there's probably going to be some resentment. I've seen people piss off a score so much that the score only messed up on their turn every time. And I'm like. And I'm like, I know. Like, I know that that person, like, had a vendetta, and it was like some Italian, old Sicilian stuff where they hide in the bush and they stab you with the knife, right? Like it's. It was.

[B]

That's. That's exact. That's exactly why sometimes shoot with bollard. It's not good.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

No, but Zach's right. And that's why a lot of times, with the score now, people behind us, other shooters. I've had words good and Bad over my shooting career. I'm not going to say I haven't with people because it's like, hey, they. They should know better. And when you turn around and give them the H and they go and think it's funny, my. My instant blood level goes.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Different levels of anger that he can hit at certain periods of time. You don't want to get in his way when he goes there.

[B]

Like vaccine. But with. With the scorekeepers, I will never piss off a scorekeeper. I will always talk to them with the utmost respect because it. It's. That's they're in control and people don't realize that. That's why I always tell the squad, guys, something happens, let me handle it. And I've had people on there that tried to. Zach's done it before, and I've told Zach to stay in his lane a couple times. I'll handle it. The reason why is I. I know the rules to a te. To where let me. Let's just fix this and blah, blah, blah. And then, hey, it's fine. And they're like, oh, thanks. Well, the last guy, he basically told me to pack sand and, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, guess what? That guy is going to remember. Like Zach said, he's going to remember that guy. And it could be the next day, the day after, it could be a year later, and that guy's going to go, I remember him. Loss. And he could do it afterwards. There's nothing you could do because I've actually witnessed it at shoots where, you know, you can change the score in between changes on the post, but once the leadoff shoots, the first shot can't change anymore. And I've seen him at the end of the round, the guy's like, hey, man, I didn't miss that target on the first post. Guy's like, ah, you know, and. And then they caught him into changing it, and it's happened good and bad, where the guy's like, no, I know the rules. I can't change it. And the. The shooters get all pissed off and, you know, so never piss off the scorekeeper. That's the best.

[C]

You don't need to do that. I mean, just. Just no, handle your business the best way you can.

[B]

The other thing is, you know, Alana, is. Your dad's there watching you. Is if there's something going on, is turn around and tell your dad, like, hey, can you. And let your dad go over and say, hey, guys, handle this? Or he could walk up. Well, technically, if it's a Scorer. No one could be on the sidewalk to the shooting line, per the rules. So your best bet is to stop and turn around, say, hey, we're trying to shoot. Can you go away if it's another score? Blah, blah, blah. Or if they're on the phone, be.

[C]

Like, hey, I'm not. I'm not a big fan of the team. Helper proponent. Whether it's a father or coach or whatever. Yes, everyone needs to learn how to do it themselves and handle their own business. Because, you know, all these kids out there, especially these young ones with these AIM programs, you know, you know, something goes wrong, and then all the coaches go to fix it, and the kids don't learn how to fix it. Right. I think. I think you need to. You need to learn, like I had to learn through pain of. Of messing up how to fix things, because.

[B]

Which was a lot.

[C]

One of the most painful. One of the most painful things I ever had happen to me in shooting was I broke. I broke a 199 out of 200 at the silver dollar one time when I was a junior or sub junior. I was gonna win champion for that event. It was the championship singles, and I did not check the score sheet on the last box, and I broke a 199. The score sheet had a zero in one of my things and an X, and there was no initial on it. And when it went into the house, it came back as a 198. I went in there and looked at it, and it, you know, it had an X, but it also had a circle, and there was nothing on it, so there was nothing I could do. Ever since that day, I look and it's my responsibility without feeling that pain. I would have never learned that lesson. And I think that you have to learn painful lessons sometimes in life to grow and to become a better person.

[B]

Well, you look how I do every time we shoot, I take a picture of the score sheet.

[A]

Yeah, you do.

[C]

You do. And that's a good thing because I learned again with Rich Bullard, and you're mean to the scorekeepers. Then they might put some circles on it.

[A]

Rich is fine. Hey, we're not dragging Rich.

[B]

Drag him. I'm going to drag him all next week.

[A]

In about 11 days, we're going to really drag him. So, yeah, we'll have a good time. Yeah. And you know, guys, this is. I think this is really helpful. You know, you guys are competing at a certain level for sure. I'll just say from, you know, the weekend warrior shooter perspective that it is. You Know, it takes you out of your concentration to go and talk and deal with stuff sometimes, but it takes you more out if you're rude, angry or upset or angry. It takes you more out of the game. So I. I try to stay. Like, I just. I saw Mitchell Loveless, his old Sunrise Productions video back in the day on dvd. And he used to say, when I hear people talk about Jaime, I just turn and look. Because I say, oh, you know what? Those are just my buddies. Or, oh, that's just some shooters. Instead of him, this, you know, standing there stewing and, you know, wondering what's going on behind him, he would just address it. And that. That does help. But I can tell you, yes, the. The younger scorekeepers, and then they have their friends come up and they're chatting while they're scorekeeping it. If you like, Zach, like you're saying, if you can expect that stuff's going to happen, you're already ahead of the game.

[C]

Murphy's Law. Just live that way.

[B]

Just.

[A]

Yeah. Well, Alana, great question. Thank you so much. And make sure you remind your dad he's on guard duty back there behind you. All right, so we are moving on. So next question coming in on Facebook comes from Jay Gox. Sorry, Jay, if I messed that up. How do you keep someone who gets frustrated easily to calm down and relax and forget about the last bird without getting them more frustrated?

[B]

Well, you just gotta have patience. I mean, don't. It's experience a little bit. Maturity. You know, all the young kids, it seems like, you know, they chip a target sometimes and they throw a shell, you know? You know, I mean, yes, I've. I've thrown shells in the past and stuff, and all it does is make you look like an idiot, you know, I mean, you just control your nerves. Because if you can control your nerves, guess what? You're going to break more targets.

[C]

Yeah, I think. I think Jay's writing this question as. As a coach or a father or something that.

[A]

Yeah, it seems that way. Yeah.

[C]

And what I would say is, you have to let them get there on their own. Like, the greatest gift that my parents ever did for me when I shot as a young shooter is they got the heck out of my way. They let me experience it and figure it out on my own. And then they surrounded me with mentors like Ricky Marshall, Dave Kelly, Sean, Holly, you know, other people that were doing it at a high level. And if you're a young person and you're a sponge and you're reading into this and you see how these guys act, you start to say, okay, these are my heroes. I'm going to start to act like them. I'm going to start to walk how they walk, talk how they talk, act how they act. And I think, you know, you find good people to look up to in the sport and aspire to be like them. That's a good way of doing it. But, but whenever. If I, if I was ever in a, in a piss poor mood and my dad was like, well, you know, why, I don't think I would have resonated with that. At that age. I think you have to feel that and you have to go through that and all you can do is be supportive and have patience. Like Rick said, have patience. Be supportive, you know. You know, be there if they want to talk about it. But sometimes you don't want to talk about it. You just want to, you know, kind of move on and let it.

[B]

Give them their, their five minutes.

[C]

Yeah. You know, a little calm down doesn't hurt anything.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And use the old line that I was told years ago by, you know, one of my, my father figures, Tom Buxman, AKA Turbo, which. Zach knew Turbo really well too, you know. Yeah. Turbo used to say, you haven't shot your lowest score. I said, damn, this ain't good. I broke a 68 today or something.

[C]

You know, unless you go with a zero, you ain't hit that lowest score yet.

[B]

That's what he used to say. And it was funny and we'd laugh about it, but that, listen, enjoy it. And, and really that. Here's, here's the one thing I, you know, I, I taught the youth group the, the Kansas City Crushers and, you know, some of their kids and their, their high school team and I told them all, have fun, enjoy. This is a, one of the greatest sports that you can do and have fun. It's an expensive sport, so if you get mad, you're just wasting ammo and wasting shells and targets and time. Listen, enjoy it. Have fun.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. And you, you don't want to turn one loss into two and two into three because you're taking yourself out of the zone of trying to, you know, concentrate. I, I think, Zach, what you're saying, I've seen some, you know, as we all have parents dealing with their younger shooters in different ways, right?

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Sometimes you have a parent who is, you know, had some competitive experience.

[B]

Right.

[A]

And they handled a little bit different. The best thing I think that I've ever seen, though, is when that parent or the coach is. They're on the bright side of everything. Right. Their job is just to say positive. Right. Hey, we've got this. Stay in it. Next bird. Don't sweat it. You know, if you start to be like, what happened out there? What are you doing? Get your head in the game. Like, I don't think tough love. I've never seen tough love work on the trap line.

[B]

That.

[A]

That's, I think just be positive as you can be. And they may not respond to it. They may still be in a little bit of that grumpy space. Right. Because, you know, they're dealing with the emotion of it. But I think our job is just to stay positive.

[B]

That is exactly right.

[A]

So, Jay, thank you for the question. Sorry if I butchered your last name there. We are moving on.

[B]

All right, folks, we need to take a quick second and get to a new show sponsor, big red motorsports. Big red, they're personal friends of mine, Jason and george lee, and they're also a personal sponsor of mine.

[C]

Now, I'll say this, Ricky looked great driving around in that side by side. I got some free rides down at tucson, the autumn grand. I think it's awesome that they deliver all across the country. And obviously they love trap shooters. They love trap shooting, and they're doing a great job.

[B]

Listen, they got can am, Kawasaki CF, moto triton trailers. Hit them up. We'll take care of you guys. With that being said, let's get to the show.

[A]

All right, next question coming in from another top fan. Aaron moistur writes in and says, thoughts or experience with Guns International 725 combo. Yay, nay or indifferent.

[C]

Okay, well, it doesn't say Craig, 725 combo.

[B]

So 725 is a Browning. Is what that is.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Guns international is where he wants to.

[B]

Guns international is where is. I'm. I'm gonna say it's the online deal. I've never dealt with guns international. I'm not. I'm not an online buyer of. Of firearms at all.

[A]

I'm saying if you're worried, I would say just. I'm gonna put call me phone number down here. Yeah. I'm gonna put Ricky's phone number at the bottom here. If you're worried about buying from guns international, we don't have much experience here, but just call rick. Right, Zach. I mean, isn't that the easiest thing?

[C]

He'll help you. Here's the thing. For any gun question, I'm just going to give the blanket a response. There's no bad guns. I think it's what works best for you, I think works best for your budget, what you shoot. Well, I think you can go from a $500 gun all the way up to a $50,000 gun, and you can have success if it fits you, if it shoots the right way. You know, at the end of the day, I shot a Browning. I don't think there's any problem with the Browning. I love my Craig Off. I would not shoot any other gun if I had the choice, and I feel that strongly about it. But I don't think people need to get in their head if they don't have this gun or they don't have that gun, they can't compete because step one is gun fit and, you know, a competitive attitude and then just working on the game. And if you do that, you do those things, you'll be surprised how much. How much stuff you could win with, you know, whatever gun you end up shooting. Right. I mean, and then from there, you can get into the finer nuances of what we need and how it works.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

Yeah, good point, good point. I mean, listen, we know we could run down the list of top shooters who have shot Brownings or are shooting Browning. So, you know, you know, it's whatever gun is going to work for you, like Zach saying, all right, we're going to keep it moving. Thanks for the question, Aaron. We appreciate it. The listener extravaganza coming in live from Facebook continues. The next question coming in. We're staying with guns here for a second. Looks like. So Jim Wimmer writes in on Facebook and says first year trap shooter using a BT99. Plus, a lot of top shooters use a unsingle. So I shouldered one and the view looks more open. Makes sense. I like the view, but never shot one. Heard a few guys say, oh, I can't shoot one of those things. Could you explain why you guys shoot an un single over a top single or maybe even a mid single, like a K8 6 special thanks. That's coming in from Jim, guys.

[B]

So, Jim, the unsingle, it gets you more eye awareness, you know, so your. Your eye sits. Even though I look see a figure eight, you don't have the barrel right there, so you have just the. The rib so you can see around it. It's. There's a lot more open vision with a unsingle versus a top single. But it's everybody's preference. I started with a top signal. I shot one from 1988 for about six months, and then 37 and a half years, I've shot an Unsingle. So I like the unsingle better. I think you acquire the target quicker in my opinion.

[C]

So yeah, I mean to echo what Rick's saying, it's just a visibility thing. It's a visibility and a preference thing. Unsingles are going to give you more awareness of the target because you have the barrel pushed out of your eyes. I would say that's an advantage. The disadvantage to the unsingle is the barrels really far away from your eyes. So you don't have a unit to make a shot if you shoot off the barrel. And also if you were to cant the gun excessively and you had a high point of impact un single. Well, there's people that have shot 60, 40 or 70, 30 top single guns with flat ribs and they've shot them really, really, really well. Then they go to an unsingle that they can't the crap out of and maybe they've got it shoot 80, 20, 90, 10, 100% high. Well, if you can't that unsingle, it's like a pendulum, right? It's going to go out of whack. That thing could be shooting to the left or to the right based on that cant. And that could cause you to not be able to shoot it. Well, along with, with those single barrels. I know some old time shooters that shoot off the end of the barrel and they use that reference point of that barrel, like a Model 12 shooter, to break the targets. And you know, not that it's right, wrong or indifferent. I mean we're not gonna get into that. But there's people that actually physically use the barrel as a, as a. Okay, I block the target out and I shoot it. Especially when we're dealing with really, really flat guns. Older guns, 870s and model 12s and things like that. Yeah, I shot a model 12 the other day just to try it. And the way that I had to shoot the gun because it was so flat as I basically had to, you know, take that barrel and drive it through that target. And when I drove it through and pulled the trigger, it was a big old black cloud. I didn't have the same visibility as I have on an 8020 Craig off with a high rib where I can see that target all the way through the shot. I physically had to cut through the bird with that Model 12 and almost lose sight of the bird as I'm shooting it. But that's, you know, that's the style of shooting. I mean it can work for you for sure.

[A]

Cool. All right, so we're going with mainly visibility, right guys? I mean that's a big advantage. That's my angle. Yeah, yeah, I love it. Okay, great. Jim, thank you so much for sending the questions in. Guys. We're going to keep jamming here. We've got a lot of questions to get through. All right, Connor Brooks writes in short and sweet here, guys. Seven and a half or eights for handicap go.

[B]

Depends on the yardage. Connor, what's your yardage?

[A]

Yeah, what? Yeah, Connor, what's your yardage?

[B]

I mean, so I will say personally, and this is just my opinion, I shoot seven halves with 27 everywhere. Now a long time shooter and, and one of the top handicap shooters, Lee Castle out of Colorado and Lee was a friend of mine. Lee broke 100 straights from the 27. One Eyed Shooter also. But Lee shot super handicap eights all the time. So. And it also matters to, I think at that distance from the 27 on your time of year. So. Okay, winter time for sure. Eights now there you could shoot or seven halves, you could shoot eights in, in humid or southern areas, I think. But I like the seven halves. But I personally, I would shoot eight shot all the way back to like the 23.

[A]

Okay, so. So 19 to 23. Eight eights are fine. After you get into that 24 and back you're saying seven and a half. Just, you know, better, better shot for that yardage.

[C]

Yeah, and I agree. I think there's places in the country where you could shoot eights. If you go to Vernal or Spanish Fort in the summertime, you got that thin air. I mean you could shoot eights all day long. You know, there's clubs in California. Eights are going to work fine.

[A]

I just zero humidity out here.

[C]

Coast to coast. I don't want to worry about it. I don't want to think about it. One less thing, you know, kind of like the Forrest Gump. It's one less thing to think about. Shoot the seven and a half from the fence and you'll never regret it. That's right. You know, other otherwise if you want to change it based on the season or based on the humidity or the, the background, well then there's a couple applications where I could, you know, I'll say I'll shoot eights but. But then I'm. Then I've got another skew of shells. Then I've got eights over here, seven halfs over here. I'm packing these, packing those. Let's just not make it so complicated. Just give me the damn. Seven and a half.

[B]

I use two SKUs.

[C]

Two SKUs. I'm just like Rick, two SKUs. I got a light eight shell and I got a handicap seven and a half. Keep it simple. The KISS method. Keep it simple.

[B]

Stupid.

[C]

That's. That's what I do. And just move forward.

[A]

Perfect. I love it. Yeah. Yeah. Getting it down to two types of ammo. Simplify your life, you know. Now I think since we're on the subject because people are always asking who maybe don't know but. And I'll just give everybody a recap. Rick is shooting his, you know, his light eights for singles and first shot of doubles and he sued his handicap load for obviously handicap and his second shot of doubles. Whereas Zach is shooting his lights for singles and his lights for both shots of dubs and he puts one box on the ground for doubles. But that's a whole nother episode. And then for his handicap, he's shooting a nitro 27. Seven and a half.

[B]

All right.

[A]

But Connor, thank you for the question. We appreciate you jumping on there and putting that in. Good discussion here. All right. John Turner just wanted to write in really quick and say enjoy the information. Keep it going. Thank you, John.

[B]

Thanks.

[A]

Definitely. We appreciate that. Now Aaron has not only come in here with a twofer. I'm seeing Aaron. I'm seeing a couple comments from Aaron on here. So top fan. This is it looks like he's got.

[C]

About three cheating right here. He's coming in getting two, three.

[A]

It's a rare three for.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But Aaron does ask a really good question. When you come into Indiana to give lessons that. So we're going to allow that one to come.

[B]

Look, I'm looking, looking at it added on here too. Aaron. I will. My plan is to try to get out there. I. It'd be really hard, I think to get out already this year. Possibly. I don't know. I did teach some private lessons at Kingan and you know, Gooch invited us to come out. They have a big added money Calcutta shoot coming up and of course it's during Vegas so we can't make it, you know, the weekend prior which we're going to be traveling or already be there. But I'm gonna get a hold of the. The King and Gun club. It was a great little club. I. I did the lessons at and I think it'd be a perfect spot, centrally located. I'll be doing some lessons there and I also do lessons yearly down at Indian Creek in Georgetown. So that's Jason and Wanda Seitz own that club. You know, father or, excuse me, mother and son, and everybody knows Jason, so. But yeah, I'll be doing it, probably two spots, and we'll. We'll get it out there on the podcast. So I appreciate the. The shout out and the question.

[A]

Good question, for sure. I want to say Connor might have written in here and answered.

[B]

I know something dinged. I heard it.

[A]

Yeah, I heard a ding come in. Let's see here. We do have a reply. Connor did reply, and he said, I just started shooting ATA, so I am at the 19, but if I make it back to the 25, to the 27, what do you prefer? Good news, Connor, we already answered your question.

[B]

That's right, we did go.

[A]

Yeah. Thank you for writing in, just for responding.

[B]

But, Connor, listen, you're on the 19. Shoot light eight. That's all you need. That's all you need. You'll. You'll break 100 straight from the 19 shooting light eights. No problem.

[A]

Yep, Light aids, for sure. Yeah. Okay, so. And listen, Aaron, we're gonna. We're gonna allow this again because you're a great question about when is Rick coming to Indiana? Okay, Aaron's got one more for us, guys.

[C]

All right, Trap Dock listeners, we got to take a real quick break. And I've got something that I'm so excited to announce. Trap Shooting USA has now become the official magazine of the Trap Talk podcast.

[B]

No, it's not only Traction usa, now it's Winging Clay Life, Lady Outdoor Lifestyles, and Clay Shooting usa.

[C]

I'm just really excited because they make such a high quality magazine. I mean, if you guys haven't had these magazines and you actually get to touch them in your hands, they've got really thick paper, they're really glossy, and they keep it really cool. I mean, I just love it.

[B]

The traveling gunsmith. And then in this newest episode, we have.

[C]

Oh, man, look at those. Look at those handsome guys.

[A]

I love this.

[C]

I love it.

[B]

I love it.

[C]

All right, folks, we got to take a real quick break and acknowledge the official target of the ATA White Flyer. They've been sponsoring us since the beginning, and they make a great target. What do you think, Rick?

[B]

It's the best target in the ata. Shout out to everybody there. All the reps, you know, Bill Daniels, Josh Taylor, Nick Arnold, Robert Crow, everything they do for the sport and all the shoots. Really appreciate it.

[C]

They're always there. They're always trying to make a better target, and they're always supporting the game that we love so much. With that being Said. Said.

[B]

Let's get back to the show.

[C]

All right, Trap talk listeners, let's take a couple seconds and thank a couple more sponsors. First of all, Remington's been with us since day one. I've been shooting these shells since 2007. I shoot the Nitro 27 from 27 yard line, ounce and eight, seven and a half and STS, ounce and eighth eights for singles and doubles. They've worked great for me as they do a lot of top shooters all around the country. Give them a try. Don't forget the gun club line when you're practicing and you're wanting to save a little bit of money.

[B]

We'd also like to thank another sponsor, Outlaw engineering. Randy Freston, R2. I've known Randy since 1988. They do engineering, survey and drafting, GIS, civil structural land development, wetland permitting. They do.

[C]

And they're friends of trap shooters. I mean, they're trap shooting family. They've been in the ATA forever.

[B]

They.

[C]

His dad's been involved. They're involved. They're beautiful family. They're great people. And we just love that they listen to the show and we love that they support trap talk.

[B]

Yeah, his dad was past president 1989. So I really want to thank those guys for the support. It. Really appreciate it here at trap.

[C]

With that being said, let's get back to the show.

[A]

If you had to listen to the same. Same song on repeat while shooting, what would your song of choice be? Need some new material now? Maybe we should start off with. What does Pat Lamont use as his song? I mean, that's always a crowd favorite.

[B]

Zach. What's Zach?

[A]

You're the only one who remembers.

[C]

It's Kesha. It's Cool kids or. Yeah, I think it's. It's.

[A]

I think it is.

[C]

I think it is Cash Cool Kids by Kesha. But. Yeah, but check it out. Honestly, I know me and Rick don't listen to music, so I know we're gonna have a very similar response.

[B]

I used. I used to listen to music and, you know, back in the day, I mean, you know, I listen to everything from what I.

[C]

What I would do, what I would do if. When I listened to music. And what I found worked well was, first of all, if you were going to listen to one song on repeat, find a song with really good breaks to it, which means short stop in and start, short stop out. So, like, if a song has like a slow intro of 30 seconds and then a slow outro of 30 seconds, well, then you're not hearing it.

[B]

Right.

[C]

So, like, I wanted something that, like, started. The music started right at 1 second and then at 1 in. At 2 minutes and 30 seconds. If it started again, it was just back in the same song. Because sometimes if you were on that song and you were going to mount the gun, and then it was, like, changing from the same song to the same song. There was like a dead silence for 10 or 15 seconds. And I even took it to the point where I edited my songs so that I could have it to where it was just always basically on the loop or the track or the hook.

[B]

If you was at your. So was that on your Sony Walkman?

[C]

Yeah, yeah. I used to. I used to carry. Carry around an eight track.

[B]

Right.

[C]

So there's like, one word of advice, and then the next, I would say, is tailor your music selection for what you're shooting. When I was shooting singles, I was listening to Nirvana, like, kind of this slow monotone, like, zone me out. Like, you know, Seattle Deadhead kind of, you know, music. And then when I'm listening to.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

When I'm going into shooting handicap, I was, like, shooting, you know, Judas Priest or, like, something with a little bit more pop to it because I wanted to wake up and I wanted to really attack. So I think music controls your mood. And if you're shooting singles, you probably don't want to be all revved up. When you're shooting single, be a little.

[B]

Bit more like, don't be listening kid. Don't be listening any kid. Rock shoes. Yeah, yeah.

[C]

You don't want bottom bang to Dang Diddy Diddy when you're out on the 16 yard line. I mean, save that for the 27 and. And, you know, and stay aggressive as far as specific songs. Just whatever you like, you know, whatever.

[A]

Yeah, well, Aaron, thank you for the question. That's good. We know, like, for example, I think Matt Bartholow listens to music, and he would always say, I listen to the hardest, fastest, you know, stuff that I can listen to. So he likes that, though. Yeah, whatever. Whatever is going to work for you. And yeah, Aaron, thank you for all the questions that you sent in.

[C]

We really.

[B]

Yes, you did. Thanks, Aaron.

[A]

Yeah, that was really good. All right, moving on here, guys. I'm gonna scroll down here past Connor.

[C]

All right, You. You missed one.

[A]

No, no, I. It resorted because I refreshed it.

[B]

We're good. Yeah.

[C]

All right.

[A]

So Kurt Grilling writes in and says, could you explain the added monies, the Lewis and the Skins game that get played? I'm not familiar with the skins. I think that lots of people don't really understand how they work. Aaron, I'm going to second what you're saying here. I know a lot of people are playing the Lewis. Not everybody understands it. They don't understand the Great Eastern. You know, they just understand a lot of these kind of, you know, added money things that they, that they're participating, these options that they're playing. So do you guys know what the skin game is though? That one I'm not familiar with.

[B]

No, I've not heard that. It could be Adam or something.

[C]

Yeah, I've never heard Skins. Maybe that's a state where they call it something and it could be a Ford purse or something like that. Yeah, you know, that type of situation.

[B]

Which they don't even do Ford purchase anymore. Anymore.

[C]

Yeah, I, I haven't seen a Ford person forever. I think they did have it up at Michigan State shoot this year. They had a, they had a Ford and they had a 50s, but it wasn't a, it wasn't a perfect 50s. It was like a modified 50s where if you broke the first one and the last one or something like that. But as far as added money goes, every single shoot has a different way of giving out their added money. There's no rhyme or reason to it. They could decide like at Nevada they're giving all the money to the handicap winner on Sunday in silver or you know, or whatever it might be. That's up to the.

[A]

Exactly. But we, we definitely have a lot of options here that now run at Nevada.

[B]

John, are you doing out of money for in state only?

[A]

No, that's not how we're doing it. So we just have. This year what's happening is we have this thing called a Nevada purse that the Nevada hall of Fame and the NSTA put together. And that is the only thing at the Nevada State shoot that's just for Nevada. It's a 1500 purse that's going to go to the category winners basically of hoa. So. Yeah. And that. And that's just. This is the first time we're doing it. We wanted to do just a little purse, you know, just for them. So the hall of Fame kind of stepped up and, and put that together with us. Other than that though, like, so did everything else we have.

[B]

Did my state change then? So I'm in Nevada resident now. I'm just kidding.

[A]

I mean, listen, I'm ready. I know you can use my address. I'm ready.

[B]

That's crap. No. So let. And, but you know, getting back To. To the question that Kurt has. So, Adam, money is always given out and it's divided up. However, I mean, that's just whatever that. That doesn't cost you anything. Now, the options as far as Lewis, your 50s, your 25s, your Great Eastern, your yardage purse, or your jackpot purse, meaning jackpot is usually a 50, 30, 20, or 40, 30, 20, 10 purse. And it's ties divide. I'm not a big advocate of purses that are even high gun. Even with my shooting ability. I just believe that, you know, you're throwing in the money. You know, that's just me. That's my opinion. But so you take like the great Eastern purse, which I think is one of the best purses out there, and it's usually between Vegas.

[A]

We call it the Great Western Vegas.

[B]

And how much is it out there? It's 25.

[A]

We're gonna do 25, 15, 10, 25.

[B]

No, no, how much?

[A]

And 30 bucks. We're gonna do a $30 on it.

[B]

So the purse is always the same way. And it's a six place purse. So it pays out 25 to first, 15 to second, 10 to third, 25 to fourth, 15 to fifth, and 10 to sixth. So breaking that down, it could be 100, gets 25, and then your second's 99, 98, 97, 96, 95. So I've been on the end of breaking a 97 and been the lone.

[C]

Seven, and then the.

[B]

And actually made more money than the champion, which. And it is. It's a great purse. Now, that purse was originally originated in the Great Eastern Gun Club in Ohio.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Which was owned by the late, great Aiden Kaufman. So that's a great person.

[A]

We wanted to do it this year in Vegas because it. Well, honestly, I saw how profitable it was for everybody in the back Fence shootout. I mean, yes, it was.

[B]

Yeah. Because that's one of our. Our big.

[C]

It's a great option. I think if there's any option that's on every single handicap in the country, it should be the great Eastern, Great western style. Because really it's saying, okay, I can hit the top four, our top six, where with a jackpot, usually it's top three or top four. And some people don't necessarily think that they can get to the top three or the top four, but when you start saying, okay, top six, yeah, I could get into the top six, I mean, that's. That's a reasonable ask. And yeah, and it generally pays out pretty good for what you're laying. I mean, you lay in 30 bucks and you know, you're getting, you're getting something in addition to that. But so one thing I want to piggyback on that we skipped over with the added money. I think in his question he was asking what about added money to options? And so like if you have a Lewis class and you have money added to it, like example at the Missouri State shoot this year, they had added money to the high overall Lewis. They had an extra $2,000 in there. All that means for your understanding, that you have to play the option to get on, on the pot. But the pots already been seeded with $2,000, so.

[A]

Right.

[C]

Everybody puts in their 20 on top and that gets added to the 2,000, right. So you have to play to get in it, but it already has a little sweetener. So whenever there's added money in a Lewis, I play it. I mean, I play the Lewis every time anyway. But if there's ever. If you're like on the borderline, do I play the Lewis or not play the Lewis? You go to a club where they add money to the Lewis, example, Tucson, the Martin Lewis, things like that. Yeah, you need to play it. You need. You. There's no, there's no question, because return on investment, you're laying $20 into something that already has been seeded with a jackpot. It's like going to casinos and paying the extra dollar on the progressive. Like you, you'd be dumb not to play the progressive. You have to put.

[A]

Yeah, you're getting, you're getting an overlay on your money. Yeah, that's really good. So great question for sure. And I, and I agree with what Kurt's saying here. Some people just don't understand, like, what are the mechanics, right. Of how this works? So, Rick, with you laying out the Great Eastern, but that's going to be, you know, a lot of the same for your classic Lewis also. It's just how many payment groups are there? Right. Like, you know. Yes, you know, so we're doing four payment groups for our Lewis, right? And we're doing it 60, 40. It's not high gun, right? So it's basically 60, 40 with four payment groups. And so four places are going to have a chance, you know, at some of this Lewis money.

[C]

Eight scores, actually. Eight scores.

[A]

Oh, eight scores. Yeah.

[C]

So the way, the way this system is set up, if you've got a 100% Louis payout, if you have 100 people and it's four splits, that means they're going to take that number, they're going to divide it by four, it's 25. So if the 100 is the top score, they're going to go down 25 people. And it's not necessarily scores, it's people because there could be multiple people with the same score. And then wherever that goes down the list, that's the next hit. So four splits means they divide it by four and there's your four splits, three splits means they divide it by three and there's your three splits on however many people there are. 60, 40 means it's two scores bunch. So 199 and then it goes down and then 94, 93 and then it goes down and 88, 87 and then it goes down. So I think numbers will.

[A]

A lot of people's biggest question, Zach, is okay, if, if the score is 97 for the handicap, what's the next jump down? Is it always 25 down?

[C]

Well, it's, it's, it's depending on how many entries you have.

[B]

It depends on the entries. So you don't, you never know what it's actually gonna be.

[A]

Okay.

[C]

Don't, you can't. But like in yours I could estimate. So like for you, that Lewis split right there, it's four payment groups. So if 100 people go in, we know that you're going to have 25 people movements on each of those splits. Now where those scores lie, if you're looking at it and you're at Spanish Fort and there's a crap ton of 99s and 98s, well then the next split might be 96 or 95. Because if you've got all your top scores in that first 25 numbers, I've seen 60, 40 splits where it goes 199, 98, 97 in the first two Lewis's because there was that many hundreds, 99s, 98s and 97s that they took up half of the scores that were in the Lewis, if that makes sense.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Well, and, and just so you know, most Lewis's usually are one money correct.

[C]

Most. But I do see, I do see some gun clubs going to the 6040 because they're trying to spread the love out. And when they are doing a 60 40, Lewis, they're doing a $25 one like this. All of the hundred percent Lewis's that I've seen are $10 or $20. I don't see a lot of $25. 100%.

[A]

Yeah. So we, you know, there's a big theme here in Vegas where as you guys know, a Lot of people play the options. We end up with some pretty big, you know, purses here.

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

All the options. A lot of play here. And the board has always been really big on saying, hey, can we spread it a little bit?

[C]

Spread the wealth?

[A]

Yeah. The price is 25, but it's a 6044 with four payment groups.

[C]

So I think it's.

[A]

But yeah. Hey, Kurt, that was a great question. Really appreciate you writing in. All right, we're moving on here.

[C]

Hey, Trop Talk listeners, let's take a quick second to thank a couple more amazing sponsors. Sos, Clay Shoot Management. They're doing a fantastic job. I love the app. I love being able to see everything on my phone instantaneously. It's freaking awesome. Rick, what do you think?

[B]

Yeah, Greg Pink and his group over there. I mean, they've got majority of the satellite grands. Majority. The state shoots. I think it's 40 plus state shoots they're doing. But the app, honestly, we were doing a little beta testing with that at the spring grand. It's awesome. You can see your squad if they paid. You know, you can see your options, your payouts, the whole works at your fingertips. Great deal. They're just.

[C]

Ricky, how much money he made before even got off the line, he was like, hey, I'm buying lunch. I'm like, yeah, good job. We're good to go. We also got gun and trophy insurance. I mean, they're the best in the business. I know. They're. They're great price. Ricky, you're familiar with them, right?

[B]

Yeah. Cole, Larry Cushman. Been longtime supporters of myself and. And I've been a supporter of them. And, you know, especially with my college team, you know, we require insurance. It's so fast and easy to sign up and get your insurance. In literally 10 minutes, you can have your guns insured. And. And they're just great. They're great to deal with. Like I said, you can do your trophies also, you know, your. Your wildlife, animals and that such, and your guns. It's just a great.

[C]

It's always good when you're traveling around to have that peace of mind and know that you don't have to worry about losing your stuff forever. And these are expensive things, especially when you got those Craig Offs. You got to keep them in your.

[B]

Sure.

[C]

So with that being said, let's get.

[B]

Back to the show.

[A]

Let's go down to Andy Podnar, and Andy says, when I put tape over my left eye, it makes my entire vision cloudy and difficult to see. It seems better Blacked out or closed? Have you ever seen this before? Recommendations? Shout out to the shot tracker for showing me how bad I lean on my left eye on the days I struggle. The data is obvious. I think he put date, but I think he meant to say the data is obvious. I have to go to one eye. It appears. Thanks, Andy. Good question. There's a lot of us out there who shoot one eye, so we'll let the guys weigh in on this one for sure.

[B]

Well, I don't shoot taped, and I've tried it, and it, you know, I. It makes that vision where my left eye, because I use both eyes, but I'm right. I dominant. But it makes my left eye really want to, like, look at the tape, so to speak.

[A]

Yeah, that's what's happening to him. He's looking at the tape. Yeah.

[B]

Like Tyler. He does it because he likes that. Almost like tunnel vision.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And so it's. It's all preference. I mean, the best thing to do instead of putting the tape on, in my opinion, and I don't have any in the office here sitting by me. I think, actually they're in my. In my fifth wheel is use the dot or the. The best thing, in my opinion, is the. The ones that have all the lines.

[C]

The graph Shooter's helper.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that really. Because you. You start with one that's really blacked out, and then you adjust and adjust and adjust. And I think that is kind of.

[C]

The way to go.

[A]

I think, Rick, I think you're right on the. On his comment about the blurriness, though, because Tish, she shoots a dot now, but when she first started, she used scotch tape. Right. And she would say, like, oh, I'm looking at the Scotch tape. When she switched to electrical tape, though, like, black tape, Black tape, that actually went. Yeah, that went away. But her goal was to get down to the dot so she could still have that peripheral. And so now it's not a thing. But I think maybe he is just looking at that tape, huh, Zach?

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

I mean, the problem is, is if you go to the tape and then you look at the tape, it defeats the purpose.

[B]

You're like, oh, I got to read the tape. Right.

[C]

So. So, like, the reality. And obviously, we all have a hard time controlling what our eyes do, and it becomes harder as you get older, I'm sure.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

I mean, I don't have a problem with my eyes now at 34, but they were a lot better 15 years ago than they are now. And I'm like, I can Only imagine how bad it's going to get. But what, what I will say is people that put that tape on, it's there to like, stop your eye from looking, not for you to pay attention to it. If you look through and you just look at the target, that blurriness will go away. I would say he's probably keeping his eyes much too close to the tape and he's paying way too much attention to the tape because it's there and it's causing him a visual distraction and that's what makes everything blurry. Instead of looking with his right eye and looking out past the gun, he should be pushing that right eye out past the gun where the trap house is in relationship to where the targets are coming out.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Agreed.

[B]

Back.

[A]

Yep. Great question. Hey, guys, small update. Alana wrote back into Randy Freston's comment about having Matt be the guard.

[B]

Oh, yeah, I saw it.

[A]

And she said, oh, he does. I believe it too. I believe it. If you know Matt, you would believe it. All right, so thank you, Facebook for those great questions. And we have a couple more questions, guys, for people who wrote in to our ask us traptalkpodcast.com Again, if you have questions, please feel free to email them to us. I think this is going really well. So in the future we'll do more of these Facebook generated ones. I think this was really fun.

[C]

We missed Josh Vanderpecken's question or whatever.

[A]

How you say Zach. Zach is right. I'm gonna go with Josh Vons Prekin.

[C]

I can't see it.

[A]

So. Yeah, yeah. But that was a good try. So false alarm. We're gonna stay on Facebook. One more question here. What is the most important thing to teach a new youth shooter? I'm actually, I'm glad you did this because this Josh was the first person actually to write in on. Yeah. So, Josh, you have Zach to thank for this one. What is the most important thing to teach a new youth shooter? Good question.

[B]

Gun safety number one.

[A]

Yeah, I like that.

[B]

And number two, gun fit. That's it.

[A]

Okay.

[C]

Yeah. I think, I think brand new youth shooter, if once they're safe, safety number one. I think fun. I think fun. I think fun before fit. And, and the reason why I say fun before fit is because if they're having fun, they're going to learn.

[B]

Right?

[C]

They're going to, they're going to figure it out. Like, are they enjoying it now? Do I want them going out there with something that's completely off? No, but I've had.

[B]

That's why you make sure the gun fit.

[C]

Correct. But, but if you get like a six year old or a seven year old that's going well, you're not going.

[B]

To teach a six year old.

[C]

I have and I've seen them go.

[A]

Out and it's all students, they quit.

[B]

Six years old.

[C]

So what I'll say is I've. I've had a couple kids that were really, really young that the gun did not fit them. And it was hard to make it fit with either the budget of the family or what it was. It was just, you know, an H and R, break open 410, throw a shell in there, you know, whatever. And I think for that situation, you know, this is a, this is a very beginner situation, right. Get him to break a couple targets, set the target on a straightaway, get them a little bit closer to the house, take them to a skeet field and put them on a station 7. Throw a target that they can hit at some level and get them breaking it and feeling comfortable breaking it. And then all of those other things, fundamentals, gun fit, all that stuff. Obviously very, very important. As they get older, it becomes more and more and more important. But, but I think the newest shooter, youngest shooter, safety and fun. And Ricky always told me that you gotta have fun.

[B]

Well, you do have to have fun. But I think the gun needs to fit for them to have fun. So that's just my opinion.

[A]

Well, yeah, because if it's slapping you up in the face, it's not gonna fuck too much fun. Well, hey, thanks again to Facebook, guys. We're gonna jump over to our email questions really quick. First one is coming in from Leni Mayfield and they write in. Hello, guys, nice meeting you at the Grand American this year. And thanks for having the barbecue on Tuesday. Listener appreciation party at the Grand American. If you weren't there, we missed you. It was a ton of fun. Come next year.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

My question is about chokes. I shoot a Kragoff KX6 special for singles and handicap using Krakov chokes. Do you guys like the Craigoff chokes or do you use aftermarket chokes in your guns? Thanks for your time, Lenny.

[B]

I love the Kragoff chokes.

[A]

Craig off chokes for Rick.

[B]

Yeah, the Titaniums. You know, I have played around with other chokes. I think all of them are, are good. I love the Briley products. You know, Bradley makes great chokes for every manufacturer out there alone. But yeah, I just always shot what, you know, you can buy off the shelf. And other than the, you know, custom stock.

[C]

So, yeah, I, I echo what Rick's saying here. I think the titanium chokes that come with the Craig off are great chokes. I think, you know, you, you, you put in what you like and go forward. I have used the Briley stuff in the past. Really like it. I've also shot guns that were Wilkinson done and thought that those chokes were fantastic. I know, you know, our friend is, is in that business now and taking that over and, and I'm interested and curious to maybe see, you know, different patterns with, you know, that type of performance enhanced chokes or hone chokes. You know, these are things that I'm interested in learning more about because I just haven't dealt with them a lot. So I don't want to say, okay, we're subject matter experts when we just, you know, I've just put in that, that choke tube from Craig off and used it and it's worked fine. You know, my, my super skeet choke seems to break them. Okay. I mean, you know, as, as Ricky would say, right. He's got that nice full in there and I'm just kind of chipping away, you know, at those singles. But I don't, I don't see an issue with it. Is there better? Maybe that's a question for the future.

[A]

Okay. Yeah. And I think you're referencing Robert height, right? And shotgun works, right.

[B]

Which we're gonna have Robert on, on.

[A]

The show here working to get Robert.

[C]

I really want to hear his perspective. So, like, I think that show for me is going to be a learning of, you know, what is he doing? Why does it work? What did he learn from Tom Wilkinson? Yeah, you know what, what is that carryover and what's he doing with that business now? Because if there's something that you can get one more target out of a thousand with, I think it's worth it. I mean, and that's something that I always felt, you know, if you can get one bird, then why wouldn't we do it, right? If it's anything, whether it's a custom stock or a premium shell or a better choke tube or better glasses or whatever it might be this whole game, if you look at the end of the grand on the thousand birds, it's one or two or three birds between the top guy and the second guy every time. So if I can get one bird, I'm, I'm all in on that.

[A]

So, Rick, you have had Wilkinson Barrels in the past, like you've mentioned.

[B]

Yes, I have.

[A]

Right. And so you're kind of familiar with that process and honing it. And I think you've even said before, you know, Wilkinson would come through and you know, set it up in a certain way.

[B]

Right. Based on what you want, your point impact. Yeah. How you wanted it. Yeah. In the barrel.

[A]

And I think, I think it'll be, it really be great to hear from Robert because I think a lot of people have heard about this process and, and they, they've heard. Oh, so. And so was shooting Wilkinson barrels and oh yeah, he, he set the point of impact for him. I think it's just going to be a great episode. So I hope we can get Robert to take a minute and come over. He's been super busy, so. But hey, that's a great question, Lenny. We really appreciate it. And Zach, what chokes are you running right now for singles?

[C]

You know, I actually just took out my full choke for the first time in my whole career at the Heartland Ground and I put an improved modified in.

[A]

And why is he lying to us? We know this.

[B]

He used to shoot other ones. Don't. Don't lie. He used to shoot them red chokes.

[C]

You know, but I didn't know those. I didn't know. I, I did try those and, and they worked fine enough, but it was a full. So it was never a different. I mean it was a full choke.

[A]

All right.

[C]

But there was.

[B]

Are you sure? Throw that through like a freaking. I see. Improved skeet.

[C]

Hey, it was working, baby. That's all I could say.

[B]

But.

[A]

All right, Lenny. Yeah, Lenny, thank you for the question. Great question. All right, next one up is coming in from Mitch from LA Canada, California. And Mitch writes in and says, hello, Trap Talk podcast. I have a listener question regarding barrel length. I am a 5 foot 7, 150 pound male with short arms, so I've always shot 30 inch over unders and 28 inch autos. I'm looking to get more serious or. Excuse me, I'm looking to get a more serious gun, but I'm just not sure if I should step up to 32 inch over unders that are in vogue. Oh, okay. The folks at my local clay sports store, however, say my reduced 13 and 78 length of pull would not be proportioned well against a 32 inch barrel. Should I stick with the 30s or should I move to the 32s? Thank you for all the detail there, Mitch. We appreciate it. We need it.

[B]

I shoot 30s and I'm 6 foot 2 and you know, 280, 290. Now whatever I am, I haven't so I, it's, it's all preference. Now as far as if with the 13 and 78 length of pole, I shoot a 16 inch length of all. But here's the thing. If you're shooting, if you want to try a 32, go try a 32. It's going to move different because it's going to be a little more barrel heavy with the shorter stock. The way to correct that is to add a little bit of weight in that stock to counterbalance it.

[A]

So that's my keep the balance of the gun. If he goes to 32, he maybe he puts a little more weight in the back to keep it more balanced for him on the swing. Is that what you're thinking?

[C]

Between the hands? In between the hands. So what's going to happen is with that short stock, what they're referring to is it might be a little heavy on the front in proportion. Right. Because there's less wood on the back. So your point of center balance on that is going to be moved forward.

[B]

Past it's going to be about the middle.

[C]

Middle of the forearm.

[B]

Of the forearm to the end of the forearm. Depending on what. Well and it depends on what gun he's with.

[C]

The gun. Yeah. And I was just going to echo that is right is a 32 inch Perazzi and a 32 inch Craighoff barrel move differently and way different.

[A]

Way different.

[C]

So. So like we're talking about barrel length. You could find, he could probably find a 32 or 34 barrel that he loves or he could find a 28 inch barrel that's heavy and doggy. That doesn't work well for him. So I think it has less to do with barrel length. It has more to do with balancing the gun and what works well in his hands and what he moves well and also his type of move. Right. But to, to say that he needs a longer barrel to break more target. I don't think that's right either. I think, I think he could break them with the 30s, no problem. So, you know, how do you swing them? We got to get down to how are you swinging it? Are you swinging it and you're slow and behind are you swinging and you're too fast.

[B]

The brand of the gun is what we need to know everything.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

I mean everything.

[A]

So we might need some follow up.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Some follow up information here from Mitch. But I think he wanted to put in that, you know, hey, I'm, I'm, I'm 5 foot 750.

[B]

So he's a smaller statured Guy, which is fine. Nope. I mean, that, that's got, I mean, no issue to it. It's all about, okay, what's he shooting for a gun or what's he wanting to get, what's he looking at and going from there.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Versus just saying, okay, this doesn't work. Or the guy at the gun store said, it's good. Not.

[C]

Here's the question I would ask yourself. When you, when you go back and you, you shoot with the gun you have now, it's Dave, right?

[A]

No, this is Mitch.

[B]

Mitch.

[C]

Mitch. When you go shoot your gun the way it is now, start to analyze. Do you feel like you're whipping past everything or do you feel like you're slow and sluggish? If you're slow and sluggish, I don't think more barrel is going to help you.

[A]

Right.

[C]

It's a different brand. If you're staying in the same brand and you're already slow and sluggish, don't add more length in the same brand. Now, if you change brands, that might be a whole nother discussion. But if you feel like you're whipping past everything in your brand, well, then you could maybe add a couple inches and it's not going to hurt you. But it's all based on your swing. Just like golf clubs. Everybody swings different golf clubs because they're different sized people. I mean, that's right. It's different.

[A]

Right? Yeah. Now, for asking for a friend, if they are shooting a parazzi, for example, and feel like they are whipping past some of the birds. What, what's the advice there?

[B]

I would, I would add a little bit of weight, John, for you, I would take some, some, you know, tape weights off that you can get at.

[C]

The golf store, the front of the gun.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And, and literally put them in between the barrel and the rib inside the fore end.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Maybe, maybe do like one strip. Try it.

[A]

One strip.

[B]

Add a second one. And you should know, usually no more than two. I mean, because what happens then? You get it too heavy.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then it just.

[C]

And you're pushing too hard. Here's another thing, John. How's your front grip hand? Are you, are you pulling it back towards the receiver? Are you in the middle of the forum? Are you on the front, I mean, at there?

[A]

Yeah, I have my index finger pointed out. It's out. It's out. Like my index finger is at the end. Yes, at the end. So I'm not.

[C]

So you don't have any room to go out more. But like there's a lot of people that I see that are kind of choking up on that forearm and they're on the. Where they're on the edge and they feel whippy. They can move their hand forward a little bit like Rick does, and that's going to smooth out the gun a lot.

[A]

If I knock the hand forward. Yeah. If I moved my hand forward, I would wrap around the front of. The front of it forend. So. So this tape weight, though, Rick, is how much weight is a strip of tape weight? Is it like a couple ounces or something?

[B]

It's like it's less than an ounce usually.

[A]

What do they use it in golf for? They put it on golf clubs.

[B]

Put on the golf clubs? Yeah.

[A]

Oh, I didn't know that. Okay. Oh, cool. Well, John will be at the golf store tomorrow. Hey, guys, there's. There's $23,000 worth of silver on the line in Vegas.

[B]

John, listen, listen. Amazon that can have that baby. There's tomorrow.

[A]

Yeah. What am I thinking?

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Prime, baby. Got to go Prime.

[C]

Easy, John. You always make so hard.

[A]

Yeah, you know, Story of my life. Well, Mitch, thank you for the question. I appreciate that. It might just be the secret to all of my. My woes. All right, guys, thank you very much for answering the questions. Facebook fans, thank you for writing in. We really appreciate it. That was a lot of fun. Again, if you want to send us your questions, it's ask us@traptalk podcast.com send them in and I'll get these guys to answer them for you. Thanks, everybody.

[B]

Thanks.

[C]

Good luck. Have a great night. All right, folks, we got to take another quick break and thank one of our show sponsors, 73 Pointers Ranch, Jonesburg, Missouri. Rick and Carla Burke. Best place in the area to go shoot chuckers and pheasants and have a great time. Rick, we got to get you down there.

[B]

Yeah, I need to come in. Hopefully I can do some hunting with you guys and come to your the annual clay shoot in August right after the grand.

[C]

It's a lot of fun. It's the Optimist club charity shoot. They throw a charity shoot, they put it on, and it's wonderful. I think last year they had over 100, 100 entries into it, and it's just a good time. With that being said, Trap Talk listeners, if you love everything about Trap Talk, please subscribe to our page. Also, throw some likes on the videos that you enjoy. It really means the world to us.

[B]

Yeah. Comment on each episode. We read them, we respond to them.

[A]

And the Trap Talk podcast is brought to you.

[C]

In part by RM Shooting clinics. Have Ricky take your game to the next level. If you want to shoot hundreds of hundreds of hundreds, give Ricky a call today. Zach Nini Financial we believe in putting people first.