00:00:00 Speaker 1: All right, what was people? The season is going to be here faster than you can imagine. I know you've all been out there dialing in your archery equipment. Actually, there's a real world out there, and if you're anything like me and my friends, you've been taking your time getting your bowl ready. We'd never advocate for you being irresponsible, but we understand it's pretty easy to end up really busy this time of year. I've been busy building browning points. Does it work over? Well? We decided to call up some of the experts to get some of their ideas on some of the things that might help you be more successful this season. That's a good thing because my ten yard pen needs a little work. Doesn't work out the Alright, on the show day, we've got Jake Major from Cobra Archery. Jake, how is your day man? Uh? Going pretty good? It's nice warm outh today, no kidding. Yeah, my truck says one hundred degrees right now in the shand so we were we were we were nineties, weren't that. You guys are Texas, right, Yeah, we're we're in northeast Texas. So it's hot down here, but you know, heats relative no matter where you're at, Like for us, for instance, if we were to go there in the wintertime, we probably freeze to death where you're at. So it would be kind of rough if I ever get like, if it ever gets down below the twenties, it's pretty tough day for me in the woods. How cold did you guys get? What? We get that from time to time. I mean they'll be like one or two cold spells um in the in the winter, probably in December that it'll be in the teens. I think I saw nine degrees one time in the past five years or something like that. But that's just a you know, just a little just hit exactly into in two days, it's fifty five, you know. It's it's kind of how do you guys ever ever have accumulation of snow? Yeah? Hardly. Ever, if if you call accumulation like it lasts more than two days, then everybody, oh, it just takes sleep for that. Down here, we don't have. We kind of got an interesting situation where like snow can happen, but the grounds never warm enough to really you know, keep it as as snow, it melts off really quick and then and then it'll like turn from like thirty during the day to like sixteen at night and freeze everything into black eyes, you know what I mean. So it's it's pretty dangerous. Actually, yeah, I'm sure the auto body shops love it because they get good that that and rout you know, left and rut. Yeah. That, and then we've got you know, crazy weather patterns in the summer, so we have plenty of auto hail detailing things that pop up, you know, cars destroy you guysbably get some wicked stores down there. Yeah, you know, it's crazy. Yeah. This past year we had like a like some seventy a mile in our straight line winds that just blew down trees and stuff all over the county. Lots of tornadoes in area to That's that's the only kind of way that spooks me. Hot doesn't, cold, doesn't. Rain doesn't. You know, usually have time to get away from rain if you know what you're doing. But when you can't get away from it, it's coming, it's coming, you know. I mean, that's the only thing that spooks me is wind, you know. Yeah, for sure. My wife has taught me into probably doing a storm shelter at our next house. So because I guess under the ground is the one you can be a gopher and get away from wind. I guess, yeah, yeah, right. Now, do you guys have basements? No? Actually, I mean maybe one out of every two d houses has a basement down here, just because people probably moved from up north and they're like, we need a basement, you know, but y'all have where you're at. Oh yeah, I gotta I got a nine a half foot basement, concrete, four walls. Man that wind hits, we got a spot for work. Cool. And you're in central Pennsylvania, right, yeah, yeah, or south central. We're um about forty minutes north of Harrisburg, up along Southquehanna Caminist from the Appalachian Trail. So we're right up here. Born raised on a farm. How close is that to Hershey? Hershey's about I can make it to hershean fifty minutes is or something like that. I would be large if I lived in that area. Yeah, yeah, you know you grew up around. It's like another park. Yeah, Mongus Park down there. They've got a great park and it draws a lot of people. I guess they keep hadding on, keep adding on, and I guess after this new expansion you're doing. It's going to have the most role coasters in in one park in in the country. Yeah, it keeps going. It's enormous park right now. Enormous. Yeah, well, that's what happens to people that each keep growing and get enormous. Yeah, that's funny. Well, Jake, you've kind of it's done a career for yourself in the archery world. What is it that you do? Man? Well, um, you know, I don't. I don't have an engineering degree, Okay, born and raised in a farm. Um, God has blessed me with the ability, uh to do this kind of stuff, mechanical mind that uh you know, it kind of never stops. So I don't know, I don't know how to describe it. Um, you know they I've been lucky enough to be but Hutton. Since I was fourteen, a close friend of mine, I was just shooting like a lemon would bree, curve and stick bow my dad's forever when I was a kid. And then my buddy introduced me to a Calmtown bow and October of three, yeah, October, I think it was eighty three. And after that, man, it was lights out and uh yeah, you know you just uh but you know, I got God blessed me with a mechanical mind. And you know I've been taking and building and doing this kind of mechanical stuff my entire life. UM. I have a stack of sketches that goes back years, the whole way up to now, you know. And uh, we're blessed enough to we have first owned a franchise and now we have since sold that franchise and interim we had started a we opened up a supporting its store and then um supporting the store and the rest of committment time to time. Uh, they knew I was, you know, built away. I was mentally and uh, I was looking for opportunities to grow and opportunities for a challenge. And this is what we got, an opportunity and it it is exactly where I'm at mentally and in our lifestyle and everything. You know, we were hunting fish. That's what we do. You mean, you know, grew up on a farm. You know back in the day, you didn't go buy something. You fixed it. You figured out how it worked, and you got the welter and you fixed it. You didn't uh, you know, go looking for the part. You didn't scroll through the internet. It wasn't the Internet. What I mean, you just figured out how it working, don't you take enough parts off it? You figured out how it works and you put it back together. And that's I guess how I started. You know, well, I confess Amazon has kind of made me as soft when it comes to hand made everybody soft, man, don't worry. Well, the only problem is when you take things apart and you put it back together. It's running fine, but you gotta cover a parts left over. Yeah. Well so yeah, you just kind of throws out in the driveway and hopefully disappeared. It's just kind of yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's cool. So what was that that first compound that you got introduced to? A kind of bow? Was that? I My very first blow was a PSC back when they went made laminated wood limbs and it was round wheels and it was actually when they use coded cable. Um, you know, I was drawn maybe two pounds something. My dad. It was back in the day of fifty let off. You thought you were somebody with that, you know what I mean? And Uh, I used to shoot so much. There was a two year period when I was uh fourteen and fifteen to the winner January February March a Beach. Both those two consecutive years, I couldn't feel uh my my index middle and ring finger. I lost. I lost it because I was shooting the barn in the cold weather all day, every day, and I lost all stealing in like three months for two years a row yep. And I've actually switched over to release and that all went away. But I shot so much and I had to talk about it, said we're just quit shooting. I'm like, yeah, no, it's not gonna happen. Well, I guess still warmed and went away. So the release business is kind of a passion project then, because you want the feeling of your fingers back exactly. Yeah. And I was. I was built my own releases before we got into Cobra. Really know, I was shooting my own, my own personal stuff before we got into Cobral. And when the opportunity came along, um, you know, we jumped on it. So you know, it's a it's a work in progress. Uh you know, we had a little over two years now and we're redoing it from top to bottom, A to Z everything, so you know, just just getting after it, just trying to make I'm just not gonna make stuff just to make stuff, you know, and it's not who I am. I want to I want to improve on everything because I you know, I'm I'm a I'm a blood the eyes bow hunter like you guys are, and uh, that's all I want to do is go out there and shoot something with my bow. So he's spent all those years in the woods, you kind of have an idea what everybody's looking for and what what the you know, attributes people want in to release, you know, you know, above all they want the thing to be reliable, and you want to be built like a tank. You know, you want to ever have to worry about is my release gonna work? You know, that should I should be the last thing in your mind, you know, I mean, yeah, for sure. You know you're drolling down on a one seventy, buddy, you gotta have everything to go, you mean, because because trust me, off screwed up enough myself. I want to make sure all my gear works, you know, I mean, after this conversation, we might talk about how to get it one seventy in front of you so you can drop down. That's the next step for me. That's cool, man, that's it's very neat to to think about. Casey was actually, Um, Casey and I were talking just I guess a week or so ago, and Um, I've been shooting a cobra for like a dozen years and I have never thought once about an issue with it. And it's kind of it is And now that you say it, it is something that is kind of a luxury and something that I've enjoyed as a luxury without probably just with taken for granted, you know, but I don't ever have to think about it, and and yeah that's what you want, then then you know you have a good product. Yeah, that's that's how I see. I'm a musician, and so that's how we think about drummers. Is like, if you don't ever have to think about your drummer during the show, then that's a great show, you know what I mean. If you have to think about him, then he's done something a little bit whack, you know what I mean. Yeah, that's right, that's right. Yeah, they will do that time time. And it's cool to hear you say that, you know about a product that works when we live in you know, if you want to talk about like the archery industry, it's driven by the A T A show. Right, Everybody wants something new and shiny to look at a T A show so they can sell they're old when they bought last year and by the new one. Right. But you know you're talking about building releases that are gonna last decades, so you know it's kind of countercultural. Yeah, you know. I always look for something I can rely on, you know, and I always like to get a product that I know as long as gonna work. So I absolutely kill myself to make sure this thing is going to be solid and always perform, you know. So I go to the ants degree, and everybody that's around me that can be around me while I'm in my design mode knows that I get over over the top, you know, and think, try and think of every conceivable possible issue that could possibly go wrong, and try and design that. You know out, So, what are some of the like top things that you consider, uh to make a bulletproof for lease, Well, you want it to be You want to have as minimal parts as possible, you know, you get all these sophisticated parts that's more to go wrong than you out all these different tallenges and stack up and then if you're all by a couple here or there, then it's problematic. You know. You know, you want to use good materials. You want to have good anatized coatings on them. You want to make sure that the you know, you're matching materials that were well together. You know, um, just all kinds of different stuff like that. So you need dropping the mud and you're okay. You know, if you just hit with hit it with the air hose afterwards, you're okay. You don't have to worry about that kind of stuff. You know, time and time, you always want to have some kind of preventive maintenance on anything. If it's moving, there's there's where, but you try and you know, like some of this stuff. I know, I've had many many machinists go, Jake, this is you're you don't need to go to this kind of Rockwell rating for your hardness of your parts. And like yeah, he said, listen, if you go with standard hardness should be fine. Like I want to crack it up. So we have we have Rockwell hardness of fifty and sixty on on our internal parts. Yeah, so it's it's not it's it's gonna wear, you know, it's gonna wear really really well, it's gonna withstand everything, so um, it's not gonna fall apart on you. Yeah. So what was the thing that you know, you said you were designing some releases and stuff back in the day before you really got involved with Cobra. What was the thing that led you to kind of make your own Like, what was the was there like a moment that's like, you know, I need to make something better? Well, yeah, there was. There was a couple of things I wish I could have, like, um, like, for example, UM, we have a product down now called the Accomplice. It's basically what I call a draw assist. You know, you use your hand and your some to to beat a bubble call up index finger release. But it's a it's a handheld with a thumb. And I made that thing fourteen fifteen years ago something like that, and had and I used it had on the work bench forever and it worked well you know, and what it does because you know, you can get a lot of power out of your some if you gripped your thumb, I mean you can, you can really get a lot of power out of that. So if you just have your um, your some involved in in the in the process. Man, you can really draw it down easily, you know. So I was just not because when I was younger, I it wasn't all that strong. And you know, strength was always not my strong point, so to speak, because I was always you know, d pounds of graduated high school. So you know, I was you know, I looked like I had worms. You know, I was just a scrawny guy. So I was always looking for an advantage. And I get that boat back in the heat of the moment. And sometimes that I was punk did kind of lock up. It's like I couldn't get my boat back. So I was always looking for that advantage. So I made that and a couple of things, and I was shooting my own stuff for a while, you know, and I had noticed no one hadn't really made those of any kind of you know, notoriety. So that's the kind of stuff. But you know, since the onset of of Curb, Bro, you know, since we bought it in July of seventeen, I've I've founded fifteen patterns. Wow, you're like the Steve Jobs of of releases. I'm not going to listen. I just like the bone, you know, And God gave me the challenge to design this stuff. My talent's his talent. So um, you know, so are you still shooting? Are you still shooting the handheld? Or what are you looking for now? Is it a different change? Well, I'll say this right now, I am shooting the switch, which is our twenty Night team product. But I am shooting a byem now, So sneaky, sneak, I'm shooting. I'm shooting that now. So um, can you tell us anything about the premise behind that product? Absolutely not? Well, absolutely not. I'll tell you this. There's some features on it that and I've never been seen before that are I believe, in my opinion, it's just me Jake talking about it. You know about my stuff are phenomenal. That's just the way it is. So let the audience, uh, you know, make their own judgment. Does someone to ever sell it? But you never got some good stuff coming? Sure? So I mean is there in regards to it? Can you can you talk about what it what it helps as far as making a good shot, like what what little attributes are you gaining with your your new products? So, in other words, what are you looking to gain on what you consider to be kind of the average two thousand nineteen release market. Well, there's a couple of there's a couple of features in this one. Um, it lines your shot up, okay. Um, it's just a couple features on there that that help you align your shot. Okay. So if you can, if you can is as little torque as you can put into shooting, the more actu'ly gonna be just like anything else. You know, if you can, if you can line up that shot, you know, elbow right down to your wrist to knock to the point of the air. But they can be in as much alignment and as little torque as possible, you know, consistently, you're going to be more accurate. So anything we can do to help that process, um and make you more accurate, that's what we're trying and drive to do. So I got one of those features in there, and um we still have some other features in it. And one of our releases are coming out with that makes life easier. Then makes then a standard release. So and we got some we've got some stuff coming that's uh never been seen before. Um. Yeah, that's gonna well to leave at that, it's good, it's gonna be good. I'm excited to show people. Yeah, yeah, I don't mean to pay anybody and not trying to oversell, but I'm just saying I'm really actious to show folks like it's uh, I'm happy. So let's get down to kind of what you've got right now that we can we can see and look at. I mean, why why uh why offerings with single caliber and dual caliber? What are those? What's the difference there? Is it preference? And why is it preference? If so? Well, you know it is a little bit preference. Um, and some guys, Uh well, the hook example, we have at least called the moment very good breaks really clean. I always choose my wife, I said, I said, I said, it breaks cleaner than an old woman's hip. It just breaks like but uh it uh that and uh you know it's still address your dee look really quick spotting stalk stuff like that. You can you don't have to look down. You can take your your thumb and just put it and and pinch your your hook right through the de loop. You don't have to look down. You know it's a you know, uh sayle caliber and double caliber. Um, you know you gotta look down. You gotta clip it on. Um the double caliper um, I would, I would. I feel the double caliper is uh more of a sense of security for folks. Whenever they have a double caliper on, they see it, they see it drop on, they push it forward. It's good for beginners, it's good for anybody. And I don't don't mean to downplay that. You know, there's lots of very experienced bow hunters out there that like double caliper and that's great. Um. You know I shot one for for a very long time. So but um, the double calipers is has a center, has a center release, you know, I mean because usually whenever you have a hook it spins and then a single caliber it drops off the edge, but a um, a double caliper, it comes off the center lines you shot up off the center of the calipers. Whenever we bought the company, I took the their design and I didn't really didn't like it, so I redid it. So we have new calipers for all of our double calipers, and uh it centers a shot and minimizes the loop wear and you can you can do get some d loop wear with with double and seal calipers. Usually hooks you don't you know, if you're going to have something, you know, any kind of friction is eventually gonna cause some kind of wear, especially if it's a fabric material. You know, if you've got the smooth, it's a smooth, it's going to eventually have some kind of wear. It just it just will. There's no way around it. Um. But who kind of eliminates that issue because it just spins, just spins right out of the way. So you don't have any you know, hard friction. When I was trying to squeeze between two points, you know what I mean, you don't really have any tight rubs that kind of thing. You know. Last season, I've shot with a dual caliper for a couple of years, and uh, I was in Colorado and had a bull elk run from about eight to fift real fast, and yeah, I was about to shake out of my pants. So it was real hard to get that bulk caliper through that d loop at that moment, you know exactly. And ever since then, I've been looking at those little hook types and man, that's at yeah, I'm telling you, because when you're rattled, when you're ratting, and it's funny because you know, when you get rattled like that, it's almost like your brain just locks up, like and then when it all settles down, it's like, why wasn't I thinking? Right? Yeah, you know that you ever noticed that? You know, thank thank the Good Lord that you know I've luckily I've grown that. But no one's immune to whatever. You know, no one's ever immune to that. You can, you're always you're always gonna fight that. But man, when I was a punk kid, I would get rattled and get so jacked up just with a dough coming by, I would do that kind of stuff, like what am I doing? She walks off? I settled down and like grow and rest comment like what are you doing? You goof? You absolute goof? You could have killed her? And now you're you're shaking like crazy, you know, I mean just on a dough you know. Yeah, yeah it's nuts man. So, um, why do you think that? Uh? People kind uh are all so different when it comes to picking some type of of a release, Like why do some people want to do the handheld versus wrist trap and and that sort of thing. Um, it's personal preference. Um. Some guys like it for control. Uh. Some guys like it because they can just grab the bow and grab their handheld, and just the easy the power you can put in your hand versus coming off your wrist if you if you draw your bow property and a handheld, I feel it's dramatically easier. But that, you know, not just me, you know, I mean some guys are like, no way, I can't. I feel like it's gonna fly out on my hand. You know, there's no way I can do because I just feel like it's gonna fly out in my hand, and it makes me over gripping torqu and then I get back and I'm just like gripping this thing like like a silver back. You just just grabbing ahold of this thing. You're trying to grab it, you know. And and like guys, you know, they struggle with the right grip, you know, I mean they try and knuckle up with this thing. And but the but the wrist trap, you don't have to worry about it. It's there, it's not coming off, and you can relax and come back, you know. And uh, you know, I shot a wrist strap for oh my thirty ish thirty issue or something like that, you know, and uh, you know it it was always there, um, the beauty of the handheld hanging in your doo loop when you're hunting and you can put your hands in your pockets. I can't tell you many times I froze to the tree just because my right hand got cold holding on my release. And then it makes your body cold, you make creeps up your helbowe and your should or too long, you're you're shivering. Um. Or if it sticks outside your your pocket, your jack, I think it's ice cold and you grab hold it's twelve degree release a man and you go grab your bell and you're freezing. But um, you know it's it's personal preference, it really is. Everybody has their own style they like to shoot, you know, it's typically what makes them the most confident. I don't care what you shoot, as long as you feel the most confident doing whatever style works the best, you know, that's what you should go with. If it's fingers, you go with fingers. Whatever it is, whatever's gonna make you go out in the woods and make you more confident, that's the style you shoot. There's not one better than the other. It's just what's gonna make you most confident. Right, is there? Um? Is there a preference when it comes to like target shooters versus hunters in release. Well, yeah, I mean the majority of your your your target guys are our hinge or some you know, or or or back tension pools through style. Um, can you talk about those a little bit? What the differences in the different types of releases are for those who may Well, yeah, I mean the hinge style is basically, um, it's it's it's a handheld release that releases the arrow as you twist the angle of the handle. If you rotate the angle of the handle, Um, it opens up the jaw. The jugger mechanism will eventually open the jaw and release. It is to eliminate and help control target panic and help have a smooth, surprised release. Okay, that's that's the gist of that, and it makes sense and it works. Um. The one thing I don't understand, and a lot of guys do it, and they do it, they have what they call it a click inside those hinge releases. Small click that's right at the end of the where it's going to release off the off the caliper, off the hook. It's a little snap, a little depression in the metal that jumps down a level before let's go, So that lets you let you know it's getting ready to go. So you can go back easy, so slowly twisting your wrist or changing the position of your fingers. You know, I want to pull more than the other. You just let it rotating your index and it goes off. But you can hit a little snap and you know it's coming then. So it helps people sometimes and sometimes it makes people worse. I prefer a hinge that has no noise. UM, I just do it's it's I shoot better with that. UM. But then you have a true back tension which you draw and you settled in. And then as you bring your shoulder blades together and kind of rotate your shoulder back a little bit, you know, ease and hitting the back wall and building pressure on your D loop. There's a spring inside mechanism side that makes it release after a certain amount of pressure. So you have a safety. But you hold me, you get back and stuff and they work find too, you know. UM. And then and then the thumb release is basically it's a handheld. And then you know you neither to single caliber your hooks. Typically their hook ours is a single caliber UM clip man and you draw back and you use your thumb to hit the trigger. So, um, they're all good, they all work, and they all serve their own purpose, you know. And there's there's highbreads of of of them, you know, So which of those should folks actually considered to hunt with? So I would, I would? You know, definitely, if anybody's gonna hunt with any kind of handhold you want, you're definitely gonna want to go with the thumb first. To do the hinge. I know guys do it, God bless them, they're better than I am. But you know I could never do it with a hinge just the sheer fact of it's an animal you're trying to kill. You have no idea what that animal is gonna do at a given point. I don't want to sit there and go, yeah, he's gonna sit there for the four or five seconds I want. I want to be able to control, whant to let the art go. The whole purpose of the hinge is a surprise release. Well, I wanted to be a surprise to him, not to me, So you know, so I go with a thumb. I'm so glad you said that, because, man, everything i'd take in media wise, everybody's talking about the surprise release nowadays, and and I get it. If you're trying to, you know, put holes in paper and you try exactly if you have all day and the targets not move, then yeah, but this is a real world scenario and we're talking about taking the life of something like I need to know exactly when that thing's gonna go go off? Right? Yeah, I don't care if you're trying to peel a chip mounth off a log. Are you trying to shoot a monster? Oh? Yeah, I mean it doesn't matter. You want to know when things are gonna go. I just you want to be on time and just right, because you know, you can the tempo of a deer, the personality of a deer, what they're doing, what they're looking at you. You know. How about how much time do you have? You know? I mean you you, I mean typically you have more time than what you think. But everybody has that feel if they've been doing it long enough, how much time you have? And I don't want to have to go, man, I wish I had another two or three seconds, you know. So that's why I would suggest if you're gonna go with the handheld I would go with a thumb. So you know, earlier you talked about the thumb having a lot of strength to it, but usually there's a kind of an inverse quality there where the more strength something has, the less of control it has. And I would think, I mean, we do as humans, we do everything with our index finger, right like you know, you scroll on your phone or whatever. So is there something to the way a thumb release is designed to where it kind of uses that strength of your thumb to where it can still be pretty sensitive. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, Yeah. Um, some guys like to take the national trigger of the thumb release and tuck it into the palm, into the into the muscle of your of your of your thumb and just and they to squeeze the release together. And some guys like to put it the way out the end of the end of the thumb and just just pluck on the end of it. You know. I mean, it varies depending, but that's that comes down to what's gonna make what makes you feel most comfortable. You know myself, when I hunt, I simplify, simplify, simplify you know everything from A to Z. I simplify my hunting as much as humanly possible to take out all the errors possible. You mean, if I can simplify the way I hunt, the way I shoot, the way I shoot my release, if I can do that without thinking, then you're going to be much more successful. So if you if you simplify what you're carrying the woods, you simplify everything, there's less to go wrong. Mmm. So aside from the caliber, the calipers and the hooks and all that, um, there's another thing to choose from when it comes to the details of a release that I've noticed that Casey and I typically differ on this um but and I don't know the terminology very well, so excuses, But like there's there are releases that are stiff and kind of longer, and some that are short and flimsy or just flimsy in general. Maybe not short necessarily. But what are the advantages of each one of those? Well, you know the advantages of of you have it like a hard post connection, what I call a post connections. It sticks out from your from your strap you release. You know, your release is always straight out, you know, or you have what you can use a lanyard or what's called a webbing connection. It's the nylon webbing that used. Um, you know that's that's personal reference. UM. I would say the majority of the people, UM like what we call now termed fullback. Um. So you know, we we developed our own this year. We have a triple we call a triple joint fullback. It's it's three positions. It's forward, middle, and reverse, and that allows you to put it out of the way climbing to stand this snap, doing all kinds of stuff you want to. You pull out your ground tube, you can bump a white tail whatever, you get your binoculars and you look around, it's out of your way. Uh. Some guys like the the lanyard or webbing connection just because it basically it eliminates any kind of torque that you may put on that string or in your de loop or or kind of can't your bow to a degree because um, there's not a hard connection right straight from your from your wrist to your to your bow, so you can kind of, yeah, your risk can be in a different position, but still remain relatively accurate, you know. Um. There again it comes down to personal preference. Uh. You know, they're weelling the majority of our folks when we sell to they put our new triple joint that we have. Um, he has a middle position. Um, it's not a forward and back, it's a middle position. So you can have it in the middle position, right, and you're doing your things hands free, Um, get your grump to do this, do that whatever, b oculus and it doesn't take your second hand to put it in the forward position. All you do is because it's sticking straight out of the ninety against your rinks, your thigh, whatever, and it jumps into into four positions. You can do it one hand. So if you can grab your gunt to and you said, waite, tell you bumping, you put it back in your pocket where you stick it, and while you're holding your bow with your you know, bow hand, you can just drop that polias right into your hand without having to grab it and flick it in. So that's why we did it that way. So it's pretty snappy fortunately. Well, it's it's built like a tank. Cool kind of that seems to be kind of like a motif of what you're what you usually go for and really is something built like a tank. And it's something that's always been an issue for me and about or anything I ever use is just uh kind of the weather proofing or maybe not weather but like dust and dirt and jumping like that, because you know, sitting in tree stands one thing, and you just still have to deal with like things freezing up and sometimes and then you know, if we're doing some spot and stalk stuff. You know in the west somewhere you're crawling around your hands and knees, or you're spotting hogs down here, you're in the mud. You know, there's a lot of issues with that. Um, how do you make a release that truly is you know, uh, I guess weather proof in those aspects, well, if you can get as little as parts as possible in it, that's going to help you out. Yeah, you know, it just it just will you know. And now if you're if you're crawling through sand, muddy sand, oh man, I don't know if you know, I don't know if anybody's will help you with that one. I mean, it's just there's a there's a there's a part where you gotta go, oh that's enough. You mean, Um, there's only so much you can tolerate. Um. But you know, if you can keep things where you can get to it, then so you so you do get in the mud and there is you got some stones in there, I got some sand in there, grinding and binding everything up. Because if you have tight towerrances and you get stuff in there, Yeah, but you want to be able to have it so you can get to it rint it. Hit it with a hit with the air gun or something rather and blow the air out and blow the water out of it, and you're back to back the normal. But you know, if you if you're try and be able to get to the parts, then you least see you can see what's going on to So there's a there's an openness you want to see to them too, you know, like like our single jowl man, there's nothing you can't see on nothing, you know. Same with the same with our our hook a. Nothing you can't see on nothing, you know. So there's something. Yeah, so if you drop in the mud, you'll be able to see any any kind of mud it's on it because you can look all through it. I can see too, where like uh, handheld would come in hand in a situation like that where you're just like, well, I'm just gonna stick in the pocket at this point in time, you know, make sure you get a dipper or something you know about you don't lose it, but you know, in that scenario is having the ability to just do away with the release completely until it comes down the moment of truth. It's probably pretty advantageous. Yeah, speaking of uh no, you know, losing one. Possibly do you ever carry do you carry extra releases on your high or is that just something you're kind of like, I'll risk it. I've never carried a spare release. I don't even own a spare release. Okay, okay, And I know I'm I am one of the very very very very very few. I don't know if anybody doesn't have to. I'm the only one. Well I'm with you on that, sir. So you know it's um yeah, I I you know, I try and I try to minimize. All my buddies make fun of me all the time every year because you guys carry it backpack into the woods. Yeah, I don't. Yeah, really no, absolutely never have, never will really no, absolutely not interesting. So I don't care. I don't carry in that stuff. I don't take any food, but don't take any drink. Your good. I don't really take a knife. I don't even take a knife all I have when I leave. When I leave to go into the woods, is I have a flashlight, um, pocket watch, my cover sent and my grunt tube. And I don't even carry but knoculars. I carry his ice min ocular. Yeah, that's it cargo pants or something now, I mean no, it's just it's small because I was gonna drive a crew, drive you crazy to my flashlight. I leave at the bomb the tree stand. I don't take it up. So all I got up in there is is my my grunt tube. Uh. And I leave my my cover sent at the basic tree too, So my min ocular and grunt tube is about all I had with me, is it? It's interesting? Yeah? I mean I I totally you know, I guess I subscribe to pretty simple theory usually as well, not quite that simple, but um, I mean I think of it this way. And I've been talking to Casey about this a lot because we are going on a wilderness backpack LK hunt this year. That's a little different program. Well sure, sure, but yeah, I guess my my point here is that, like we're I've had to buy quite a bit of gear to kind of prepare for that, you know, And so as Casey and um and you know, we got a we got a video I killed a buck a couple of years ago, a really nice buck on some public land, and uh, I had a comment recently on it that was, you know, referred to the fact that I was wearing um, you know, sick of gear top and I had a twelve year old bow. And I know this kind of coming around to this, I guess. But I've talked Casey a lot about this. You know, if you were if you had a back up everything and and upgraded your system, all your systems every year, I mean, you've got to be making well above what people normally make, you know, blue collar hunters to do. So I just the fancy stuff, got to have a new bow over year. You don't have to do all that stuff. You gotta have what makes you come sure. Yeah, And and I mean if you were to try to carry I mean, if you're spending fifty bucks on a release or whatever it might be, and then you want to, oh, well, I need two of those in case one goes awry. You know, then you've got if you can subscribe to that method and you think about all the things that you might carry or you might hunt with, you know, Uh, you could. You could really start to add, oh yeah, you got two of everything, good night and be broke. Yeah, and you have a retail store in the in the stand with you, you know exactly. Yeah, my buddies are good. Thing going with the backpack, I said, man used the snow drift on the way home. You're good for a month whatever you got packing that thing? You know there. You know it's crazy, but you know that that makes them confident and that's cool. Sure, you know, I try, I try and minimize my sense. So I I want to have a little fabric with me as possible. Yeah, I mean, so the less fabric and other stuff I got going on, the less likely. You know, if you can pick up one per cent, you know, one percent of an opportunity. Yeah, and you do that ten fifteen times, but you just change the odds really good in your favor. Just a little tiny thing, I'll go to the nth degree to get it one per cent. Yeah, I mean those little things add up to when they're when it's you know, several of them and and uh, I mean you've kind of got you've kind of got uh skins on the wall to prove that you're not just crazy and you know what I mean, you know, it's it's I've been blessed, you know. I find them dumb ones, you know, it's it's hey, it's all good man. I mean sometimes hunting the dumb ones is a lot more fun than hunting the smart ones. Yeah, it's it's much easier, you know, it's much easier. So I hunt here in p A. And if you can kill a good buck every year in Pennsylvania, you're getting it done. You know. It's just these these deer are They're difficult to hunt now they do this still. I'm not gonna lie. Need to get a little stupid there in November, you know, so um that happens, and uh, but you know, honestly, I try and kill my my buck before that because I'm out west that time of year. You know, I've been blessed to be all go out western for a number of years now. So I go out there to spot. We have a special spot out there we go to hunt and uh, you know, so you know it is what it is. But I enjoy it. I love it, you know, from the days of shooting chickens in the barn, you know what I mean. When I'm a kid, I tried to put an arrow through absolutely everything. I mean everything everything. We be shooting pigeons and chickens and uh you groundhogs. And I shot a club club foot goose one year, he's gonna fly. I got him. Man, goodness, man, I had my My wife has been talking about getting chickens lately, and she was like, do you think you could, you know, ring one's neck, just pick it up and wring its neck. You know, I've done that with birds or whatever, they've shot whatever. And I was like, I'll just buy a GUI team broadhead and shoot that sucker. And she's like, no, We're not doing that. Yeah, you don't want to. Don't want to traumatize the kids too much, you know there, you know, fluff of your no or whatever they you know, cluck or whatever, you know, check his name is you tore his head off? That's not yeah yeah anyway, Yeah, that's funny, man. Yeah. But you know I always I was always hunting stuff, you know, and you you learned and I probably lost when I was a kid, probably dozen arrows down the ground arcal. So I figured out, don't shoot him with a field point. Yeah. Yeah, Well, did the same thing with armordals around here, you know, growing up, I love shot because they popped, you know, popal And then like if you don't put him down with the first arrow, he's going in the hole in your heir's toast broke off. And they're tough. Yeah they're real tough. But yeah, yeah, luckily a statue. Limitations are worn out on most of the things, Like kids. I think the first thing I don't deal was a tweety bird red bird, so uh yeah, you know, you just kind of get that when you're a little kid, but it's it teaches you a lot. I mean, I'll learned a ton about stalking and stuff, you know, because of stuff like that. You know, just go out, go out hunt scrolls with the twin too good, because you're gonna see stuf in the woods that you know we wouldn't see, or you're gonna have animals come up for you get to learn from him, you know, I mean, starting out young and and and just you don't gotta go straight to deer. I mean I didn't go straight to deer. I was. I was a mad squirrel hunter when I was in school too, you know, and and uh, you know, squirrels teach a lot. Yeah. I guess my last question here is is there what was there ever a time that, um, you were a kid, but you weren't a punk kid. Uh no, absolutely not. He was always a punk always. I'm a short late, you know. Yeah. So, but you know I'm here now. God's got me here, So I'm thankful for that. Yeah. I got a wife and two great boys, and uh, you know, there's nothing better than we'll do than have than have kids. That's awesome, man, That's the greatest thing on the planet that no matter what I do with the rest of my life, my greatest achievement will be raising children. Yeah, that's awesome. Brother. How old are your kids? Uh? Nine and eleven? Not on eleven? That's fun agent man. Yeah, two boys. You know, we got the form there and and uh, we got a stream that goes through the yard. We got a pond in the yard. I mean, there isn't anything we can't get into. And you know we're out in the river over the weekend catching bass and catfish and you know, that's just it's good stuff. You know, it's funny because they're nine eleven and they have not hunted deer yet. Really really Nope, they have not hunt deer yet. I take them with me. You know, I'm kind of bagging them, so to speak. They you know how to They know how to do a food plot great. They know how to find and and hang a stand and what to look for. They know deer sign really well. They know body language really well on a white tail. All that stuff the foundation of of hunting it. I mean, I don't I just uh, I want them to come and say that I want to carry the rifle or dad, I want to carry the bow. And I'm not gonna push that on them. You want to, you want to, absolutely, I'll teach you everything I possibly can. But in the meantime, you know, we do food plus together. It's one of the on those things we do, we always end up in up the gra big seat battle at the end, you know. I mean, you know, we go check trail cameras together and put out minerals together and all that kind of stuff. You know. We built a We bought a bunker last August. It's an eight by eight uh sixties six untreated locust railroad ties we built into the bank. It's we call it a bunker because it's it's buried down in the ground. They have only half is sticking out in the tops covered with dirt, so it's it's vined over and it's just a hole in the side of the bank. You know we put her, you know it's we put a rubber over top before we buried it. And you know you can drive over with the tractor because it's all locust railroad ties and it's eight by eight inside. So we've got a big, big table in there. We got chairs hanging on the wall. We got water stash in there, so we all called Melisson and the boys were all climbing there together. And I don't care. We don't shoot anything, I really don't. You know, they get to see some deer up closed. Now. Last year, uh, last our youngest one was giving me the debt because she's like, dad, what are you to shoot one? You drew eight times? Now? I'm like, easy, man, I want to make sure it's just like you guys. You want to make it a horrible experience. Yeah, exactly. You gotta practice for that new release you designed to a lot. Here a break, that's right, man. Hey, Jake, it's been awesome. Dude, get talking to you, and uh, if we want to send some folks to h to Cobra to check out what y'all have. Where should we send them, Uh, Cobra Archery dot Com. Okay, all our stuffs on there, and uh, you know, stay tuned. We've got some incredible stuff coming and you know, skies of them at for us. Yeah, for sure, man. And and it's cool because I believe you when you said that, because you're an enthusiastic dude who's gonna get some things done. So yeah, I appreciate your time. Man. What what's the hunt you're looking forward to the most this year? Um, well, I'm gonna go out west hunting. Yeah, and we're gonna be hunting some some big white tail. But my most favorite hon I'm looking forward to is climbing into the bunker with the boys and Melissa. Yeah. That Uh, we'll probably go out the first day of archery in the evening because it's an evening spot to come down off the mountain into the food plot. Um, that's what I'm going forward to the most. Those those evenings. I get the climbing in the You know, of course we're not too cent free there are. They're eating cheerios, are drinking milk. Carnes juice like yeah, and I got sharpis are righting on the inside of the wall, like you know, we hope we're down win exactly. Make sure they're wins right yeah. But it's good stuff. That's that's that's the best right there, that's the absolute best. Yeah. Yeah, that's cool man. That sounds like a ton of fun. Well uh yeah again, Jake, thanks so much for spending some time with this man. We really appreciate you answering all these questions and good luck this season, dude a. Thank you two guys, and keep us posts. Let me know how you make it out. Yeah man, thanks, all right, take care understanding this stuff is really something I feel I can take my archery game to the next level absolutely, man. Guys, make sure you go subscribe to the podcast, leave us for review, and remember this is your element living it

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