First step

So where do I want to be in a little less than a year?  I want to be in the best possible shape for my hunt when I arrive in Colorado.  I want the endurance and stamina to hunt hard all day, every day during my trip.  What does that mean for me?  I need to lose weight.  Every pound you lose is a pound you do not have to drag up the mountain.  I will need to work on my functional fitness, working on exercises and movements that will help me to excel in the high country.  Lastly, I will need to work on my lung capacity and endurance.  Not an easy task at 20 feet above sea level.

I have broken my plan into three phases.  The first phase will be six months long and the goals are getting in better shape and losing weight.  I joined a crossfit type workout class that runs four nights a week.  Goal is 5 workouts a week with the fifth one being a low impact cardio workout (Stairclimber, treadmill, a hike).  Cleaning up my diet will be a major part of the plan.  Discipline is the key to a clean diet.  Most of us know what to eat and what not to eat, we just need to do the right thing.  I find that writing down everything (EVERYTHING!) that goes in my pie hole is a great way to hold yourself accountable.  I use Myfitnesspal.com.  Its free, easy to use and has an endless database of food items to log.  I will blog food hints in the future.  Food and beer can be my weakness but I have developed strategies to keep it clean.

The second phase will be four months long and will add functional fitness and endurance exercise while losing the last bit of weight.

The third phase will be two months long and will focus on stamina, long capacity, and functional movements that will be needed in the high country.

Here we go!

Arrow Fletching and FOC. Learning from my mistakes.

My last Elk hunt was in 2017 and it was an archery hunt.  I learned a lot about arrows from that trip, unfortunately, most of the knowledge was learned after the hunt.  The arrows I use are BassPro Blackout X1 pro, which are made by Gold Tip and these arrows are supposed to be equal to the Gold Tip Hunter Pro.  My arrows were 31 inches with 100 grain Magnus Black Hornet broadheads and Lumenock nocks.  I did not make any changes to the arrows before the hunt. 
     I practiced extensively and my practice arrows were exactly the same weight as my hunting arrows with the only difference being the field point.  I was accurate out to 60 yards.  I also broadhead tuned my hunting arrows at 20 and 30 yards.  Only minor adjustments were needed to broadhead tune my arrows at those ranges.  I only did 20 and 30 yards because I was shooting in a suburban setting.   This was a mistake!
      Less than a week before my Elk hunt I traveled out to where I deer hunt to check game cameras and to check my broadheads out to 60 yards.  I shot one field point and one broadhead arrow at 20 and 30 yards and they were spot on.  At 30 yards my broadhead removed the fletching from the field point arrow.  I felt good about the results.   At 40 yards the broadhead arrows began hitting differently than my field points.  The field points were still hitting where I was aiming but the the broadheads were off by 3 to 6 inches without any trend on where they would hit.  The broadhead arrows would hit above, below, and each side of the field point.
     I moved back to 50 yards and this is where I could see a big change.  The field point hit my block target basically dead center.  My first broadhead arrow missed the target.  Because of the Lumenock, you could see the arrow corkscrew into the ground as it approached the target.  The next one corkscrewed above the target, glancing of the top and into the woods.  This was not good.  I only had four broadheads and the one that hit short hit a rock and was destroyed.  (Magnus replaces their broadheads free of charge)  I found the other arrow and the broadhead was fine.  I left feeling fairly dejected and and confused why the broadhead arrows were flying so erratically. 
     The next few days went quickly and there was not much I could do to change my setup.  My maximum range would be 40 yards for the hunt and that did become a factor during the hunt. 
     When I returned from the hunt I started to do research on arrows.  It searched many bowhunting sites and I found the first problem with my setup.  The Blackout X1 Pro comes with a straight fletching.  No offset or helical.  (Offset is where the fletching is angled a couple degrees to cause the arrow to spin.  Helical is where the fletching is curved at an angle which will cause a more aggressive spin)  You need at least an offset and most probably a helical fletching with a broadhead setup.  Offset or Helical is needed to spin the arrow and counteract the aerodynamic steering of the broadhead.  I bought a fletching jig and re-fletched all of my arrows with a 3 degree helical.
     I also learned about FOC (Forward of Center).  For good arrow flight it is recommended that a broadhead hunting arrow has 7 to 15% FOC.  Because of the 100 grain broadhead, a long arrow shaft, and a relatively heavy Lumenock, my arrows had and FOC of only 4%.  Think about a dart for a dartboard game.  Imagine if that dart did not have the weight forward but it was in the middle of the dart.  The dart would probably not fly very well.  The same is true for arrows.
     To change the FOC of my arrows I went to a 125 grain broadhead and added another 20 grains of weight behind the broadhead.  This changed the FOC to almost 10%.  The arrows are heavy now, about 490 grains, but with a 70 pd pull these arrows have a lot of KE (Kinetic Energy).
     My arrows are now accurate out to 60 yards with the broadhead. 
A couple of lessons.
1.  Learn about your equipment.  The archery pro shops are perfectly happy to sell you arrows without explaining changes you might need to make.  Knowing that you need a different fletching to shoot broadheads is not readily available, you need to do some research.
2.  Broadhead tune you bow out to your max range.
3.  Tune your bow and arrows at least a month before the hunt in case you need to research and make changes.  You will have time to do it.
Links:
http://www.magnusbroadheads.com/
http://www.bowhuntingmag.com/tactics/tactics_broadhead_flight/

Self Assessment

To embark on any journey you need to know where you are starting from.  An honest self assessment of where you are is crucial to set your path to reach your goals. 
An honest reflection of myself one year from my hunt is that I have gained weight.  Too much summer fun and too much beer.  Diet has not been solid and did I say too much beer?  I would not want to drag this Offensive Tackle looking body up and down the Rocky Mountains.  Obvious goal is to get leaner.  Every pound is one pound less I have to carry up the Mountain.   The good news I have enough time to do this gradually by cleaning up my diet (Paleo works for me) and drinking a lot less beer.

Everything is not bad though in my self assessment.  I have been working out.  At least 3 times a week and most of my workouts have been with a workout group doing TTS.  (Things That Suck: Burpees, Mountain Climbers, Bear crawls, etc.)  I have a decent level of fitness so working out will not hurt like someone who is completely starting over.  It is true though, that you can not out workout a bad diet.

I am also getting older.  Recovery takes a longer and joints hurt a lot more.  Training smart and listening to my body is important.  Attempting to lift too much weight or running too far could cause injury.  An injury would be a big set back.  It would take you off the path toward your goal while you recover, wasting time and effort.

Elk Hunting

I am not a good hunter, and especially a good elk hunter, but I am getting better.  I have never harvested an elk, but the adventure of the chase in the Rocky Mountains keeps calling me to try again.  There is so much more than just the kill, though hopefully I will harvest my elk someday.  I went to a college in western Colorado where I got to go Elk hunting for the first time.  I played college football so I was able to go exactly one day each year but it was exhilarating to me.  I was hooked.  I read Elk hunting books and scouted in the off season.  I was a subscriber to Bugle magazine starting in 1988. If I had stayed in Colorado, without a doubt I would have continued Elk hunting.

     I became a Marine Corps fighter pilot for twenty years.  I also got married and had kids.  I lived on the coasts of the United States and I was far away from the mountains and I was busy.  Elk hunting became a distant memory.  Over twenty years passed without learning, practicing, preparing and I forgot all I had learned about hunting.

     I retired in 2010 from the Marine Corps and moved to Virginia.  Two years later one of my best friends also retired from the Marines and invited me to go Elk hunting with him and his family up in Wyoming.  When I got up to the mountains I thought I was going to DIE!  I did not prepare at all.  My post retirement workout regime of some weightlifting and low intensity cardio at 15 feet above sea level was worthless.  That first hike up the mountain at 8,000 feet had my heart was beating out of my chest and I was sucking wind.  We saw some Elk and my buddy bagged a 6 x 6 the day after I left.  No doubt it was easier without me sucking in all the pine needles off the mountain and breaking every branch in sight.  Being up in the mountains and experiencing the chase, I was hooked again.

     I went back the next year.  I had changed my workouts to include hiking, some running, and the StairMaster.   It was not good enough.  I was still sucking wind and breaking branches.  My buddy harvested a spike on the first hour of the first day.  He uses the meat all year long.  We saw elk, but no more shots.  The three feet of snow also hindered us.

    I went back a third year.  This time I had added weighted hikes.  I found the one hill in all of tidewater and hiked it.  I added a lot of weight training for my legs and a ton of time on the StairMaster.  I was better prepared physically but I there was definitely more I could do.  I still was not a good hunter either. The season was hot and dry along with a ton of people (hunters and non hunters) in the woods.  We did not see a shooter elk, much less harvest one.  The out of state costs and human pressure in the area made me reevaluate hunting in Wyoming.  Someday I will go hunt Wyoming again.

    The next year I got into deer hunting in Virginia.  Hunting from a tree stand is not nearly as exciting as hunting for Elk and the physical requirements are not even close.  I did get a compound bow and bow hunting has become an addiction for me.  I love bow hunting even though I am not that good at it.  I have learned a ton about bow hunting over the last few years (What I have learned will be a future post).  I also learn every time I go into the woods.  Analyzing each day and hunt to try and become a better hunter. 

    A couple years ago I found out that an old friend of mine was an elk guide at an outfitter in Colorado.  I got all the information and surprisingly the cost was reasonable.   I signed up for a bow hunt during the rut in 2017.  I had over a year to prepare and I worked hard.  I got into High Intensity Interval training (HIIT).  I followed a couple of hunting training regimes.  I ran hills with 40 pounds in my backpack.  Countless hours with the pack and Training mask on the StairMaster.   I lifted and ran sprints.  I showed up and I was prepared.   I was able to hunt hard the entire 5 days of the hunt.  The hunt was epic.  I saw Elk everyday but was unable to get a good shot.  My lack of bow hunting experience also did not help.  I learned so much and I plan to apply the lessons as I prepare for my trip in 2019.