Successful Assault on Wily Clay Pigeons

I am, apparetly, one of 3 people leaving Greenville/Spartanburg today...kind of like having my own toy airplane!

We were filming a sporting clays episode of SHOOTING GALLERY, something you guys have been asking me about for years. The big delay was finding an instructor I was comfortable with and felt would fit into the SG model, such as it is. I found Dan Schindler through his book, TO THE TARGET, and his work on mental training and was impressed with his wholistic view of the shooting sports.He proved to be ever bit as good — and better — than we expected. As always, my goal is take-home value, which I think you guys have come to expect.He is truluy a world-class instructor capable of taking complex actions and breaking them down into simple, repeatable pieces...and good heavens, doesn't sport shooting need more of that!

I think it's going to be a great episode, and the River Bend Sportsmen's Resort, where Dan's Paragon School of Sporting is HQ'ed, provides a beautiful backdrop. Of course, now the crew is spoiled and now expects all our filming to take place as beautiful resorts (not to mention the fact that Cheryl Schindler, a world-class photographer in her own right, prepared us a huge Southern dinner one night...that really spoiled 'em!).

When we finished up yesterday around lunchtime, we spent the rest of the drizzly afternoon breaking clays...I have to note that it turns out to be a lot more fun when the clays break! Hmmmm.

Check Dan out at Paragon's site.

Am sad to report that my very good friend Ed Head has left as GUNITE's Director of Operations. I believe Ed has been instrumental in bringing the great shooting academy back from the brink, and I'm sorry to see him go. He's still going to be teaching — in fact, we'll be filming a "cars, houses, and pocket pistols" episode of SG with Ed next month at GUNITE. And rest assured Ed will be a continuing presence on SG, DRTV and other projects.

All in all I'm pretty excited about how this season of SG is shaping up. You're going to see some cutting edge stuff that's not available anywhere else, again another of our goals. I'm also [leased with the birthing pains for GUN STORIES, scheduled for Q3 2011 premiere. Again, a series I've wanted to do for a long time. My plan, as always, is to reset the bar at a level my competitors can't reach. Works for me. I can announce that at this point, Steven Hunter and master gunsmith Bill Laughridge will be regulars. Haven't made a decision on host yet, but there are some verrrrrrrrrrrrrry interesting negotiations under way!

And speaking of Steve Hunter, there's a new Bob the Nailer coming in January, and Steve worked with SG Producer John Carter to do a video promo for the new book. I saw a rough cut last night, and it is just hysterical...I laughed out loud. The finished product will end up on YouTube and DRTV to promote the new book...I'll let you all know.

Had dinner with Ken Jorgensen from Ruger last night and we talked about wine and the new products coming from Ruger...MAJOR new products. I'll be shooting them in December, and you'll see them on DRTV quick like bunny.

I'm sorry I've been MIA over at DOWN RANGE...this is my second hellish season for filming and it's all I can do to keep running.