This past October I, along with my good friend, Zach Hein, of CZ-USA, embarked on an elk-hunting trip together near Gunnison, Colorado. We had both hunted together before. We successfully hunted black bears in Idaho and upland game throughout Zach’s home state of Kansas. Both Zach and I have hunted elk before, but never together. Zach has killed an elk. Me? Not so much.

By Jay Pinsky

The author headed to Colorado with high hopes of getting his first elk, but the real trophy ended up being his newfound freedom to push himself beyond his injuries’ limits.

It’s after midnight here in Virginia as I reflect upon my Colorado elk hunting adventure with CZ-USA’s Zach Hein. Let me make this easy for the glory-hounds, I didn’t shoot my elk. I never even saw one.

What I did experience though may well be the most important lesson of my life.

You see, a few years ago I suffered a neck injury that caused quite a bit of muscle and nerve damage to the entire right side of my body. After several years of physical therapy, I reached what I thought was my fullest potential physically and mentally. I had learned that, for better or for worse, I had a new limit to what I could and couldn’t do, dreams be damned. But, I’d soon learn Colorado didn’t care.

Boundaries are good. They keep us safe, sane, and focused.

Yeah, about that …

The rugged terrain near Gunnison, Colo., doesn’t give a damn about your feelings, your heart, your history, or your dreams. It doesn’t care if you deserve success. Chances are you’re going to experience failure, and plenty of it because defeat is the number one export of the Rio Grande National Forest.

I wanted to see an elk. I wanted to kill an elk. Zach did too, both for me and for him. Colorado didn’t care, and it had other plans.

Our base camp with High Country Outfitters sat at about 9500 feet. That’s about 9499 feet higher than I’m used to here in Virginia. I did train though. I swam, hiked, stair-stepped, ran, hiked some more, and weight-lifted. Knowing full-well that I had my limit due to my 2017 neck surgery, I figured I’d go to Colorado and do my best. Zach knew my limit and we felt confident, even limited, that my best would be enough to succeed.

Colorado didn’t care.

The first day of elk hunting at 11,500 feet had me dragging my suddenly lead-filled bones up and down the mountains so slowly that I was sure I was time traveling back to the 1800’s. My poor guide, Edwin Lilly, pushed me so hard that by the late afternoon my body just stopped. Well past my expected limit, my body and my mind decided that this new boundary was just too difficult and that given my muscle and nerve damage I had reached the end of my potential, and it just wasn’t good enough.

Colorado didn’t care.

Too tired to cry about defeat, my body stumbled back to camp resolved that I had given it my all. I’d never hiked higher, farther, or harder than I did that day. I held my head up thinking I had done my best and elk hunting in Colorado was something I just couldn’t do.

Exhausted and content that he had reached his physical limit due to his injuries from the military, the author resolved himself to thinking his best wasn’t good enough.

Colorado didn’t care.

We still had a full week of hunting left …

Colorado didn’t care.

I went back out. This time I was paired with the young and Mother Teresa-level of patience having elk guide, Michael Quesinberry. Knowing my limits, I hiked. I figured we’d take things easier. After all, I couldn’t do the hiking I needed to do to find an elk.

Colorado didn’t care, and neither did Michael – thank God.

He knew I wanted an elk, and he pushed ever so slightly hour by hour as we went up and down the most rugged and steep country my eyes and lungs have ever experienced. We did more than I thought we could, or I should. I didn’t complain. In fact, I never complained. Why would I? I had an injury, an excuse, a disclaimer as to why I didn’t have to succeed and for more than a year it helped me feel comfortable with being a little bit less than what I thought I could be.

Colorado didn’t care.

By mid-afternoon I was hiking higher and faster than on day one. I was still slower going up than a boulder falling down mind you, but that wasn’t the point.

Michael knew I could do more, and somehow over the next few days he managed to prove to me something I couldn’t prove to myself – there are no boundaries.

Still, Colorado didn’t care.

On day three, like clockwork, my body acclimated to the high altitude and my body celebrated by powering itself up and down the mountains at a steady but still painfully slow pace. I didn’t know it yet, but I was moving faster by the hour. Michael knew it and slowly picked up his pace as the day went on.

By the end of day four I was climbing so fast and so sure that my guide stopped, turned around and asked, “You find a secret stash of cocaine I don’t know about Jay?” It was the proudest moment of my life.

The author, left, and his inspired elk guide, Michael Quesinberry, who helped him discover that the only limit his body has are in his mind.

I was keeping up with him for the first time all week, and I was still getting stronger. My injury wasn’t a limit anymore. It was a memory, and a distant one at that. Later that night Zach Hein told me not only was I keeping up with the guide, but I was moving faster and with a greater sense of purpose than he had ever seen from me. So much for boundaries, huh?

I’d finish the week strong bouncing out of camp without ever seeing an elk, yet I was never prouder. Did I climb like the elk guides? No. Those guys are half man, half mountain goat. But I did climb. I’ll climb again too, this time higher, faster, and better than I ever have before because I know the only limit my body has is the one I think it does.

Still Colorado doesn’t care. And for the first time in my life, neither do I.

I can do anything. Hell, maybe one day I’ll even kill an elk.