had been part of the 2008 bus ride—says the team practically begged to be reinstated. “We met with deans and higher-ups twice a week. Eventually they re- alized they had something they didn’t want to let go of. National championships look good for a school.”
Needing a coach with spot- less credentials,
Lindenwood
found Dulohery. A highly deco- rated shooter who competed in the Athens Olympics and had won fi ve world championships, he was nearing the end of his commitment to the Army Marsk- manship Unit. Dulohery inspired Linden-
wood to reactivate the team, mi- nus those involved in the drunk driving incident. An athletic di- rector served as interim coach for a year (he guided the Lions to another national title) while Dulohery fi nished his military commitment. Then Lindenwood became the Dulohery show, a tighter, stricter program. In fact, the week before the 2013 national championships, he suspended four Lindenwood shooters for
“violating team
rules.” One was a competitor he was counting on to score crucial points in San Antonio. “College is about experiencing life as a young person,” says Dulohery, a 48-year-old disciplinarian who knows when to have a soft heart. “I tell them if you’re going to do something stupid, be smart about it. If they can take care
of themselves like a family, they won’t let themselves get into that kind of trouble. “I really enjoy seeing people laughing and having a good time,” he continues. “To see that emotion, that’s my calling. At my age, after everything I’ve done, I get to feel what it feels like to be a twenty-year-old kid winning a national championship. I’ve been blessed to be around these kids. Some of them I love like an adopted son or daughter, but it’s gotta be that tough love.” In the days leading up to the Dulohery’s competi-
nationals,
tive drive is apparent. “Ten is the focus, ten consecutive titles,” he says while walking around Gate- way Gun Club, just a few miles from campus. Until recently, Lindenwood’s shooting team had to make an hour-and- a-half round-trip from St. Charles into St. Louis to practice. But several years ago a group of private investors re- built a fl ood-damaged shooting range across the Missouri River in Bridgeton. Because Dulohery is an old shooting buddy of one of the owners, he was able to ar- range matters so that the team is now among the gun club’s larg- est clients. The range’s facilities allow Lindenwood to practice all the games they shoot in compe- tition. Its proximity means shoot- ers can leave Lindenwood’s cam- pus—a beautifully manicured Ivy League–looking spread without all the old—and be fi ring at the
sky in about ten minutes. The Gold team, primarily the compet- itive traveling squad, practices on Mondays and Wednesdays and, in the spring lead-up to nationals, throws in a third day weekly. The Black team, mostly shooters who would like to be on the Gold team, practices on Thursdays. Lindenwood University insists that all fi rearms be securely stored. The school bought a bank adjacent to campus, and students’ guns—many of which are provided or sold at discount to the better shooters by Krieg- hoff, Browning, Perazzi, and other sponsors—are locked in the vault each night. Shooters can fetch
their fi rearms and practice on their own during specifi c hours, but all guns are signed out and back into the vault daily. Although some Lions work out on their own, most of Linden- wood’s shooters have no formal training regimen that doesn’t consist of trying to consistently shatter clay pigeons and win championships. They don’t do jumping jacks or push-ups. They don’t run stairs. They don’t do squats. They shoot, and they work on strengthening their eye muscles.
If suspending shooters before the 2013 championships made Dulohery restrategize before San Antonio, so did some weak out-
March 2014 | USA Shooting News 49
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