30 minutes
With the template and blank together, I cut off most of the waste at the bandsaw then refined my lines even more at the sander. Then I headed to the router table to flush trim the blank to the template and drilled out the hole in the pommel at the drill press with a 1 1/8" forstner bit which is the O.D. of a piece of 1" copper pipe. I cut the pipe with a metal cutting bandsaw but an angle grinder, hacksaw, or pipe cutter would also work.
Here’s a video on the whole process.