Caribou Gear Tarp

Shooting technique

Don Fischer

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Jun 27, 2017
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Was reading in the long range shooting thread and got me to thinking, sorry! When I get a new rifle I generally re-bed it in liquid steel. I believe liquid steel or even epoxy make's a much better fit than any machine can make. But also know the best made and best adjusted rifle out there is no better than the person shooting it. These days it seem's the become proficient all ya might need is a bi-pod, don't think so but then never used one.

While in the service stationed in Europe I worked the base firing range and taught shooting. The service taught me to shoot first though. One of the things you can't do qualifying with rifle is mount a bi-pod. So to shoot well technique must be learned. The one huge draw back most often found was guy's hadn't a clue there was stress in their body that made their shooting worse. Easiest place to see it is in prone position then sitting and then kneeling. Hard to see off hand! laying in prone position we'd have the shooter's line the sight's up on the aiming point and then have them close their eye's and relax. Really relax in in a few seconds have them re-open their eye's and see where they were aiming. Most shooter's would find that the sight's had drifted to one side or another of the aiming point. It's cause by tension in the lower back. To correct it if your off the the left side, move your whole body a bit to the left, think that's what it was, that was back in the late 1960's I was doing that.. Doing that lessens the tension in the small of the back and when the tension is gone, you re-open your eyes and the aiming point hasn't moved. Do the same thing in sitting and kneeling to clear the tension from your body. You don't do that and your actually fighting that tension and it will ruin your ability to group shots. In each position your entire body turns into a shooting platform. Prone is most accurate because most the platform is on the ground. Next is sitting, very stable but a good part of the platform has been raised from the ground. Then kneeling as you now have even less platform on the ground. raise the platform up and it's similar to raising anything up. the higher something get's the harder it becomes to stabilize it. You use a bi-pod I strongly suspect the best position to shoot from is prone and worst is kneeling or off hand it you have a bi-pod to shoot off hand from. The base keeps moving up the becomes less steady. Steady the base and shooting improves's.Really show well off hand. Hold your elbows away from your body and shoot. Next move your elbows into your body and shoot again, shooting improves Last, move your whole body to some kind of solid support and once again the shooting improves. In each cash from prone on, all your actually doing is lessening the base, your body, and very important, you relieve the stress in your lower back, steadying up the base. You really want to be better at long range shooting it has more to do with your technique than your equipment.
 
Cool. Prone with a bipod and rear squeeze bag, nearly eliminates any influence posture has on the shot. Only point of contact is trigger finger and shoulder at recoil, short of packing in a lead sled I don’t know if a steadier shooting position.
 
I concentrate on technique when I can. Sometimes in the field it all goes out the window. mtmuley
 
Oh man. Beep ur horn to get em to stop . Hang that thing out the window over the mirror and let her rip tater chip.
 
In the field it certainly can go out the window. About trigger press. We had a short program to work on guy's trigger pull. Stand off hand and mount the rifle. Now have someone balance a quarter on the end of the barrel. Try and pull the trigger without dropping the quarter. Some guy's just never seem to be able to do that and of course most of them had a terrible time qualifying!
 
Oh man. Beep ur horn to get em to stop . Hang that thing out the window over the mirror and let her rip tater chip.

lol. Part of me thinks your joking but the screen name makes me think your not. Probably urban legend but I heard a story about 3 generations of guys from one family who all shot the robo deer up in that country. Sounds like a common shooting position for the area.
 
I teach youth shooting sports. I teach them that the three most important aspects of accurate shooting are: breathing, natural point of aim, and trigger squeeeeeeze. These are more important than sight picture, even though that’s counter-intuitive
 
lol. Part of me thinks your joking but the screen name makes me think your not. Probably urban legend but I heard a story about 3 generations of guys from one family who all shot the robo deer up in that country. Sounds like a common shooting position for the area.
It was all jokes. But I have heard the same thing from a few people about the robo deer up this way. Always made me wonder what in the hell they were thinking . Lol sorry for screwing around on your post man.must have been the lunch beers.
 
They teach this to snipers and military police in the Marine Corps and the Army and in infantry rifle marksmanship. There are techniques including using the improvised sling to steady your aim in the kneeling and standing positions. They also teach breathing techniques so that your aiming point moves in a perfect vertical up and down and then time your shot to when your aiming point just hits the 12 o'clock position on your target as you begin to inhale. I was taught not to hold my breath because that causes you to flinch and makes it hard to maintain proper sight picture but instead to time the trigger pull to match your breathing and where the aiming point crosses the 12 o'clock point or the target or your kill zone for wild game.
 
I was and am a dedicated archer before doing a lot of rifle shooting. Shooting off hand with a bow is really the only way you can do it without resorting to the Crossbow/gun mounted on a bipod. I feel I can hold a bow steadier aiming at a target at 100 yds than I can a rifle offhand. One of the reasons for this is your body or trunk muscles are loaded while holding the bow at draw. You cant really do the same thing with a rifle as you are not parallel with the bullet path when using the gun. You have to turn more into the gun so it has a shoulder to lean into. I have watched some videos and read about offhand shooting and they describe the closing your eyes, adjusting your shooting position method. It really wasn't working for me. I think a lot of people learn to brace the forearm elbow on the torso to help stabilize the rifle. The palma rest comes to mind, if that is the right way to say it. I found that if I identified my correct angle to stand, I could lift my elbows up until they were even with the rifle bore or were tensed, I was a lot less likely to wiggle all over the darn place.
I have bipods on all my rifles that are designated to shoot beyond 150 yds. A lot of places, the terrain does not allow for the prone(it is the most accurate) so i end up sitting behind the rifle/bipod. This is a pretty secure shooting position. If in the woods, I try to sit behind a sapling I can brace my hand on and rest the forearm on. This is pretty accurate as well. Your mileage may vary.
 
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