Gun Salesman of the Year

[reverend]

not many creatures there tarrant most of the targets were falling plates or mass targets, im interested in the ability of the shooter not the target!

the point is shooting accurately over that distance takes consumate skill, its incredibly difficult and takes a degree of natural ability which cannot be taught, you either have it or you dont, I have been shooting since I was eight, I have won competitions with everything from fullbore rifles to shotguns and air rifles , yet the furthest I have ever been able to put rounds on target accurately and consistently is 900m, what those guys are achieving is incredible!!

the skill of shooting is not throwing huge amounts of ammunition at big close targets (the fun of that soon wears off) its in the ability to hit a small target at extreme ranges in non ideal conditions, at 1300m a powerfull .360 round can deviate huge distances due to wind and temperature before you add in the gyroscopic effect of a spinning bullet and ballistic drop!

I can highly reccomend the sport of target shooting to anyone, even an air rifle is a very difficult tool to use at the limits of its ballistic performance, maybe you could give it a go one day and see how difficult it is!

[tarrant]

I don't doubt the talent and effort of a skilled shooter. Like all sportsmen who achieve excellence, and those that seek it, I admire them immensely.

But I saw this chap playing with the telescopic sight. It appearers to be for more than simply seeing a target since he was adjusting two sets of dials.

I don't know if he was using a tripod or other means of rest.

But that hardly seems sporting.

[Libby]

I appreciate circumstances are different in the USA regarding the use of guns and gun ownership. I think it's wrong to highlight tragedies like school shootings over there, thankfully these shootings are rare. In the UK we have our own problems with weapons - knife crimes are increasing daily. This is the main problem we face over here.

[reverend]

the Dials, are the turrets which adjust the crosshair position relative to the trajectory of the bullet, what he was doing was dialling in the amount of correction he considered neccessary for the wind (left to right) bullet drop due to range (up down) temprature, gyroscopic drift and type of ammunition, thats part of the skill involved understanding how much to adjust for those parameters!

once he has made those adjustments he must then controll his heart beat and rate, his breathing, his weapon hold and stance, any slight and i mean tiny error and at that range the shot will miss by yards, even if using a bipod its incredibly difficult to put all those parameters together and pull off the perfect shot.

I have seen competent shots miss at 300m let alone 1300, its similar to attempting a hole in one in golf at 400 yards!!

[tarrant]

Understood.