Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Tips for fixing the shooter........

I shoot prarie dogs all spring through hunting season.
Follow through, not picking your head up, breath control are all important. That and a good trigger set light covers a variety of ills.

Watch them shoot….how they set up, etc. Are they muscling the rifle into position? What are they doing with the off hand? Are they holding down on the scope on one shot and gripping the stock on the next? Are the sling swivel studs contacting the bags? Is the end of the pistol grip hitting their rear bag? Is their head jerking up as soon as they shoot?

You can learn a lot just by watching them shoot. The hard part is getting them to change old habits and pay attention to the details when you recommend a better way.

When we were learning to shoot centerfire rifles dad would always load the gun for us. Reason being is that he would slip in an empty cartridge at random to check our shooting form, follow through, and if we were flinching. If a flinch ever happened we were done shooting for the day. Then we would be back on with a .22 LR only the next time out.
I did this with my brother in law when I was doing load development for his .30-06. I had taken the rifle with me to do the load testing and had a couple different loads that were shooting MOA or better at 200 yards for a 10 shot group. I sent him with the one that had a higher velocity. He called me up and told me that his rifle wasn't shooting worth a hoot - 6" groups at 200 yards. We went back to the range to figure out the problem. I sat down with the rifle and my loads and proceeded to put five shots touching at 100 yards. Then I loaded the magazine and put an empty in the chamber and handed him the rifle. He settled in at the bench and I quietly started recording him on my camera phone. Flinched at the first trigger pull. He looked at me funny, recocked the rifle and settled in again as if it was a bad primer strike. Flinched again. I told him I must have not put a loaded round in the chamber. Oops. He shot a four shot group at 100 yards that was around 4". He said, "See, the rifle doesn't shoot." I showed him the video and the problem. He's one of those guys who can never be wrong, so if I had told him he was flinching he would have denied it. But it's hard to argue with a video. Then we talked about good shooting technique. He still insisted it wasn't the main problem, but I sat down and shot another group under an inch at 100 yards and told him that his flinching is the problem. He didn't like that very much.

Tips for hitting what he's shooting at. Not a world class olympic shooter, just the average Joe. A few tips to shrink his groups is all I had in mind. Although I have seen a few tips already that were good to be reminded of.

We had no wounded animals this year, at least that would be admitted too, and only one miss, moving target, at 60 yrds. The group did well. Most are area shooters, not spot shooters, therefore small group size dosen`t matter. It`s in the shoulder area, or right behind the shoulder that is aimed at, maybe.

I have no argument with the OP`s basic premise..in fact don`t think it belabored enough by our gun writers. The equipment, no matter the gimmicks, performs only as well as the operator.

I'm self taught so I've made lots of mistakes I practice as if Im getting ready for a hunt as I most often am. I handle a rifle every day, dry fire and I shoot a lot mostly 300-400 yards. I don't use bipod. But shoot with a sling from field positions. I'm surprised no has mentioned neutral point of aim every position has one, not sure off a bench? Before I take a shot when I feel I'm ready I close my eyes and take a deep breath let it our and open my eyes, if the reticle moved move your body position to correct it. This may be out of line with this thread as he was asking about small groups. This has worked for me and more satisfying to me. I'm not a long range hunter, but deer at 400 yards is a big target

One good tip I think is missed on many is trying to look at the target through the scope during the shot process. It is good practice to shift your focus to the reticle itself until the shot breaks. This tends to help on field accuracy, especially on game as we all tend to get a little too target focused and fail to recognize the drift of our reticle from our intended point of impact.

Shoot. When I watch a guy take 10 minutes to get all settled in for each shot, I know bad things are about to happen.

We all want to think we have been at this a long time and have it all figured out but if you get the chance and can find a clinic or instructor to give you some tips it is usually money very well spent. When I used to shoot high power the Army Reserve shooting team would put on 2 or 3 day clinics that were outstanding especially for hunting/field position shooting.

Quite often guys at the range ( especially new style tactical types) take offense when they ask what is going on with their rifle, and I tell them there is nothing wrong with the gear at all, but to go to first their form and then their wind call.
I was told the other day that I handicap myself by shooting a 308 with a sling and irons instead of using a big scope, bipod and a braked rifle.
The explanation of shooting within a specific discipline's requirements and trying to shoot well within that discipline went right over the the guy's head.

Equipment will only take you so far , of course, then it is entirely up to the shooter, and the only way to get better is to log every shot and pay attention to what is happening within the log book read, take seminars, ask questions and change what you are doing wrong.

A few years back we had a match with very high winds and bad visibility, basically the condition was changing drastically with every shot.
the really good shooters had scores lower than their normal averages, but not major.
The inexperienced guys ? well, let's just say the excuses were pretty comical! :>)
Cat

A lot of champions use electronic trainers such as the SCATT. I do not believe there is any better way to train and break bad habits.




The different colors of the trace represent different portions of shot execution, divided up by time. For instance, green is the approach and red is the follow-through. Blue is the triggering action, i.e. trigger control. The colors are user customizable.



This does not, however, eliminate the need for live fire if you intend to shoot outdoors. Live fire is a must for wind reading skills. There, the new E-targets (Silver Mountain, etc) and Shot Marker cameras are extremely effective.

I might mention that shooting with both eyes open is also very useful for watching wind-flags at the range, or "natural" wind indicators when hunting.