You don’t need a bigger gun, you just need to keep practicing at a mile. The further you go, the more critical your wind reading skills become.
My .243AI/105AM has outshot a .338LapuaAI/300Scenar at a mile, due to shootability, familiarity with the load and DOPE, and the ability to easily spot shots through the scope due to much less concussive blast at the shot.
Your 1 mile range must be quite a bit different than my 1 mile range......
At 1000 yards my most accurate guns are a 6-284 with 107SMK's and a 6BR AI shooting 95gr VLD's........ at 1 mile at my range I have never spotted a miss with a 6mm bullet and I always have a spotter with an alpha spotting scope.
I have a 338LapuaAI shooting 300gr SMK's, I can always spot my own shot through my rifle scope. My 338 out shoots my 6's 10 times out of 10 at a mile
It’s quite possible. A 1-mile range with the target set amongst a lot of vegetation makes spotting misses with the smaller bullets difficult. Shooting against a disked crop field, rocky cliff face, etc, makes spotting misses easy, even at very long range and with small bullets. The ~3-second flight time makes it pretty easy to spot misses even with larger rifles, but not as easy as with rifles that smack you with less concussive blast, etc, as long as the bullet makes a big enough splash to be seen in the terrain behind your target
I’m a fan of the 7WSM with 180ELD or 195 EOL for extended distance as a pretty great compromise between ballistic efficiency and “splash on target”, and reasonable recoil and blast. Having said that, I have had good luck with 6mm, .224”, 6.5mm, .308”, .338” bullets, etc, as well, so I’m not offended if other guys have different preferences.
