Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Competitive Shooting Biathlon for kids/ advice wanted

Here's the story: In a couple of weeks my 8 year old granddaughter is coming to spend a few days. She loves to ski, downhill and cross country, she's very athletic. This past summer, when she stayed with us for a while, she found she really liked shooting the little "Chipmunk" .22 I've had around for the grandkids who are too small to shoot full sized rifles well. Got a brainstorm, I'll fix up a little biathlon course for her out at the farm. I'll scale down the distances of course, probably have her shooting at hanging clay pigeons rather than regular biathlon targets, and I'll hold off getting her an Anschutz until she finds out she really wants to pursue this. (If by chance she really did take off and want to do this seriously she'd be all set when she's a little older, she lives in Lake Placid where coaching and facilities exist.) Anyway, not having any experience myself with biathlon, is there anybody out there who does, who might offer some advice? I just want the kids to have fun, but would like to avoid any mistakes. Thoughts?

I never shot biathlon, but I was a varsity smallbore rifle position shooter in college-so take it for what it's worth...

At 8 years old, focus on safety and marksmanship fundamentals (sight picture, sling use, maybe one session with open sights, one with peeps, one with scope-to get her acquainted to those platforms-who knows, many options). Don't ski with a loaded rifle. Load at the shooting area. Keep the clay pigeons close, to reward the shooter with a break ( ie 10 yards or 50 ft ? ). Maybe post one paper target (like a 50 ft pistol target with 8" black rings) for a 5 shot group/score, so to give an idea of how the rifle is sighted in.

Focus on prone position (more hits = more fun) for about 75% of the shots. Mix in a little offhand, for comparison, and future training.

Maybe have a "shooting session" before and/or after the biathlon mix, to reinforce fundamentals (and have fun).

Don't wear her out with skiing. You want her to enjoy the activity. Try it yourself. Learning by example is both memorable, and fun for both of you. It's a lot different shooting with a calm heart rate, compared to a heart that is pounding.

Keep it simple, and make it fun. Remember, she is eight. That means you are dealing with a person with VERY short attention span. Keep the number of "training points" to a minimum-but be resolute in reinforcement, and be encouraging, supportive, and patient. You want her to come back, not swear off the activity based on unrealistic goals (or anger, not implying you would do this-just covering the bases).

While I can claim I've outshot US Olympic Gold Medal Rimfire shooters in smallbore rifle (which is a good memory for me), my most fun shooting was when I started to learn how to shoot by my Dad when I was about 10 years old. We'd walk out behind our cabin in the Catskill Mountains (NY State) during the winter, and put down a plastic table cloth and a blanket to lay on in the snow. We would then take turns shooting icicles that hung from the rock outcroppings (from frozen spring drips) with a Savage model 24 22/410 and single shot 22 bolt (Erma). It was fun seeing the reactive targets break with a hit-but it was grand just being with my Dad and shooting with him.

I hope your "junior biathlon" is as fun and memorable as my icicle shooting gallery time.

Maybe you can make some colored ice cubes as targets (food coloring, orange, red, green etc), and put a piece of string in each for hanging. Try hanging some charcoal briquettes with kite string from a branch/board. We do this at our winter shoots at my muzzle loading club. Fun. We sometimes use a "clay pigeon board." You used whatever size sheet of plywood you can find (2'x4', 4'x4') and put in two nails about 1-2 inches apart on a horizontal line (so that you can place a clay pigeon on the two nails. The nails are hammered in so that about 3/4" or so (not critical) of the nail is exposed. You can place these two nails every 8 inches or so in a horizontal line and make a very nice reactive target zone.

Maybe have this as the range, and then have her ski a loop of some distance (25 yards?) to come back to the target zone, and fire another 5 shots or so from prone (put down a blanket for her to lay on, no need to freeze the child).

There are plenty of links for biathlon on the internet for more formal info. I currently live in Maine, and they have a strong biathlon program in the northern part of the state. Here's the link. Drop them a line for specifics. Good luck.

http://www.mainewsc.org/teams_biathlon.html

Buttstock - You brought up some good points. Thanks for weighing in.

I raced biathlon in CO for a number of years. I shot well but I never was a fast enough skiier to be seriously competitive. In the long run, being an excellent nordic skiier is the more important part of the equation.

When last I knew, our kids program started at 8 years old. The children's program was shot with air rifles at much shorter range than the adults. The children were not allowed to carry their air rifles. Their air rifles were left racked at the range and the kids would ski up, take their air rifle, get into position, load and shoot. It has been a few years but as I recall even somewhat older kids, who were old enough to use a 22 and shoot the adult targets still had to leave their rifles in the rack. I may be completely wrong on this but I think in our program you had to be 16 to carry the rifle (you also had to pass a USBA safety course).

For a child learning to do Biathlon, it is important to learn to ski well. Learning the fundamentals of rifle marksmanship is important too. Safety is paramount. It is also important for a child in the early stages to have fun and not take things too seriously. Biathlon is hard because to be competitive you need to be a really good skiier and then you need to be able to stop and do a difficult fine motor skill with your heart rate up. It's fun but it takes tons of work to be good. I saw children with unreasonable expectations drop the sport. At a young age it's probably better to enjoy skiing, enjoy shooting, learn to do both as well as possible but to realize that it's a hard sport and it takes time to be good.

By the way, I'm not sure how familiar with Nordic skiing you are but Biathlon is freestyle, meaning that you can ski classic or you can skate but everyone who is competitive is skating. If she really wants to do Biathlon she needs to skate, if she isn't already (if she downhills she can probably skate a tiny bit since that's how you cross the flats to get in the lift line). In the long run skiing and cross training for skiing are where you spend the most time in training for biathlon. Also, in the long run, if you want a little course on your property you would probably need a snowmobile and something to pack with because skating takes a wide packed track.

I'm writing this rather quickly but hopefully that helps some. It's a fun sport. I met nice people. But in the long run it's lots of hard work.