Just shot sporting clays for the 2nd. It was a "fun match" of 100 rounds and it was just a great, fun filled event! The match directors said they set up a fairly easy course (I love this statement!!) and it couldn't have been a better shoot. Lots of challenging targets, a good group to shoot with (even some mild razzing), great scenery overlooking the Thomson River Valley, terrific weather and a good lunch afterwards. I even bettered my first score a bit. Things just don't get much better than that!
When the smoke cleared I started thinking and realized that there were about a thousand questions needed answering and that I needed a strategy to approach the game. I know I'll shoot it again. One problem, of course, is that the course can change. This is a large attraction of the sport and I think probably one of its major challenges too. The fact the course can change and the various stands represent very different challenges demands one be flexible, and it will require a lot of shooting to start doing well. But it also started me thinking about what chokes and loads one should use and so on. I used modified and improved modified chokes this time around and didn't change at all. I'm sure next time around that I'm going to have at least one improved cylinder or skeet choke mounted because there weren't any truly distant birds or long range crossers. Still, there were people changing at each stand and people not changing at all. Does anyone have an opinion about what approach a person should take to the choke end of the game? Another really big question for me was deciding how one should approach shooting a particular set up. Sometimes you can watch the more experienced shooters and get some idea and this is good, but our group was puzzled once in awhile. We had one set up, for example, where both birds were going away at an angle on the right side, and it took us about three times at bat to figure out which one to shoot first. They had two very close, and close running, rabbits that completely devastated me. I don't know how many shots I put in between the two and behind the last. It felt like I was closing my eyes (I'm sure they were crossed too!!!
) and pulling the trigger by the end. (First lesson for me was not to rely on rabbit for food, that's for sure!) The teal were a challenge I did better on, but it would be nice to know how to shoot a double. I seem to get one or the other but not both quite often. Of course, there are as many questions as there are setups, and it is going to be fun putting in the time to get better. But it would be nice to have some idea of how to approach various stands too or what to think about when approaching a new one. A good day...hope the same for you...fred
When the smoke cleared I started thinking and realized that there were about a thousand questions needed answering and that I needed a strategy to approach the game. I know I'll shoot it again. One problem, of course, is that the course can change. This is a large attraction of the sport and I think probably one of its major challenges too. The fact the course can change and the various stands represent very different challenges demands one be flexible, and it will require a lot of shooting to start doing well. But it also started me thinking about what chokes and loads one should use and so on. I used modified and improved modified chokes this time around and didn't change at all. I'm sure next time around that I'm going to have at least one improved cylinder or skeet choke mounted because there weren't any truly distant birds or long range crossers. Still, there were people changing at each stand and people not changing at all. Does anyone have an opinion about what approach a person should take to the choke end of the game? Another really big question for me was deciding how one should approach shooting a particular set up. Sometimes you can watch the more experienced shooters and get some idea and this is good, but our group was puzzled once in awhile. We had one set up, for example, where both birds were going away at an angle on the right side, and it took us about three times at bat to figure out which one to shoot first. They had two very close, and close running, rabbits that completely devastated me. I don't know how many shots I put in between the two and behind the last. It felt like I was closing my eyes (I'm sure they were crossed too!!!
