Gun Speed

Its odd how the learning process works. In the beginning I had to learn how to do the basics and in the process I was told about gun speed. At the time I wasn't really ready to listen and preferred to apply physics to the task.

As time rolls on and I have learnt more about the intricacy's of clay pigeon shooting I have begun to realise the point of what I was repeatedly told!

I am at a point and in reality have been for a while now whereby I enter a stand and quite often I will kill the first birds, even if they look fast and tricky. This often happens when they take me by surprise and I have to rush to catch up with the target. In this situation I clearly sweep through the target, using gun speed and hand eye coordination to kill the target. On the next target however I "see" the same picture as I saw in shot 1, but without the same gun speed so as a result I miss.

In my head gun speed has the result of "flicking" the shot as it leaves the gun, almost spraying it in a horizontal cigar pattern. Whether this actually happens or not I am still not totally sure, but that is what I feel happens. As a consequence it has got to be easier to kill targets as your shot is spread over a larger area. This is perhaps why it sometimes feels like I killed a target I didn't even see properly...... though perhaps not!

When I "do the maths" and apply physics to shooting I have far less gun speed so I need to be far more accurate as my shot is flying in a much tighter ball than if it was flicked with gun speed................ this might be pure conjecture on my part?!

My goal is going to be to concentrate on pushing through a shot with my shoulder and right arm in order to increase my gun speed where required. When I am coached, the times when I have hit birds when told to push with my shoulder and "attack" the bird means that it is something that I need to practice more. I need to lose some of my analytical approach on faster birds. The trick I suppose is knowing which targets to use which technique on.

Bank Holiday Monday 100 Bird Competition

I am getting frighteningly close to achieving my goal of a 70 by the middle of June. On what was a wet and windy Monday I hit 65 which put me 3rd equal in the Sporting Targets shoot for which i picked up my first ever prize money.

It was very satisfying to see some improvement in my shooting, although I am kicking myself a bit as I was careless with my concentration a couple of times and dropped birds as a consequence. If I had only applied myself and not allowed distractions to affect me then I would have had a great competition. I am allowing myself the next Sporting Targets shoot to achieve my goal which will be on the third Sunday of June.

The problem with winning prize money is that I took it straight into the Gun Shop and spent it on essentials!

Sporting Targets 100 Bird Competition

It is a wet and windy bank holiday monday morning, Sporting Targets have their monthly
Clay Pigeon Shooting competition on today and the weather is just like you might expect a week before June in the UK!

Some time ago I set myself the target of shooting over 70 / 100 on a registered shoot before my birthday. Sadly I have yet to achieve this feat, the best I have done is a 64 in Oxford, and a 59 last week at Kibworth. I was given a 66 at Grange Farm, but that was a counting error to which I have set them straight....... surrendering =3rd place prize money in the process!

I now have only a couple of weeks left to hit my target and I will be away for the first week in June so it is looking increasingly unlikely. I am going to count up to the next Sporting Targets
shoot which is just after my birthday, but I still seem to be lacking the requisite skills to hit a 70.

I am hoping for at least a mid 60's round today, if I 2nd barrel the first bird if required it should up my score a bit so that is one tactic I will employ.

Kibworth 100 bird competition

Last Sunday I shot at Kibworth with my good friend Andy Clifton from Sporting targets Clay Pigeon Shooting Ground. It is always good to tag along with him as he does push me hard. I scored a 59 which was ok for the first time at that ground. I had been hoping for a 65+ if I was honest, but there were plenty of targets that I usually struggle with so I suppose I shouldn't be too disappointed.

Clay Pigeon Shooting boils down to two simple components in my opinion, firstly you need reasonable hand eye coordination, but that alone isn't enough. If good hand eye coordination was all it took we would all get straights every round. Second is the ability to read a target. This is the more important skill in my opinion as there are many factors to consider.

There are only 6 basic types of target, incoming, going away, crossers, quartering, teal and rabbits, everything else is a combination of these. My greatest problem is what I call 3 dimentional birds, namely a target that is not just going up, or crossing left to right, but the curling quartering going away type of swine that they put on against a sloping background for good measure.

I need to put systems in place to look firstly where the trap is, where the clay lands, its speed, if you can see more face early or late etc etc...... all these factors are things that currently I am not paying enough attention to and it is costing me points.

I am shooting the 100 bird sporting Competition at Sporting Targets on Monday the 26th so it will be a good opportunity to put these new measures into practice, although it will be raining so anything might happen!

My first "Not" win!

I stopped by the Grange farm website to have a look at the scores for the comp on the 11th and blow me if I wasn't showing as 3rd equal on 66/100.

Now while it would be nice to jump up and down at this point and say yippee in only 6 months I have got into the prize money..... I do believe that my original scoring was correct (see last post) and that they must have made an error with their maths.

I called them today to report the matter so that they can have a recount and demote me to where I should be!

Where is the glory in a false win... or 3rd in this case?

When I do pick up my first prize money I want to do it knowing that I have really achieved the result. There is an outside possibility that I did add the scores wrong, but I am sure there were 44 "0"s on the sheet so I doubt it!!

100 registered Comp at Grange Farm

On a beautiful morning I shot an ok round at the grange. I shot on my own which was interesting as I had to shoot first at most stands. John Taylor came round with me but was only have a 50 bird practice as he went as he was n his way to the English open for a possible shoot off for 2nd in A class. As it turned out his 88 was good enough to retain 2nd place, so congrats to him for that... his personal best in the countries biggest competition... you can't ask for more.

On Johnnys advice..... or because he wanted to be finished asap, we went anti clockwise around the course. This meant that I started as badly as I normally finish! I had a shocking start with 2/6 2/8 3/6 as my first three stands..... thankfully i then hit 6/6 which refucussed my attention on what was important. I still struggled a lot on what I thought was a tough shoot with lots of stuff that I wasn't happy with. I did straight another stand towards the end, then got 5/6 which was sloppy as it should have been straighted too, then 8/8 which did pick up my score. I think I am making progress as it was a tricky shoot, I tend to suffer on stands when I go first which today was most of them and still added 5 to my previous best round there. I went there hoping to be in the 60's so was initially disappointed, but on reflection I think I did ok.

My target of a 70's score by my birthday in 5 weeks is looking distant, but thats what targets are for.

Facing my nemesis.....

I have this long standing issue with rising curling quartering clays. I have been practicing the ones I can at Sporting Targets, but these clays seem to be the ones that make clay pigeon shooting the challenging sport that it is.

I think however that I might have had a breakthrough as I believe my problem is as follows;

By the time I have tracked the clay, decided where it is going and allowed for lead etc I am quite late on it. Because the clay is traveling first up and to the right then curling down to the left it seems to me that the reason that I miss it so often is because I hang on it, but don't allow for its change in direction. I got on better when I took it on early as it didn't have time to move from the tradjectory that I had predicted for it.

I shall continue practicing and keep you posted. I hit another 22 on skeet using 24gm steel cartridges........ ther is nothing wrong with using steel at all. Randall was hitting my nemesis quartering bird with steel too.... which irked me slightly!

Steel Shot...

Having tried steel shot I will be using it for skeet practice as it offers a significant saving over the lead cartridges I currently use. I will still use lead for sporting and competitions, but steel for close up stuff.

I suppose the price of steel will soon be rising too as everyone starts using it, but I will enjoy the cost saving whilst I can!

Practice....

I spent Wednesday evening clay pigeon shooting in the rain. I work on the theory that when I am booked into a competition I will have to shoot whatever the conditions so the more I practice and get used to wind, rain and low sun the happier I will be!

I started off practicing my two nemesis birds in the quarry at the top of the range. First the right left crosser that runs along the top of the bank, followed by the left right quartering away bird that has elluded me on such a regular basis. I found that by throwing 50+ shells at them, it is better for me to attack them both and shoot them earlier than I have been doing. My hit rate was higher than when I was hanging on them.

I am still missing too many of the quartering birds, especially as report pairs, something to keep working on I think.