Re: Stock Weld & Follow Through
I often find that cheek weld is an often overlooked reason for zero deviation from day to day. I have been helping several new (to precision and competition) shooters over the last year and this has come up several times. I have used instances from my own learning path to help them see the importance of cheek weld.
First, I have found during slow paced, prone matches (F class) that my vertical spread is most often due to change in cheek weld. Before I was more attentive to this, I would have a distinctly high or low shot that was called center. The next round I often noticed that my position felt "lower", "more solid" or "just better" than the errant one. I also could look back and recall that follow through on recoil was not as clean. When settling in for the next shot, my cheek would notice a difference. The shots where I didnt have solid cheek pressure down on the stock were both errant and poorly controlled in recoil for follow up and spotting. Once I started paying more attention to feeling the same relatively heavy cheek pressure on the stock, not only did the shots tighten up, but I was more comfortable after long strings of fire. I was likely holding my head up to some degree. This is something I still catch myself doing from time to time, though usually I catch it before the shot now.
Second, while shooting the bull at my local shop, a buddy and I were talking about getting in some bowhunting soon. He and his girlfriend are competitive bow shooters. He mentioned that he has a tobacco zero and a no-tobacco zero for his bow. His zero changes when he has some snuff in his cheek because even that small change in his facial shape throws off the relationship between his release hand and his jaw. So, being curious, I tried this on my rifle at the range. Not being a dip man, I chewed up some dried venison sausage and tucked it in on the right. I alternated groups with and without the venison and sure enough it threw off my cheek weld. Just shows how a small change can give big results.
As for stock placement, this one took me a little longer to learn. I did not pay special attention to this until I was shooting service rifle regularly. I was having some trouble with my 600 yard slow fire stage- much to the amusement of the regulars who shoot F class with me. Luckily, one of the Distinguished, HM, P100 shooters decided not to shoot that day and did a little coaching with me. I had inconsistent stock placement throughout the long stage and was causing errant shots. After indexing my coat and quite a bit of dry firing, things tightened up. Master scores soon followed.
Get down on the gun, relax, be consistent, and "drive the rifle through recoil" (Jacob Bynum 2006)
just my thoughts...
Sean
