TargetTalk

First of all, I just wanted to say hello to everyone, just registered
My air rifle and smallbore team have been shooting 3P matches recently for many different events. The biggest of which was probably the 3P Air Junior Olympic National Championships in Bowling Green Kentucky. I average about 575/600 in 3P precision but my Standing always seems to be higher than my kneeling. My wobble looks smaller in my sights in kneeling, I just can't seem to get the shot off at the right time.
Any possibilities?

one thing that i found with 3-p air is that your hold is a lot better than it looks. so in kneeling i was having a really fast, but small movement in my hold. i was jerking the shot or trying to use muscle to get it to stop. what i found to work was to just trust the hold and have a smooth pull. it sounds weird and is hard to do in the moment, but it works with that kind of hold because you are holding in the 10. if you have a larger, slower movement, your approach to trigger pull should be different. i was working with a kid down in georgia just on being about to pull the trigger because he was having a similar problem to what i was having and by letting them go he went from 95's to 198-199's. it's just having confidence in your hold and ability.

hey waltherwill,
i shoot standing air rifle and 3p smallbore, so the only time i see kneeling is with the .22... i have this problem too, though not nearly as bad recently after reading up on the matter. go into your kneeling position and approximate the angle your right leg makes with your left on the floor: if it's more than 50-60 degrees, you could get an awful lot of sideways sway that may not necessarily show up until the moment you fire the shot. i find good stability at about 35 degrees. also, i've found that the most important part of the body to keep completely relaxed is the inner and upper left leg muscles (right leg if you're a lefty). this is the bridge that connects your rifle to your main support: the spine. if the target hangers at your range are adjustable for height, i would play with that, because i've realized that my preferred height is a lot higher than i would have expected had i not experimented.
forgot to add, i'm 6'1", 150 and pretty goofy, so this info may not fit right for everybody, but it's a good place to start and will put you in the mood to experiment.
i would recommend Ways of the Rifle if you want a really in depth explanation and have 45-50 bucks kicking around.
hope this helps, and good shooting.

make sure your eye is at the same place behind the sight everytime, a millimeter's difference can cause your zero to shift

i've found that the most important part of the body to keep completely relaxed is the inner and upper left leg muscles (right leg if you're a lefty). this is the bridge that connects your rifle to your main support: the spine.

I have been having spasms in the inside and outside of my left (i am a righty) leg. Don't know why but I'll work on it.

Thanks guys

Look on the USAS website in the rifle part of coaching under troubleshooting the kneeling position. Dave Johnson has written a great way to build a kneeling position. Read over it carefully, work on each part seperately and take your time. I've worked with him on his kneeling position and it works great.

Many of today's digital cameras have a time lapse feature.

get one/borrow one and set it up
1) behind you
2) to your right (for the righty)
3) in front, slightly to the right of you.

What you feel may not necessarily be what you think your position is.

Also do you stretch out before you shoot?

WaltherWill wrote:

I have been having spasms

I have been having spasms in my left arm during kneeling and standing. It's not as recognizable in standing as it is in kneeling but ever since I have been shooting high scores [99's and 100's] in prone I have been having spasms in the other positions. Is it related to my sling position or the way that I hold my gun? Any help would be much appreciated.

Spasms are not good. You need to try and get rid of them. Work out when they start - do they appear after x minutes shooting or straight away ? I would suggest they could be due to oxygen starvation in the muscles but that would probably progress to pins and needles / cramping. Perhaps some proper warm up exercises before shooting would also help, but I'd advise you try and find a coach / experienced shooter who can help you.

Rob.

The last month or so, my kneeling scores have been, at least better than my standing. The couple of things I changed:

1) I started placing my kneeling roll as tightly against the top of my right foot when getting in position.

2) I started focusing hard on follow-through. My coach recently told me after watching me shoot kneeling,
"You need to follow through more, I thought I saw your head come off the gun before it went off on a couple of those shots!"

3) well, I can't really think of a third. I guess I just started practicing a little more.