Horizontal Stringing in air rifle

[robruger1]

My 14 year old daughter began junior rifle this last march and shot through May when the season ended and then started again the beginning of Sept. when practice resumed. She has come a long way in a short amount of time and in air rifle is currently averaging mid 370's out of 400. When looking at her shots, there seems to be very little variation in the vertical placement but varies a lot more on the horizontal. I'm hoping to get somewhat of a diagnosis for the horizontal stringing and hopefully some idea of what she can work on to help minimize this. She's shooting all off hand with a Feinwerkbau 700. Thanks.

[dahigg]

Does she have proper boots, jacket, pants?

[robruger1]

Yes. Monard jacket and pants, Anschutz Boots. Under Armour leggings and top underneath and a shooting sweater.

[redschietti]

That's typicall at that level in my experience...training will decrease it. Slightly adjusting the position may also decrease the wobble. B4 we had scat I watched the muzzle with binos

[justadude]

In the grand scheme, as has been mentioned, the vertical string goes away first, then the horizontal string. Just due to the way the foundation is built it tends to take a lot more to get the rifle moving up and down, while side to side motion is no where near as well anchored.

Places to look: Getting a consistent natural point of aim in offhand can be tricky as getting the left arm (assuming a RH shooter) in the same place on the hip every time is tough. To some degree, it is shots down the line with concentrated emphasis on getting the elbow in the same place each time that builds that one.

Next is the support hand. Is it going under the rifle the same place each time? Is the hand or wrist turned at all. There are about a zillion different variations on the support hand them so experiments there are important. Experiment with supporting the rifle different places on the hand, before the shot it delivered think about are the shoulders and hips relaxed.

Also experimenting with length of pull may be helpful as LOP can cause the shoulders to be too closed up or open to be fully relaxed.

'Dude

[FrankD]

Hi,

also a little complicated to explain the reason a to much front heavy rifle can increase this grouping in the horizontal.


Regards

Frank

[rotor]

Hi.

This is the common challenge for the standing position. Let's think about the forces effecting the rifle.
1. Veritical forces: The rifle is resting on the left hand (for RH shooter) and assuming the shooter is not carrying it with his/her muscles (means it is carried by the left hand-forearm-elbow-hip-knee-foot, carried by using the "bones"). The rifle is expected to travel to downwards because of the gravity but with the help of the facts above it can no longer travel to downwards. If the position is not tensed too much or there is no hold error the rifle is not expected to travel to upwards too. So, this was the easiest part in standing position.

2.Horizontal forces: Now, this is the real challenge. There are numerous of reasons for the horizontal body sway.Some of them are listed below:
***The shooter doesn't have a good NPoA.(Natural Point of Aim, shortly, aim the rifle with closed eyes, relax your position, open your eyes, if you're aiming at least very near to the bullseye your NPoA is good enough to begin shooting)
***The rifle is not adjusted to the shooters body. (The buttplate length, the grip position (assuming you have a modell 700 alu rifle) etc. First you must find a position, with relaxed muscles using your full competition gear but without the rifle. Measure the distances between your right shoulder, left hand, trigger finger, right hand and cheek. Adjust the rifle with using these measurements and then aim with the rifle. With the rifle's weight, fine tune your position.
***The shooter's gear is too stiff/too loose or not fit. (Use proper shooting gear and if it is very new and too stiff because of this, just be patient and keep wearing until it fits)
***Hips are not parallel to the line of aim. (Sounds strange i know but a good NPoA depends on this especially when you're using a small or big bore rifle. Keep it as parallel as you can but if it makes you very uncomfortable just stop it where you feel yourself good)
***Shooting boots laced up too tight of too loose. (Use it's benefits. If it is laced up too tight, well this is worse then it is laced up too lose thus the blood circulation will not be enough so you begin not feeling the movement of your body)
***Triggering errors. (Even if everything is perfect, the last moment is the most important one. I don't want to comment on the triggering techniques but the common rule is you must not move the rifle at the moment of trigger release. The right trigger technique is up to the shooter.)
***Holding errors.(Let's consider the rifle is set up good but what if the shooter is not relax the muscles enough? The shooter must apply some relaxing techniques (like progressive relaxation) during the competition. Another holding error is not holding the rifle as planned before at each shot. Some benchmarks can be used and can be checked with eyes quickly at each shot)
***Not having enough level of fitness. (Shooting is not an easy piece of sport, so like every other sport, the shooter also must be fit enough to stand still for at least 2 hours. Do some endurance training and apply a fitness program)

Hope this helps.

[robruger1]

Thanks for all the help folks, I appreciate it. I'll make not of all of this and see if we can figure it out.

[redschietti]

Watching my daughter shoot today reminded me of this thread. Its obvious she has a bit of a left/ right wobble in both air and SB guns today. Still showing a good score 590 plus air with integer. Some days the hold isn't as good even for great shooters.