2025 NRL Hunter

[parshal]

No PF for skills. You can shoot anything you want.

 

[wind gypsy]

No PF for skills. You can shoot anything you want.

Yep. Same for 1 day matches (at least in decorah), they dont even chrono loads for anyone but top 3 finishers after the match there.

 

[OverInfinite]

Awesome, thank you!

 

[T_Widdy]

For the Alaska match, they're alluding to needing to know the hunting regs. I've never shot an NRL match before. How do they usually integrate hunting regs into target selection? Or is this a novel thing?

What were the regulations relating to the match?

 

[9.3koolaid]

What were the regulations relating to the match?

Stage 10 had two bull moose head targets, one with no browtines and one with 4. The page from the reg book was posted on the stage briefing so it was pretty clear.

I was ready to mil 50" though haha

 

[T_Widdy]

Stage 10 had two bull moose head targets, one with no browtines and one with 4. The page from the reg book was posted on the stage briefing so it was pretty clear.

I was ready to mil 50" though haha

Were you only supposed to shoot the legal bull?

It looked like it was an awesome location for a match!

 

[9.3koolaid]

Were you only supposed to shoot the legal bull?

It looked like it was an awesome location for a match!

Correct, it said 1 target, 4 positions, target 1 legal bull.

@walk2112 probably has a photo

 

[T_Widdy]

Correct, it said 1 target, 4 positions, target 1 legal bull.

@walk2112 probably has a photo

Nice, when they have another match up there I’m going to try and make it.

 

[walk2112]

Correct, it said 1 target, 4 positions, target 1 legal bull.

@walk2112 probably has a photo

Yep! What a great weekend! I’d do it every week if I could.

 

[Pilsner]

Exactly. There was a 1 target 4 position stage this time that first position was an awkward height standing, then 2 kneeling, then another standing. I shot it from position 1 to position 4 then the middle two kneeling. Very convenient to pickup the gun and tripod at the same time when it was probably a 30’ move across the stage.

Which event are you guys discussing?

 

[wind gypsy]

Which event are you guys discussing?

The Alaska match. Edit: Didn't see you were quoting wooly when i first responded. Decorah.

 

[WoolyBugger]

Which event are you guys discussing?

Decorah hunter games

 

[WoolyBugger]

Yep. Same for 1 day matches (at least in decorah), they dont even chrono loads for anyone but top 3 finishers after the match there.

They haven’t chrono’d top 3 this year, tie breaker has been rifle weight.

 

[Wiscgunner]

Just got back from Alaska Wilderness Hunter match. This was my first NRl Hunter match and I have to say I enjoyed it much more than PRS. I shot Open Heavy Teams with my main hunting partner. We had a great time, met a lot of great people. Rusty Ulmer shot quite a lot with our Squad on Day 1 which was cool to watch and pick his brain. We definitely refined our skills for real hunting, especially the communication part in a time crunch.

Saw a few Rokstoks in the wild including a sweet looking setup from Tyler Freel that was lent to a shooter in need. Another shooter, who happened to be in our squad was unfortunate enough to get his rifle stolen out of his rental car. Still pushed through the match with a borrowed rifle and rough dope. This sport really has the best people.

You could certainly tell the difference between the Alaskans and those from “down in America”. It was the first NRL match for about 1/2 the people shooting. Looking around you saw lots of dudes with hunting gear (packs, rifles, etc) shooting off packs and lots of people that, lets say, looked from out of town (Eberlestock Upranger bags instead of hunting packs, PRS rifles and muzzle brakes, jersey like shirts, triple pulls, multiple tripods, etc). None of this of course it to knock anyone but just to say there was a diverse array of shooters shooting the match for different reasons.

The course of fire was quite challenging the first day with unpredictable winds going up and down the mountain or through Hurricane Gulch which we often shot across. We didn’t have very far targets, although the terrain certainly would have provided ample distance. I think the longest stage was less than 900 yards, most were 600 and in. Terrain was very natural without contrived barricades, plenty of willows to shoot over and sponge moss to try to steady a tripod on top of.

Certainly got a workout going up and down to different stages. Definitely not for the guy with bad knees pushing a baby stroller full of garage sale gear and bean bag chairs for each type of position.


There were some growing pains but overall a very professionally run match. Of course, Alaska provided its own input into the match. Bears attacked numerous targets and the zero range but the MD’s had them reinstalled before “sunrise” although the sun never set. Saturday we shot until 10pm even though it looked like late afternoon. Lots of water stations and snacks throughout the course to keep us going.

The recently ignited wildfires kept a haze in the air and caused some travel shenanigans, at least for me, as the highway back to Fairbanks was on fire and shutdown. Every once in a while mount McKinley would show itself in the distance through the clouds and smoke.

The breeze and altitude kept the mosquitoes mostly at bay although you definitely got to enjoy the “state bird” where the Ruger 454 side stage was setup.


Overall, I look forward to shooting the next Alaska match and might be talked into shooting one in another state.

 

[Wiscgunner]

Schmidt & Brender was there on the mountain with new hotness. Awesome to check out their new 24oz 3-18 hunting scope in actual terrain you would use it instead of in a showroom. It is now top of my list.

Leofoto and RRS both had side stages to shoot of their tripods. Really nice to compare against our own and each other. My teammate was running a Leofoto version of the RRS 34 with Anvil and the difference was noticeable, at least to me. I asked the RRS rep running the stage if they had any plans of making an inverted hunting tripod like the Tricer HK. He said there were discussions on new products and to send feedback into RRS. I plan to do just that because while the Tricer is less expensive, I would rather buy American. If they choose not to make one, then there will be a Tricer HK in my near future.

 

[B_Reynolds_AK]

First NRL Hunter Match complete.
That was really fun and had some unexpected challenges. Tyler Freel and I squadded up, along with @AKarchery and a friend of Tyler’s from FBX. I shot Skills with my UM Tikka 22 CM w/ 80 ELD-M’s @ 3195 fps in a HNT 26.

Challenges

- Targets were hidden very well. The battleship gray steel was harder to see than I expected. I guess that’s what I get from only hunting white creatures, or atleast ones with white butts haha. I zeroed out on my first stage trying to find 4 little porcupines. Things went quite a bit better after that stage.

- Tikka bolt stop pin sheared off on stage 2 or 3, losing the stop & spring along the way. Thankfully the cheek piece kept the bolt from falling out the rest of the day. Had to run the bolt carefully. @AKarchery took apart one of his own Tikkas to give me the parts from it, as we was driving back home that night.

- Rangefinder. After a couple stages, I quickly realized that my BR4 and Swaro NL combination wasn’t going to cut it if I wanted to actually not time out on more stages than I wanted to. I called up @Marty, who was RO’ing a few stages further up the mountain. He graciously sent another RO down on his SxS to swap out his Revic BLR’s for my NL 10x32’s for the rest of the event. They made my workflow much easier. He also provided a Ckye Double pull for me to use, rather than the short Atlas Cal I have.

- Spotting Impacts
I can’t think of one target that had dirt or rocks around it to spot misses and make corrections. The sub alpine brush soaked up any misses. If you didnt see your trace, it was impossible to determine how to correct. Made it hard at times to even determine what direction the wind was blowing, as it would switch fairly often.


- Playing the game in general. Getting my mind to think carefully about the limits, placards etc.

In general, I felt pretty comfortable once I got into the flow of things. The shooting positions were straightforward for me, as I do a lot of tripod shooting. Cleaned a couple stages and got 7 points on the bison at 900+ yards that only about 5 shooters cleaned and 5 got 7 points. I ended up with 99 points overall, which in combined scores, put me at 48th out of 138 shooters. The difference in points between first and second round hits really makes a huge difference.

The hiking was great, though a bit dusty!
It was horrible keeping my action open the whole time, letting all the dust blow in there. My KRG Midas got a little stiff one time, but my the next shot, was back to normal. We hiked 5 ish miles each day.

Used my RRS Ascend-14 with MA-30L head.
My Scythe didn’t blow apart. Success.




Squad


Cross Canyon Stage


@AKarchery @bearcreekbandit & Gabe


@AKarchery in his first Match and first time shooting past 300 yards. He used his Rokstok/RS1.2 gun.


Me, wearing my headphones improperly haha.
I’d not be wearing them at all except for the few guys with f****ng brakes around.


Second day we had some pretty lengthy backups on some stages, 1 hr +


@bearcreekbandit 2nd in Open Light

 

[bearcreekbandit]

That was a really fun match and great to hang out and shoot! You had good observations and took to it really well after getting the hang of it.
The biggest thing I've noticed as I learned is there are certainly some gaming aspects that don't always line up with how we hunt or the gear we would normally bring on a hunt. However, by learning to play the game, I've gotten a lot better at quickly looking at a spot and recognizing potential shooting positions and also knowing when it's not worth wasting the time to set up a given position. The pressure of the clock also helps me practice thinking methodically and clearly in a situation where I'm going to have to shoot something.
A big step — and benefit for hunters — is learning to run your gear and shoot without making silly mistakes.

Can't wait for the next one!

 

[ruger35]

First NRL Hunter Match complete.
That was really fun and had some unexpected challenges. Tyler Freel and I squadded up, along with @AKarchery and a friend of Tyler’s from FBX. I shot Skills with my UM Tikka 22 CM w/ 80 ELD-M’s @ 3195 fps in a HNT 26.

Challenges

- Targets were hidden very well. The battleship gray steel was harder to see than I expected. I guess that’s what I get from only hunting white creatures, or atleast ones with white butts haha. I zeroed out on my first stage trying to find 4 little porcupines. Things went quite a bit better after that stage.

- Tikka bolt stop pin sheared off on stage 2 or 3, losing the stop & spring along the way. Thankfully the cheek piece kept the bolt from falling out the rest of the day. Had to run the bolt carefully. @AKarchery took apart one of his own Tikkas to give me the parts from it, as we was driving back home that night.

- Rangefinder. After a couple stages, I quickly realized that my BR4 and Swaro NL combination wasn’t going to cut it if I wanted to actually not time out on more stages than I wanted to. I called up @Marty, who was RO’ing a few stages further up the mountain. He graciously sent another RO down on his SxS to swap out his Revic BLR’s for my NL 10x32’s for the rest of the event. They made my workflow much easier. He also provided a Ckye Double pull for me to use, rather than the short Atlas Cal I have.

- Spotting Impacts
I can’t think of one target that had dirt or rocks around it to spot misses and make corrections. The sub alpine brush soaked up any misses. If you didnt see your trace, it was impossible to determine how to correct. Made it hard at times to even determine what direction the wind was blowing, as it would switch fairly often.


- Playing the game in general. Getting my mind to think carefully about the limits, placards etc.

In general, I felt pretty comfortable once I got into the flow of things. The shooting positions were straightforward for me, as I do a lot of tripod shooting. Cleaned a couple stages and got 7 points on the bison at 900+ yards that only about 5 shooters cleaned and 5 got 7 points. I ended up with 99 points overall, which in combined scores, put me at 48th out of 138 shooters. The difference in points between first and second round hits really makes a huge difference.

The hiking was great, though a bit dusty!
It was horrible keeping my action open the whole time, letting all the dust blow in there. My KRG Midas got a little stiff one time, but my the next shot, was back to normal. We hiked 5 ish miles each day.

Used my RRS Ascend-14 with MA-30L head.
My Scythe didn’t blow apart. Success.




Squad


Cross Canyon Stage


@AKarchery @bearcreekbandit & Gabe


@AKarchery in his first Match and first time shooting past 300 yards. He used his Rokstok/RS1.2 gun.


Me, wearing my headphones improperly haha.
I’d not be wearing them at all except for the few guys with f****ng brakes around.


Second day we had some pretty lengthy backups on some stages, 1 hr +


@bearcreekbandit 2nd in Open Light

I'm not sure if you're the guy in the blue shirt, but Sunday he sure did some showing off to us flatlanders when he ran down the hill and back up with a smile on his face lol. It was our first match and first time ever shooting with my partner, definitely took some getting used to the format. The only other competition I had shot was a couple weeks prior at NF and it's a totally different shooting rotation than NRL Hunter.

--Spotting misses
I can only think of one or two stages that had something to show misses. We mis-ranged a couple of targets and luckily I was confident in my dope and and rifle system that I was able to score impacts by holding in the reticle when I couldn't see the impacts. I also learned quickly even if it's one target to write my dope down. Costed me on the caribou stage, should have been at 3.9 but didn't write down the dope and thought I remembered 5.9. I couldn't spot the misses on the bison, asked the RO after the stage and he told me that I had actually made a good wind call but was right under it every shot.

If anyone is interested my shooting partner who sponsored some discounted action certificates and owns Roaming Shot Precision & Outdoors actually put out a podcast last night about our experience in Alaska. Should be a funny listen to hear some out of shape Louisiana rookie's perspectives.

 

[Marty]

Observations as an RO from the Alaska Wilderness NRL Hunter Match.

If nothing else, consider this my public “note to self.”​

• Time Management:
  • The best shooters I saw moved with a purpose but did not run into the observation position. Their eyes were up scanning for placards, targets, and references.
  • The slowest shooters were eyes down, bumbling through gear, taking out equipment that could have been stowed more thoughtfully prior to the stage starting, etc. Running into the stage didn’t seem to make a difference.
  • It varies from stage to stage but my general goal will be on glass looking at known or likely placard/target positions within 30 seconds (+/- 15 seconds).

• Gear Management:
  • I saw shooter with all the things, the minimalist, and everything in between. My big takeaway is to be practiced in how to use the equipment.
  • Shooters with the minimum equipment (say a tripod, one bag, and a bipod) performed the same as the shooters with multiple bags, 1+ tripods, triple pulls etc.
  • Shooters below that minimum gear mentioned above struggled to adapt to shooting positions designed by the MDs to deliberately make it challenge (but some still managed to connect).
  • Shooters with “all the things” fell into two categories for me: shit hot or yardsale. I think the difference is the experience to know when and how to use the right thing.
  • Glass supported. Super frustrating to watch as folks come up to the stage with all kinds of things strapped, dangling, and stowed in their pack along with tripod(s) and try to glass free hand. Supported = steady with aids in finding targets and getting a good range (thus ballistic solution).
  • For my next NRL match, I’ll have my bipod on my rifle, a tripod, and one gamechanger bag with a lighter fill, and of course my pack.

• Tripods, Tac Tables, and Bags vs. Clip Ins:
  • The pros know how to deploy a tripod, put a bag atop a tac table, then glass. More commonly, however, was folks trying to do what the pros do, and having the three components, tripod, bag, and binos, fall over. 15-30 seconds later, they’ve re-established their shooting smore and can begin to glass once again.
  • I tested myself to find what works best for me: I’ll have my binos clipped in before the stage start. After shooting multiple 5 round groups (single shot make then break position under 20 seconds) I have found that for me, a tac table doesn’t help. I got the same general results either clipped into my tripod or with a gamechanger or smedium game changer placed atop my pic/arca ball head.

• Work Flow:
  • Finding target(s), collect ballistic solution, building a stable shooting position, Watch trace and collect those points! The shooters that performed the best did these four steps smoothly and fast. Practice each.
  • Team Communication Best Practices:
    • Target Talk On: Big to small. Find something distinguishable, even if it’s outside the target area, get your teammate to see that, then talk your way to the target(s).
    • Wind Holds:
    • Do say: Center, Right/Left third, Right/Left edge OR
    • Do say: Use 1/10th of mils
    • Don’t say: the bull’s crease in it’s leg (do the conversion for the shooter!)
    • Don’t say: the wind is 6mph at the 4 o’clock (do the conversion for the shooter!)

• Fitness Matters:
  
  • Have the "Be an athlete, don't suck" (BADS) mentality.
  • Shooters that were in better shape didn't comment much on the mileage or elevation gain/loss.
  • Shooters in poor shape seemed to comment more about the physical effort required to move from stage to stage.
  • Sorry as this might come across as a bit of a soapbox stance but I feel and have seen how fitness is a component of being a lethal human.

If I could make some adjustments to match design (within current NRL hunter rules)…

• Score Card with Strip Map on back. This would help shooters understand their flow from stage to stage. Perhaps even an animal symbol and a place for quick notes during post stage reflection.
• Putting targets at increased angles. Most during this match were within 15 degrees. I’d like to see targets at 30+ degrees. This would come at the cost of increased the time and complexity for target set up, and longer delays if a target went down during the match.
• Increase variety of shooting positions. Much of this match was best shot off prone or with the use of a tripod. I’d like to include rocks, downed logs, and perhaps even an ATV or boat as a prop to increase variety. Again, this would come at the cost of increased set up time.

Other random thoughts (outside of the NRL hunter rules)…

• I’d like to see a minimum pack weight. I’d go so far as to suggest minimum mileage and elevation gain/loss but understand that’s not realistic for certain parts of the country.
• Change the time standard, number of targets, and positions. I think this would open up additional options to MDs for stage design. I can’t be the only one to crest a ridgeline, see a target animal closer than I thought and have less than 30 seconds to put a lethal shot into it.
• Retain the first round impact = two points, second round impact = one point, two misses = zero points.
• Power Factor: while I understand the original purpose, we’ve circled back to gamers with 6.5mms and even a few .25 CAL (for non-skills division). There is a big enough body of data to suggest that larger cartridges, bullets, etc to not equal an linear increase in lethality. I’d like to see rule changes to allow folks to shoot what caliber they like (including 22 CAL, 6mm’s etc.).

Had a blast shooting teams division with my friend and learned a bunch ROing every other participant that came through the stages. Cheers!

 

[B_Reynolds_AK]

I'm not sure if you're the guy in the blue shirt, but Sunday he sure did some showing off to us flatlanders when he ran down the hill and back up with a smile on his face lol. It was our first match and first time ever shooting with my partner, definitely took some getting used to the format. The only other competition I had shot was a couple weeks prior at NF and it's a totally different shooting rotation than NRL Hunter.

--Spotting misses
I can only think of one or two stages that had something to show misses. We mis-ranged a couple of targets and luckily I was confident in my dope and and rifle system that I was able to score impacts by holding in the reticle when I couldn't see the impacts. I also learned quickly even if it's one target to write my dope down. Costed me on the caribou stage, should have been at 3.9 but didn't write down the dope and thought I remembered 5.9. I couldn't spot the misses on the bison, asked the RO after the stage and he told me that I had actually made a good wind call but was right under it every shot.

If anyone is interested my shooting partner who sponsored some discounted action certificates and owns Roaming Shot Precision & Outdoors actually put out a podcast last night about our experience in Alaska. Should be a funny listen to hear some out of shape Louisiana rookie's perspectives.

Confirmed blue sun hoody. Had to do a quick battery change in Marty’s Revic BLR