Training Drills for NRL Hunter and Hunting

[Macintosh]

@Lawnboi Not certain I understand perfectly, are you saying that you would recommend not even going to a match until you can hold 1.5 inch groups from any supported position?
I’m really only doing local matches, but I can tell you I cannot hold 1.5 inch groups from most positions on the clock, and while I certainly wouldn’t say I do well, I certainly have fun.

 

[Lawnboi]

@Lawnboi Not certain I understand perfectly, are you saying that you would recommend not even going to a match until you can hold 1.5 inch groups from any supported position?
I’m really only doing local matches, but I can tell you I cannot hold 1.5 inch groups from most positions on the clock, and while I certainly wouldn’t say I do well, I certainly have fun.

Negative. Go shoot matches, it’s the only environment that applies pressure under someone else rules, besides hunting.

As far as training I see a lot of people wanting to shoot far to train. Reading and spotting is hard and that needs to be practiced but if your shooting 3-4 moa at distance your not really gaining much in the way of learning. It can be almost frustrating.

Once you can shoot 1.5” in different positions everything seems to start to come together, and spotting and adjusting becomes much more intuitive. On top of the fact that you now likely know how to limit wobble and remain steady.

I’m not the best shooter. My first match I think I hit 13 targets out of 100. It was terrible. Once I started doing 100 yard paper drills and finding out that I’m just lucking into hits it really opened my eyes. I got my Kraft drills down to 1.5 inches and suddenly I could count on my shots, put more on target and actually adjust to make more hits.

Maybe I said it the wrong way, didn’t mean to. Just emphasizing how important knowing your cone of fire is before adding more variables.

 

[Megalodon]

Practice just building/breaking positions quickly. Set a target however bear or far you want. Turn your back to it and throw some kind of markers over you shoulder. Those are your spots to transition between. Obviously helps if you have some varied natural terrain to work with.

 

[Macintosh]

Negative. Go shoot matches, it’s the only environment that applies pressure under someone else rules, besides hunting.

As far as training I see a lot of people wanting to shoot far to train. Reading and spotting is hard and that needs to be practiced but if your shooting 3-4 moa at distance your not really gaining much in the way of learning. It can be almost frustrating.

Once you can shoot 1.5” in different positions everything seems to start to come together, and spotting and adjusting becomes much more intuitive. On top of the fact that you now likely know how to limit wobble and remain steady.

I’m not the best shooter. My first match I think I hit 13 targets out of 100. It was terrible. Once I started doing 100 yard paper drills and finding out that I’m just lucking into hits it really opened my eyes. I got my Kraft drills down to 1.5 inches and suddenly I could count on my shots, put more on target and actually adjust to make more hits.

Maybe I said it the wrong way, didn’t mean to. Just emphasizing how important knowing your cone of fire is before adding more variables.

Gotcha! That makes much more sense. For sure, doing kraft drills or something similar at zero-distance allows you to see the positions you are really weak at, and focus on those in practice, and as you are able to close those groups through practice you definitely see your match performance improve. That part I think is really fun.

Edit: also, for hunting, I like the 100 yard hunting rifle drill with the circles outlined in
Post#1 of the “equipment vs practice” thread. It’s basically a diagnostic tool just like a kraft drill, but the different-sized circles give you something of a “standard” for different positions. There’s no reason really not to use 4 kraft targets for this, just using your most common hunting positions under time. It shows what your real best-case ability is at various positions, so you can target weaknesses and address them, as well as track progress.

 

[KChunter71]

Equipment versus practice posts and Rifle practice/shooting

This isn’t in response to anyone I particular, but there is an up tick in the amount of “I want a XXXX distance hunting rifle” traffic the last few months. I am getting a lot of questions relating to this, which I do not mind helping, but thought a public post might help answer some questions...

rokslide.com

Thanks for sharing this thread! No idea how I missed it or over looked it.

 

[ddowning]

If you're just learning to shoot, dryfire with a dfat is incredibly valuable. I don't mean learning to shoot like we did with a bb gun when we were 4 either. I'm 39 and did the bb gun thing at 4. I was by far the best shooter of my hunting group for most of my life. I did not learn to actually shoot a rifle until 2018, and I did not become proficient until 2020. I haven't consistently shot matches since 2023 I have lost a lot of ability. Dryfire will teach you to aim, break a trigger, follow through, run the bolt, and build positions.

If you want to be truly competitive at matches, build trainers in 22lr and 223. Add 308 if you can afford it. Some are naturally gifted, but there are a ton of guys that put everything they've got into precision rifle shooting. If you want to win, you have to beat those guys. Shooting very small targets in practice will make you hyper focused on everything like calling wind and spotting and making corrections.

Everyone says to practice shooting at 100 yards, but there is a thought process in shooting long range that involves follow through and correction after spotting where your last shot hit. I like to do that around 400 yards at least. If you want to do it at 100 yards, the timing works better with a 22 lr. It helps to have a really good feel for time of flight to spot trace and splash.

I do recommend doing build and break drills. I normally shoot a max of 2 shots per position in practice. For NRL Hunter it is a good idea to practice the entire process from pack on to shot until it becomes very efficient.

There are a ton of things you can do to improve. Find the things you are bad at and break the process down into steps. Practice those steps until you are good. Don't spend much time (maybe 5-10%) trying to put it all together until you have mastered every step by itself.

Don't spend too much time working on gun/load. For NRL hunter if it will shoot 1.5 moa for 10 shots you can win with it. A lot of guys want sub 3/8" for 5 shots. 5 shots is not really statistically significant and you wind up chasing your tail. With heavy PRS guns you can get sub 1/2 moa for 10 shots but that is a VERY good barrel. Most PRS matches can be won with a gun that will shoot 3/4 or even 1 moa for 10 shots.

When you are top 5 or close a more precise gun will help. Until then the difference between a 1.5moa gun and a 1 moa gun is not holding you back like a skill deficit is.

Matches are a lot of fun, but the level of competition is far above what it was 5 years ago and is continuing to rise. Shooting to have fun is one thing. Shooting with the goal or intention of winning requires a pretty big time and money commitment.

 

[doc holiday13]

@Lawnboi Not certain I understand perfectly, are you saying that you would recommend not even going to a match until you can hold 1.5 inch groups from any supported position?
I’m really only doing local matches, but I can tell you I cannot hold 1.5 inch groups from most positions on the clock, and while I certainly wouldn’t say I do well, I certainly have fun.

Now if you can't hold a 3" -100yard group... I'd be worried. Targets are big unless you're shooting a "know your limits" stage. A 10x16" piece of steel is a big target. Life size animal targets are even bigger. Purpose of the competition is to challenge yourself. If anything you'll possibly learn to shoot better after a comp

 

[Macintosh]

I think I agree mostly, but do remember that 10" is only 2moa at 500 yards, which isnt all that far in a match. Add wind to horizontally disperse your group beyond what you can do at 100yds, and most shooters that I know will miss a few even when they’re shooting well.
I was simply commenting on my own ability to hold groups from different positions. I’m not typically using a tripod as a rear support, or other “gamer” stuff from PRS, so most positions that aren’t prone or supported at both ends of the rifle are going to result in groups bigger than people would like to admit, especially as soon as there’s any sort of time limit put on it. To me that’s the type of thing that you have to go to a match first and experience that stuff, otherwise you’ll never go if you think you need to shoot a 1.5 inch or a 2 inch or whatever group from EVERY field position. I wouldn’t wanna go into a two day expensive match a long way from home, but find a local match and just go, figure out where you need to improve later, thats all.

 

[NickyD]

It’s been a while but it seems like there’s some talk in this thread so I figure I’ll give a little post-shoot assessment.

I learned a ton and had a great time at the Laramie event. I shot about 200 rounds (plus a few hundred rimfire) in the months before. Without that I would have done significantly worse.

That being said in retrospect I would have done a few things differently and will train accordingly:

1. I’d put more emphasis on position transition training. The most time consuming task (outside of finding targets) was transitioning from position to position. I thought I did enough of this but I plan to do even more in the future. As @hereinaz recommended I’ll be doing this at home. I’ll try to do this daily a few weeks before another shoot/hunt.

2. Too much emphasis on practicing with my tripod when I should have spent more time working on using a shooting bag. I’ll be getting a bag specifically for these competitions, even if I don’t use it for hunting. Luckily my range has some barricades setup and while they’re not practical for NRL/field shooting, getting away from shooting on flat ground is critical and is rarely practiced.

3. Practice spotting shots. I recently upgraded to a 6.5 creedmoor but I was using a 30-06 for the competition. I could kinda spot shots on some of the longer shots but it was very difficult to see where I was hitting. I have no issue spotting shots 400+ at the target range but the stresses of competition definitely made it harder for me.

4. It was super windy and I struggled to make wind calls. I generally avoid target practice when it’s windy because if it’s that windy I limit myself to short shots in a hunting scenario. But for the sake of being competitive I recommend practicing in super windy conditions to get a feel for it.

5. Practice using your rangefinder. I think this is something I overlooked. Don’t need to be at a shooting range for this. And if you don’t have rangefinding binos, it can be time consuming to switch between binos and rangefinder.

Thanks for the advice everyone! It’s been a busy month but hoping to get back into training soon. I already miss visiting the shooting range on a weekly basis.

 

[ChrisAU]

Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast.

 

[Jordan Smith]

In general, I try to train in more challenging conditions than I’ll compete or hunt in.

 

[LRshooter6.5]

I recently started a small business selling NRL Hunter Dryfire posters. Check it out!

 

[ChrisAU]

I recently started a small business selling NRL Hunter Dryfire posters. Check it out!

Ordered that and an IOTA from you yesterday morning, excited to get that.

 

[LRshooter6.5]

Awesome! We’ll get it out to you as soon as we can. Processing should take about 2-3 weeks and hope to get that down once we get a better idea for demand.

 

[thewakler]

Good to hear.

Here's another question. Is it dumb to practice with 6.5 creedmoore? Or should I really try to put together a .223 "trainer rifle" like I've been reading about?

There are a ton of great recommendations in so short of a thread, it has been refreshing.

I just wanted to offer my experience with the “trainer rifle.” It will cost you more than a barrel (2k-3k rounds) before you even start to get close to breaking even (granted these are reloaded prices, but match 223 vs match 6.5cm factory would still be relative).

If anything, I’d recommend a 308 barrel/trainer so you benefit from more recoil and worse wind performance. 22lr at 150yds is brutal to train with, but even with a rimx/center-x you’re doing exceptionally well to hold a 1-1.5” group. 308 you can hold great groups at whatever training distance you have so you can actually spot deficiencies with the shooter and not weapon system limitations.

Dryfire a lot and put money towards ammo/barrels for your match rifle.

 

[Pilsner]

I recently started a small business selling NRL Hunter Dryfire posters. Check it out!

What is the difference between the Precision Rifle set and the Competitive Hunter set besides the number of posters? Not sure which one to order. I only have enough wall space to use one poster at a time. Thanks,
Doc

 

[LRshooter6.5]

The Competitive Hunter has 4 posters that connect to make 1 large panoramic range (~76”x11”) with 6 courses of fire similar to a NRL Hunter style match. The Precision Rifle is a single poster (~19”x11”) with 6 courses of fire similar to a PRS style match. The one I recommend depends on the style of shooting you prefer. The Competitive Hunter has you find, “range”, and engage targets while the Precision Rifle gives you the ranges right off the bat and more challenging positional shooting. Let me know if you have anymore questions!