So, last night I
was able to do something which I have wanted to do since I started reloading
and shooting 1/4 MOA at 100 yards. I
thought this opportunity would only come in the distant (no pun intended)
future due to the need for additional equipment and a lack of practice needed
to work up to the ability to accomplish the task.
However, I met up
with a friend last night around 7:40pm we jumped into the truck and headed off
to a gravel pit his company owned. We
found a steel target which someone in the company had setup and had been using
for practice. After painting the frame,
covering numerous holes and placing a paper target, we were ready to commence
shooting. We first dropped back to 250
yards because I was not sure if I had sighted in the POS scope I had placed on
top of my Browning A-Bolt TCT Varmint. This scope is a Bushnell Banner 6-18x50.
First shot was
about 10" low and right, I quickly did the math in my head; A MOA at this
distance equals just over 2.5", 2.5" goes into 10" four times; so
I made the 16 click adjustment and fired round two. This time the shot was at the correct height
but still right. I again made my adjustments and fired my 3rd shot. Finding my shot in the spotting scope, it was
right on and I was ready to move back to the next distance.
We jumped into
the truck and headed back. I was getting excited because I haven't shot at
anything near a 600 yard distance. As we
were driving I was thinking we should have stopped by now, but because it was
getting dark I knew my friend wanted to push his new 6.5 Norma to new limits;
he was going for it all. When the truck
stopped I knew we were not 600 yards away. My friend had told me before we
arrived at the gravel pit, they had the Target surveyed to 1000 yards from the
gate, and we were at the gate.
I quickly grabbed
my mat and gun. I put the bipod on and wished I found my sand bag before
leaving the house. As I loaded my mag
with a single round, my friend was already putting rounds down range. I looked
at the drop of my bullet on my phone app (STRELOK); 380.24" of drop from
my 250 yard zeroing, this meant I had 145.2 Clicks to count. My first thought was crap, I don’t know how
many MOA or clicks are in a revolution of the turrets on this scope. Counting
1,2,3......I finally stopped at 49. I
subtracted 49 from the 145; sweet only 96 clicks to go. I divide the 96 by the
49 and get 1.95 more revolutions. I turned the turret until it stopped it stops
3 clicks shy of two full turns, it maxed out perfectly. As the sun was disappearing and I was
struggling to see through the cloudy scope I fired my first attempt at 1000
yards. I fired and hoped I would see
impact, but I didn't recover the gun fast enough to determine whether I hit or
missed. My friend was busy with his
shooting and didn't see anything. I fired
once more and again struggled to get the scope back on the target. As I was getting back on the target both my
friend and I heard the sound of the bullet hitting the steel target.
Oh the
joy, that was one of the best nights of shooting I have ever had and I only
shot 5 rounds. I guess there are times when you need someone to put you in a
situation where you have only two choices You can try for something you don’t
know if you can do, something you don’t think you’re ready for, or something you don’t even have the
gear to do. The other option is not try and therefore fail because nothing was
done nor accomplished anyway. This was a
great accomplishment for me, particularly since I didn't have the Nightforce or
Leupold scopes I had dreamed of mounting to my gun, the sun was pretty much
gone and I didn't have the bench-rest equipment. All in all, a wonderful and
fulfilling experience which has only fueled my desire to pinch pennies until I
can amass the needed funds to buy the equipment necessary to make shooting from
this distance a habitual hobby and not a one-off experience.
