Humble pie not my favorite dish...

[daved]

so I figured I need some help in figuring out how to shoot a rifle unrested.  I thought I was a pretty good shot, off the bench I can generally get my CFX to hit where I point it.  Last night, I did some shooting to sight in before shooing the Black Death target.  With a mediocre scope in windy conditions, I was getting 1" or smaller groups with Superdomes and Exacts.  Went with Superdomes as they were on POA at 40 yards.  And yes, Raterminator, it was a measured 120 feet.  I have a 200' tape for this kind of thing.  Then I put up the Black Death target and promptly died.  At present, my unrested accuracy at 40 yards is about the size of a dinner plate.

All this led me to do some research, and this is some of what I found.  http://www.viriato.net/airgunning/bfta_technical_skills_manual.pdf
  Some of this I feel I have a pretty good handle on, breathing, trigger control, etc.  But the info on body positioning for the various stances seems invaluable to me.  Some of the rest of you may already know all this, but I've never done any kind of organized competitive shooting, and even when I was shooting a lot, it was almost exclusively hand guns.  So keep an eye on my targets guys, I'm planning on doing some practicing, and expect to improve.  Later.

Dave

I find that when I take a deep breath a few times ti calm my nerves, then exhale slowly when im about to shoot really helps lock in my x-hairs.

[DanoInTx]

It's odd, I was the same way.  I can hit dimes at 10-20 yards all day long with a scope and rested.  But that's exactly why I made this a "NO REST" competition, takes a whole lot more skill to level a good shot without a rest.  Not saying that using a rest requires no skill because it does, but without a rest requires the use of muscles and focus that you never think of when using a rest.  I find that sitting, with my knees pulled up tight to my chest, my left elbow in tight to my body, and my left hand loosely cradling, or "taco holding" the forend works best for me.  Of course I also said that you could lay prone, which is also a nice way to shoot if you have good level ground between you and the target.  I'm working overtime at work all week, and working saturday, so I haven't been able to try any shooting...I swear I'll get some targets up in the yard on sunday, even if I have to lock all the kids in their rooms:)

Dan

[raterminator]

I believe you, Dave. Of course, only if your dinner plate is not of the size of a penny
I’m not sure if I can do better, nor if I can hit it at all. I do not have a chance to shoot at 40 yards today, but I remember how I used to cut the matches stuck into the plaster at 15 yards in standing position 30 years ago. I didn’t lift the rifle to the target, always aimed a little bit higher and slowly lowered it until I met the target. I don’t know why, but this way I managed to stay fixed on target for a couple of seconds for a sure shot. Probably, because one uses less force while lowering a gun than pushing it upward and trying to control breathing at the same time.
Unfortunately, today I can only hit it in a sitting position, from the bench and with scope only.

This might help. It's something I wrote up.
http://www.kermitairgunclub.com/fieldtarget/ftpractice.htm