Rifle shooting is no longer like golf.

Rifle shooting used to be kind of like golf. Get a feel for the clubs and the ball and the turf, groove your swing, and hit it. Long range shooting is not like golf at all. All this long range stuff going around today makes shooting more like data science, more like a video game. Its more about turning the dials instead of swinging the club. I am not sure it is for the better. I guess it must be a cultural change. I can't say that I like it, but who am I to judge because I am 66 years old.

What do my fellow bloggers think?

I personally like that it's scientific, makes it feel like a math problem. Then when stuff doesn't come out right I like finding the issue and solving it. Then once you're dialed in it's awesome to ring steel at all different ranges.

I disagree that they were similar.
Personally, I dislike golf -- simply do not have the patience, maturity or coordination for it. I was a caddie, usually for the scratch players at my club, and loved watching these guys play.
On TV? Gouge my eyes out.
That said, golf equipment makes a difference. You can take an average player on forged clubs, give them good investment cast ones, and watch their handicap drop by 3-5.
I would say its more likely that you can take a bloke off the street and turn him into a spectacular marksman but making them a master golfer requires innate ability that one is born with.
Shooting long range, you can make more hits with better equipment, but nothing makes up for practice reading the wind, trigger and relaxation technique.
With or without the data and electronics, I still love shooting because when I'm in the zone, time stops.
Edit to add, you don't *need* to use electronics at all. You can always make up dope tables for your pet loading, and even use a slide rule to confuse those around you.

Tidus56 said:

I personally like that it's scientific, makes it feel like a math problem. Then when stuff doesn't come out right I like finding the issue and solving it. Then once your dialed in it's awesome to ring steel at all different ranges.

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Ok, I see what your are saying. Like I pointed out, there has been a change in culture.

If you like golf, then golf. My grandfather could do things with an '03 Springfield that'd Beat out Arnold Palmer at his own club match, but couldn't touch today's keyboard commandos with a shiny new savage in 6.5 creed and vortex scopewith factory hornady ammo at laser measured distances and computer generated shot data. Two different games. No one is being forced into either. Each can do either with the right budget. I respect guys who use the new stuff combined with the skills and outright artistry of "feeling " the environmentals and making first round hits

I find the whole concept of long range shooting extremely intriguing. I suck at math but it has made me pay attention to it. Still in the very beginning stage of all this. As for golf, going to the driving range and hitting little white ball and seeing really bad slice isn't to bad for the soul.

Todays shooting is weaponized math. shooting at 1 mile.

I golf better with more beer!!. I don't shoot while drinking beer so can't compare the 2.

Your on the wrong web site if your asking these questions

Like ole Roy said in Tin Cup, "grip it and rip it".

That doesn't really work for long range shooting but it worked for your thread title.

Like said above no one is forced into but I love the challenge of developing a load thats capable of a first round 1 moa or less hit to 1k. I wouldn't shoot a deer that far but the science is great fun.

It seems maybe 20 years ago 1k was darn near the holy grail of long range shooting. Now there's a small handful of factory rifles capable of it and a bunch of sporter weight customs that will do it.

In reality there's likely few people comparably to have actually shot an animal past 500 yards. Not a tremendous number past 300 at that. The TV shows demonstrate it and people talk about it a lot but when you look at the number of people hunting divided by those who have killed past 500 id wager it to be a low percentage.

I love both and appreciate the similarities among them. Both of them require you to practice if you want to become consistently good. Hours on the range, hitting balls or ringing steel, develops a familiarity with your rifle or club that you then can immediately rely upon when pressure rises to make the shot.
Worn out grooves and spent primers = higher odds of success.

I see the long range aspect as simply another aspect of what we do. If you cant pay attention to the weather and wind and where your scent is going, if you cant swing a rifle and shoot a deer on the run in the thick stuff, if you can't be patient and sit in a blind or under a good tree for hours and a ton of other stuff you won't bag many animals. Shooting is only part. Shooting long is for many people an even smaller part. We spend so much time and energy on the fun stuff( rifles bullets barrels and ballistics ) that many people don't realize that humping in a few miles and the ability to "see" in the woods is just as if not more important.

Tldr: being a skilled shot and skilled hunter are very different things.

Plinker147 said:

I golf better with more beer!!. I don't shoot while drinking beer so can't compare the 2.

Your on the wrong web site if your asking these questions

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You're

Its definitely been geared more towards the general public and making it seem a lot easier than it really is, without any practice. Guy gets a $400 rifle from walmart, a $200 BDC scope, some factory ammo and thinks he can kill deer at 1000 yards cause he seen it on tv...lmao that's my take on things anyway. 20 years ago, a guy actually had to have some sense of how to hit a target at 1K. There wasn't hardly any of this fancy new equipment out, scopes with custom turrets, reliable rangefinders, ballistic apps. Now a days though, just about any joe blow can ring steel at 1K if they have any common sense. My only problem with it is the new guys that havent practiced at the ranges they are intending to shoot animals at. Even with all the latest, newest equipment and gadgets, one still has to know how to use the equipment, and have the time and place to practice, and put it all together. It's good to get people in the shooting sport, but I feel like they've made it a little to easy for the average person to think he can just start shooting at 1K because they see it on tv and think it's easy. Which it is pretty easy at 1K these days, if a guy knows what hes doing and has the place to do it. However, most people dont have access to shoot 1K, therefore they have ZERO business shooting at game that far. That is all. Oh, and BTW, I've always disliked golf in all my life. Nothing is as boring as hitting and chasing a stupid little white ball around and trying to put it in a little hole

Ive never swung a golf club either, but i have watched a few of the worlds best play in tournaments on t/v.
At 85 i remember well when players like Arnold Palmer were in their prime. Question is would they still be competitive today with modern day players if they were still using those old clubs?
So how far has that world progressed by way of clubs?
Today it seems the shooting world has discovered the 6.5 cartridges, including the relatively new 6.5x300 WBY.
Yet in the early 60s lots of guys were using 6.5x300 WBYs for long range hunting.
By the mid 70s very few still were however due to better bullets like the the 7 mm 162 gr BTHP match by Hornady. Quite a few were also using 30x378s in the early 70s with 200 or 220 gr SMKs.
In as i recall 1986, an old friend by name of Earl Chronister set a new 10 shot world record at Williamsport
using a (250) gr SMK in a 30x378 rifle built by Howard Wolfe and using a Unertle scope.
At that time most everybody used Unertle scopes because names like Nightforce didnt yet exist.
I think you might find the modern day 10 shot heavy gun record isnt much smaller than the one from over 30 years ago.
When you turned the dial on one of those Unertles it made a click click sound, much the same as the new scopes today. lol
As for rangefinders, we have had very good ones from as far back as WW one.
And unlike those holes on the golf coarses, all those things we ranged with them 40 years ago havent moved a bit in all that time.
Now im told that there are things you can hold in your hand that actually tells you when the wind is blowing.
And if you have enough time, it can even accurately figure out how many scope clicks it takes to hit something.
But i dont know what happens if the deer dont have enough time, or if just maybe the wind could be blowing a bit stronger or even from a different direction over yonder.
Maybe Arnold would know.