This article covers the basic equipment, information, and skills required to successfully engage in practical long-range rifle shooting. Keep in mind that this is an article and not real training, and there is no substitute for getting out there and learning from each shot.

It is divided into three sections. The first is about the rifle and gear. The second discusses trajectory and optics selection in depth. The third explains how to put everything together to make hits on targets in the field.

PRACTICAL LONG RANGE RIFLE SHOOTING Article Series:

PART I: THE RIFLE & GEAR - priorities, cost, calibers, rifles, ammunition, scopes, range-finders, ancillary gear, spotting, data

PART II: OPTICS - ballistics, elevation, wind, lead, data cards, dialing elevation, parallax, first focal plane vs. second focal plane, elevation adjustment & travel, clicks, zero-stop, single- vs. multi-turn knobs, bullet-drop compensators (BDC), tube diameter, reticle features, MIL vs. MOA, reticle illumination, brightness, magnification, objective size, specific recommendations

PART III: SHOOTING - zeroing, finding a range, targets and placement, packing up, arrival, target location, positioning, making scope adjustments, engagement, follow-up, shooter/spotter communication, efficiency

Practical precision rifle shooting involves engaging small and/or distant targets at the limit of weapon, ammunition, and shooter capability under time pressure in field settings.

Applications include but are not limited to: very small targets 1/4"-1" at 100 to 200 yards, so-called "cold bore" shots, arbitrary unknown distance targets, moving targets, ranging, shooter/spotter communication, and combinations of all of those under time constraints.

Generally, these include everything a rifleman is likely to find in any "sniper", "tactical", or "field" rifle match. The typical platform is a bolt action rifle, though an auto-loader of sufficient accuracy and appropriate caliber can do the job with some trade-offs.

For our purposes, consider "long range" to reach to the load's trans-sonic boundary (the point at which the bullet slows to 15 to 20 percent faster than Mach 1). For example, with typical 308 loads and rifles, we are interested in ranges from 25 yards out to about 700-1100 yards, depending on ambient conditions and the particular load.

This article, Part III of the series, is intended to cover the "how to" component. Keep in mind that there is no substitute for actual practice, getting out there and pulling the trigger. After reading this article, you should know the steps involved in practical long-range rifle shooting and be able to get out there and start throwing rounds down-range and making long-range hits.

In specific, this tutorial covers the "Hike-and-Shoot" style shooting, where the shooter moves throughout a course, locates, ranges, and engages targets, and then moves on. This, in my opinion, is the essence of practical field-style rifle shooting. This article is intended to explain the practical aspects of long-range shooting. There are many resources available for pure marksmanship, such as NRA High Power, F-Class, and bench-rest. I recommend reading David Tubb's books on rifle marksmanship. Zeroing simply means to set the point of impact at the point of aim at a certain distance. This distance, called the "primary zero", is the where the bullet will impact where the cross-hairs are pointed, when the elevation and windage knobs are zeroed out and have no adjustments applied.

I recommend using a 100-yard zero instead of a longer-distance zero for several reasons. First, any wind that is present will have a very small affect on the zero. Second, if you are "off" in distance by up to 10 or 15 yards, the effect on your zero will be minimal. For example, if you're actually shooting at 90 yards or 110 yards instead of 100 yards exactly, the difference in point of

impact will be less than a tenth of a minute. Lastly, 100 yards is so short a distance that if you travel up or down in altitude, or if the temperature changes dramatically, your primary zero will not be affected. Longer-distance zeros such as 500 yards will become invalid with large environmental changes such as those, because the air density will affect the point of impact. When running a 100-yard zero, the primary zero stays valid, and you just need to adjust your down-range dialed trajectory.

Zeroing should be done either from the most stable position possible, such as off of sandbags on a bench, or from the most stable position you use in the field, such as shooting off a bipod or rucksack. Shoot at least three rounds into a group before changing the point of impact using the knobs. When the rounds are all going right into your point of aim (the center bullseye, for example), then loosen the knob caps and zero them out, and retighten. Now you can dial to longer distances using the data from your dope card. In many parts of the country, finding a rifle range longer than 200 yards is difficult. Even with an established range, you are normally limited to shooting from the defined "bench" shooting area, giving you essentially one shoot position on a known distance (KD) range. One way to get access to good field-style shooting is to attend a national-level match of that type. Examples include Colorado Multi-Gun's Practical Rifle Team Challenge, and the Blue Steel Ranch Steel Safari.

Unless you have access to thousands of acres of private land where you can shoot, the best bet is to find public lands where target shooting is legal. For example, in most National Forests, shooting is legal as long as you follow some simple rules and clean up after yourself.

Obviously the first priority needs to be safety -- be sure of what is behind your target, and that there is enough empty to ensure safety.

I recommend shooting at armor steel (AR400 or AR500) steel plates, hung from conveyor belt strap. If they are one a metal stand, make sure some "play" is available. This will make the steel "ring" to indicate a hit, and help to reduce ricochets.

For practice, I recommend placing hanging steel plates in front of a hillside of rock or dry dirt. This will make it easier to spot misses, since the dust will be readily visible and its location can be easily determined relative to the target. If the target is on the top of a hill or a totally flat location, or in front of bushes or trees, it can be very difficult or impossible to spot misses. (When setting up a match, do not follow those guidelines-- don't want to make it too easy for the shooters!)

Place targets at arbitrary and irregular distances. This makes the shooters actually range the targets and not just guess knowing that you set targets every 50 yards, and do some interpolation of their data card compared to the actual distance.

Here's a checklist of things you should bring:

• Rifle with solid 100 yard zero.
• Ammunition (the same ammo you zeroed the rifle with)
• Data card for the rifle, ammunition, and current environmental conditions.
• Rear bag.
• Laser range-finder.
• Optional: binoculars for spotting.
• Eye and ear protection.

Put everything in a small-medium sized backpack, and hike to the first shooting position. As you approach the first shooting location, start scanning the area for targets. Getting an idea of where the targets are will influence your shooting position. You want to pick the most stable position where you can engage the most number of the targets. If it's not possible to shoot them all from one stable position, figure out which targets you can engage from the first position, and which targets you'll have to move for. Since we are interested in first-round hits, it's better to take a little extra time to get into more stable positions, than to shoot targets from an unsupported position.

First, un-sling the rifle and place it on the ground. Second, remove the backpack and retrieve only the equipment that you will need to make the shots. We're not having a picnic, just engaging a few targets. I usually grab a magazine, the laser range-finder, and my rear bag. Get down into what will likely be your shooting position for the first target. Pick up the laser range-finder and range the first target.

You always have the option of locating and ranging all the targets first, or ranging them as you go. I always try to locate all the targets first, so I can determine the engagement order. I usually then range targets as I engage them, since I do not take notes or write a range card. This makes sense if your goal is to make one or two hits per target and then move on. If you will be at a shooting position for a while, and engaging the targets multiple times, coming back to targets, or waiting for emerging targets, it makes sense to write out a range card. A range card should describe the location of each target or referential terrain feature in a terse manner, with the object distance. Annotating the object distance with the drop value for your rifle from the dope card is a good idea, since it removes the look-up step when you come back to that target.

To range a target using the laser range-finder, in most conditions you will be able to put the LRF reticle on the target, press the "range" button, and get a range value. For targets that stick up from the ground (like a hanging plate, a popper, or silhouette) be aware that if you are off to one side or the other, the laser might miss the target and reflect off the ground behind the target. Depending the terrain, this can be a substantial ranging error since the range will be over-estimated. One way to get around this problem is to range the ground or grass at the "foot" of the target, or to range a very nearby bush, tree, or other object. Try ranging the target two or three times to verify a consistent value.

If your LRF is broken, or you don't have one, or you don't have time to get to it, or for whatever reason, then you need to "mil" the target to determine its range. One mil is 1 part height in 1000 parts distance, so 1 mil will demarcate 1 yard height at 1000 yards distance, or 18" (1/2 yard) at 500 yards. The formula is: take the object's actual height in inches, multiple by 27.8, and divide by the number of mils it covers in the reticle. For example, if a target is 30" high and it appears 1.75 mils high in the reticle, then the distance is 30*27.8/1.75 = 476 yards. Get into a good stable shooting position. Usually, this means getting as close as possible to shooting prone off the bipod with the rear bag in place, as comfortable as you can get, with as little muscle tension as possible.

If prone position is not possible due to terrain and target location, get into the best position you can using the features and equipment available. This is the time to employ your shooting sticks, maybe sling up in your shooting sling, consider using your backpack as an additional support, or see if you can brace up against natural rock formations or trees.

I recommend loading the rifle now. You can engage the safety or even leave the bolt open. The purpose of loading at this point is to conserve time between making your wind call and breaking the first shot, and to be able to "stay on" the gun and looking through the scope without having to break position and get up to do something else. Wasting time allows changes in wind condition which can cause misses. This is a good time to adjust the scope magnification setting. In Part I and Part II, I recommend scopes with intermediate magnification, such as 3-12 or 4-16. A common mistake is to firstly buy a scope with too much magnification, and secondly to use the maximum magnification all the time. As the magnification is increased, the field of view narrows and the exit pupil gets smaller. This makes it harder to locate targets and for magnum calibers, to maintain a sight picture through recoil. Mirage is worse at higher magnification, and it can be a problem if it prevents a good consistent sight picture. If you are shooting one target at a time and you already know exactly where they are located, shooting at a power between 12 and 16 is probably fine. If you are going to need to rapidly acquire a second target or the targets are hard to locate, consider shooting at 5-10x instead.

With the target's range in mind, look at your data card and find the line corresponding to that distance. It is likely that the ranged distance will be arbitrary, like 627, and not exactly one of the lines on the card (you might have 600, 620, 625, or 640). Within 1000 yards, you can round to the nearest 10 yards, and use that line from the card. The first value to obtain from the card is the elevation correction. The examples here will be in mils, since that's how I operate my S&B and US Optics scopes, but the data might be in minutes (MOA) for Leupold or Nightforce scopes. If the distance splits two lines on the card (e.g. the actual range is 610, but you have lines for 600 and 620), look at the elevation numbers and pick a number between them.

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With this elevation number in mind, dial the scope's elevation knob to correspond to the the elevation correction. I usually double check since this is one of the most important settings.

Next, consult the range-card for the windage correction for this distance. All my range cards report the windage correction for a 10 mph wind. With this number in mind, I observe the conditions and determine what proportion of a full 10 mph wind value is present. It might be a third, half, or even two times a 10 mph wind value. There are two choices how to apply this wind correction to the scope. The first is to dial the correction on the windage knob. The second is to hold off with the reticle, if it has features, such as mil dots or hashes, which are regular and calibrated in the units on your range card. Holding off is faster and less error prone to correcting in the wrong direction. Dialing will give you a better sight picture since you'll be holding the target in the center of the cross-hairs.

We have ranged the target at 754 yards, which we round down to 750. On our data-card, the elevation for 750 is 4.9 mils. We dial 4.9 mils on the elevation knob. The windage for a full 10 mph wind value at 750 yards is 1.2 mils. We determine that there is a 3-5 mph wind left to right, so we dial 4/10*1.2 = 0.5 mil left windage.

At this point you've determined the range, made your wind call, made all the scope adjustments, and you're in position.

While minimizing natural body movements, break the shot with a good sight picture. Maintain a sight picture through recoil, and, if you've done everything right, you should see the bullet impact the target. If yes, that's great. Even if you have hit the target, don't forget that you can get information from the hit. If it's left or right, you get some information about the actual wind condition compared to your wind call. If it's high or low, it means your load is shooting faster or slower than you thought, or that the target is closer or further than you thought.

If you missed the target, you should be able to see the miss nearby as a puff of dust. If your drop data is correct, it will probably be left or right of the target. Use the features in your reticle to determine the additional correction needed. For example, if I am dialing windage and I see the miss 1/4 MIL from the desired point of impact by using the mil dots or hashes in the reticle, I would dial an additional 0.25 mil windage (actually 0.2 or 0.3 since the clicks will be 0.1 each) and make the follow-up shot.

Every shot throughout the day gives you feedback about wind conditions, and can help you learn how wind moves throughout the locale. If a single shoot position has 5 targets to engage, with up to one hit each and no more than 2 rounds fired at any target, it makes sense to shoot the closest ones first. With unknown wind, you are more likely to get a hit on the close targets, and the hit location on the target is a indicator of what wind was present. This information can be applied to further targets, as you step out from near to far.

When you have finished shooting at this position, it is time to reset your elevation knob by turning it back to zero. This is especially an issue with elevation knobs that turn multiple revolutions, such as the Leupold M1 and the Nightforce. It is not uncommmon for a shooter with one of these scopes to forget to dial down to zero after dialing up for a 500+ yard target, and then at the next shooting position, they are shooting 15 or 30 minutes over the target.

If you are using a scope that has a single-turn elevation knob like the S&B PMII series or the US Optics EREK, this is less of an issue. Even in this case, however, it's a good idea to dial it back because then if you are confronted with the need for a "snap" shot within the point-blank range of your cartridge (a few hundred yards on practical targets), your scope is ready to go.

It's common to shoot long-range targets with a partner, either as part of a team match (such as the PRTC or ITRC), as part of training, or even hunting. While shooting with a partner, the efficiency and accuracy can be improved by divvying up the tasks. For example, while arriving at a shooting position, the "shooter" can start to get his rifle set up while he looks for targets. At the same time, the "spotter" can be locating and ranging targets. The spotter can look for wind indicators and call wind values, so all the shooter has to do is dial elevation, double-check windage, and shoot. The spotter can help to spot the hit or miss and give correction or hit location information back to the shooter. When shooting a rifle I can keep on-target throughout recoil, I have found that I can spot my own hit or miss, make the correction, and shoot a follow-up shot faster without getting confirmation or miss information from the spotter. If both shooter and spotter have rifles with good optics and have pre-ranged targets, it's often helpful for the spotter to use his rifle-scope for spotter the other guy's shots. He can use the reticle features to call specific miss location, like "3/4 mil left", instead of saying something more imprecise such as "about one target's width left". If there are more targets to range and engage, it's faster for the spotter to stay looking through the LRF so he can immediately confirm range of the next target.

The shooters and teams who win field-style "hike and shoot matches" usually do not run cross-country, nor do they rush. They move at a brisk pace on an efficient route to the shoot position. They approach the shoot position knowing what they are going to do. They locate and range targets deliberately, and engage each target, usually without missing. The key is that movement is not wasted. This is something that comes with practice, but key places to look for improvement: movements that do not directly support making the shot; and thought processes and adjustments which are not needed. For example, your data card should be set up so that you don't have to do any mental math while in the field.

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