Sporting Shooter UK – August 2019

SHOOTING

TECHNIQUE WITH STEVE RAWSTHORNE

T

he inspiration for this month’s article comes

from a letter that the editor forwarded to me.

It read: “I am a seasoned shooter of Sporting

clays only. My problem is that just as I am about

to pull the trigger I lift my head up off the stock

(peeping)... guaranteed to miss the clay! I have

asked many shooters who shrug their shoulders.

Can someone out there help me please?”

Well, at least his friends didn’t offer a solution,

which is something. There are a number of

common problem actions which shooters make at

every level and which limit their performance and

stop them progressing up the rankings ladder,

beating their mates or just putting food on the

table. ‘Stopping the gun’ and head lifting are

among the two most common.

How often have you heard someone at a clay

shoot being told by his mates that they’re “behind

it”? In order to help someone out of one or more

of these problems, the coach needs to

understand WHY they are doing it. Head lifting or

stopping the gun is only the physical

manifestation of the problem, the visible aspect.

The real problem occurs between the ears,

sometimes due to external influences.

Head lifting

Since head lifting is mentioned in the letter, we will

start there. To make a successful shot, we need

to keep the head on the gun when we pull the

trigger and follow through after the shot. Failure to

do this will result in ‘stopping the gun’ at the

moment of pulling the trigger or just before. A

miss will result. Sometimes, a shooter will get into

the habit of giving a target massive lead so that

when they stop they occasionally bump into

something, but this is not a consistent solution to

the problem.

So why do we lift the head? There are many

reasons and sometimes a shooter will suffer from

all or several of them. As we age, our eyesight

does not improve. Lifting the head up above the

rib or barrels gives the shooter a better,

unobstructed view of the target, so one solution

may be to visit an optician and get an eye test and

some glasses. There are specialist shooting

opticians who understand the problem better than

the high street ones, but if you explain to a high

street optician that you are a shotgun shooter and

need to retain your eye dominance, assuming it is

the right way round, they can normally help.

Glasses themselves can be the problem. Some

Head for the skills

Steve Rawsthorne comes to the aid of an experienced shooter who has started lifting his head

off the stock, offering a solution to this and several other common problems

PICTURES:

STEVE RAWSTHORNE

Glasses with small lenses can leave you trying to look through the frame of the glasses, causing you to lift

your head. It might be worth buying glasses with larger lenses for when you are out shooting.

IN THE FRAME

Pantoscopic glasses (designed for snooker players) have a hinge on the arm and feature large lenses. These

could help you get more of an unobstructed view of the target.

PANTOSCOPIC GLASSES

‘Head lifting is

only the physical

manifestation of the

problem – the real

problem occurs

between the ears’