Anyone who goes to an Appleseed Shoot hopes to qualify Rifleman. All you have to do is shoot a score of 210 or higher on their AQT. Of course, it’s not. With a perfect score of 250 and the course of fire designed to throw off your NPOA multiple times. It takes skills to get that 210 or better score. So the question is how does a person earn their Appleseed Rifleman Patch? The simple answer is lots of practice. However, nothing is ever that simple. It takes having all the steps taught at a two-day event, click.
Teachable Attitude
The most important part of becoming a rifleman is having a teachable attitude. Not just the first time you go to a shoot but every time you go to a shoot. I can attest to this one. My second time around I felt like I knew what they were teaching so I just did the practice. Ignoring paying attention to a very important refresher on the fundamentals. This was of course not having a teachable attitude. Which in turn caused me to actually shoot worse my second time around.
What it also caused me to do is have to learn the fundamentals of my time. Spending hours reading over the literature given out at the shoot. Researching and reading article after article on about becoming a Rifleman. Studying the fundamentals over and over, until I knew which ones I missed every time I pulled the trigger.
Fundamentals of taking a shot
1. SIGHT ALIGNMENT — Line up the front and rear sights, or your crosshairs
2. SIGHT PICTURE — Keeping the sights lined up, bring them onto the target
3. RESPIRATORY PAUSE – Deep breath, exhale, then pause your breath as your sights line up on target
4A. FOCUS YOUR EYE — Focus your eye on the front sight
4B. FOCUS YOUR MIND -– Keep front sight on target
5. TRIGGER SQUEEZE –- Squeeze straight back while sight stays on target making sure you hold it back until your shot hits paper
6. FOLLOW THROUGH — Keep your eyes on the target and watch where your shot lands. You should be able to call your shots.
Truly Understanding the fundamentals
In theory, knowing the fundamentals will earn you the Appleseed Rifleman patch. The problem is there is so much more to it than just understanding them. They have to become second nature. It’s very easy to say you’re squeezing the trigger but run a ball and dummy drill and you’ll find out that you are yanking the trigger. You can see it every time you pull the trigger and the sights move.
Even though you think you are focused on the front sight or crosshairs, you almost have to force yourself, to not be looking at the target. While respiratory pause is an easy concept. Making sure to pause at the same place every time, can become a problem if you aren’t concentrating.
The hardest fundamental is the follow-through. It’s hard to remember not to let go of the trigger right after the shot breaks. I think shooting to reset was something that took me a while to remember to do, instinctively.
Steady Hold Factors
- Support Elbow under rifle
- Support hand relaxed
- Sling behind support wrist
- Relaxed into sling to make it snug
- Sling well up on the support arm
- Support side leg in line with spine (prone position)
- Trigger side leg bent at knee (prone position)
- Trigger side elbow planted firmly (prone position)
- Firm “handshake” grip with trigger hand
- Neck extended (Turkey Neck)
- Cheek Planted on Stock (cheek weld)
Understanding Steady Hold Factors
Understanding the steady hold factors is easy. Perfecting them not so much. I swear my first two Appleseed’s I couldn’t get my support elbow under my rifle for anything. I even had a problem getting my arm under the rifle standing up. This of course was made even worse by my inability to relax into the sling and let it do the work. By the end of the second day my muscles were so sore I couldn’t shoot worth a darn because I was still trying to muscle the rifle around.
The worst thing I’m guilty of is the turkey neck or lack there off. I can’t get my scope far enough forward to see clearly in the scope with my neck extended. I even added a recoil pad to my rifle to lengthen the stock. Which helped some.
It’s All About Consistency
I had to put foam on my buttstock for a good cheek weld and get used to having my neck in the same place every time I shoot without the turkey neck. Understanding the steady hold factors is realizing that to earn your Appleseed Rifleman Patch you have to be consistent. Sometimes being consistent means you have to change-up the steady hold factors a bit to work with what’s best for you and your rifle. Without them, you will never get a good natural point of aim(NPOA).
NPOA
Natural Point of Aim is the most important thing in earning your Appleseed Rifleman patch. If you miss a fundamental here or there, get lax on a steady hold factor, you can still put shots on target if your gun naturally points in the right direction. Your shot group won’t be as tight but it’s still close.
Missing your NPOA, on the other hand, will have every follow-up shot off even with perfect fundamentals. During an Appleseed shoot, they explain how your body is like a cannon carriage. You don’t hold the cannon barrel on target. You move the carriage till it holds the cannon on target.
The same goes for your body and your rifle. When you follow the steady hold factors you turn your body into a carriage for your rifle. Thus you must move your body to aim the rifle. This takes some work to not just move your arm or hand and instead move your whole body.
Shooter’s Bubble
The shooter’s bubble is something that was only mentioned in one of the three Appleseed’s I’ve attended but it’s something everyone should know about it. The idea is that when you are shooting the only thing you concentrate on is yourself. You’re in a bubble nothing else matters. The problem is that ignoring the guy next to you shooting an AR with a loud muzzle break is nearly impossible. The shooter’s bubble is more a matter of being able to everything right, while distracted. Where even that muzzle brake and gas in your face doesn’t affect your ability to shoot using all the fundamentals. It’s easier said than done, but once you get it, nothing will affect you.
3rd Time’s a Charm
Most people take more than one Appleseed shoot to earn that 210 score on an AQT. It took me three times. Honestly, it almost took me more than 3 times. I got my score of 227 on the second to last AQT on Sunday. Somehow following it up with a score of 229.
I was pretty worried on Sunday when my first AQT was 205, then 209, followed by a terrible 186. Exhaustion had set in and I was sure I wasn’t going to qualify this time either. I knew lots of shooters better than I, had skirted that 200-209 scores many times without getting the required 210.
This was when a short break and a fun shoot was what I needed. Just to get out of my head and back into my shooter’s bubble. Somehow the guys teaching knew I needed a break because they had everyone run a red coat drill. This is what our group needed. As I wasn’t the only one who qualified after our break from shooting AQT’s.
Conclusion
Earning your Appleseed Rifleman Patch is no easy task. It takes lots of learning. Sometimes even relearning the correct way. Then it takes hours of practice and patience. The ability to understand the fundamentals isn’t enough it takes being able to do them all correctly without thinking about it. In the end, it’s all worth it. Each shot I’ve been to has been more fun than the last one. The two or three days of sore muscles, sunburns, brass burns have all been worth it. The history I’ve learned and the history I know want to learn is amazing. In fact, it’s been the only time I’ve ever enjoyed having someone talk about history. In the end, earning my Appleseed Rifleman Patch is one moment I’ll never forget. I just hope that I can help others find this joy of finally shooting a Rifleman’s score on an AQT.
Good article but you made one critical error in the 6 steps (Fundamentals of taking a shot) that will mess up people following your advice.
Respiratory pause – You say exhale partially and hold your breath when on target which is incorrect.
First we need to correctly define respiratory pause. It is the point in your breathing when your body finishes exhaling. There is a natural pause before your body begins inhaling. That is what we call the respiratory pause.
We want to adjust our body’s positioning so that our sights land on target at that respiratory pause. This is what we call our Natural Point Of Aim (NPOA). Your body is naturally pointing at the target at your respiratory pause.
When breathing in and out the sights will rise and fall with that breathing. When prone our sights will drop down as we breath in and rise up as we breathe out. We are most stable when the air is out of our lungs because we don’t have a big air bubble in our chest or the muscle tension caused by the diaphragm holding air in.
If we partially exhale and then hold our breath we will always be varying the exact amount of air in our lungs which will change where our sights stop moving and force us to increase muscle tension to compensate which will throw off our shots creating a larger group size.
You can extend your respiratory pause to 1 or 2 seconds but no longer before you begin trembling. Ideally you finish exhaling, watch your sights land on target and take your shot withing the half second or so of your natural respiratory pause.
Here’s the definition I have on my Shoot Boss sheet…
Respiratory Pause – As you finish exhaling pause at the moment between breathing in and breathing out.
Hope that helps,
Roger Lomshek
Appleseed Shoot Boss
Kansas Appleseed Coordinator
You are correct my explanation could confuse people. My point was to tell people to exhale to the same point each time. As not everyone exhales the exact same amount each time I personally find the standard definition to be confusing and hard to follow. I just didn’t explain what I meant very well and will correct that. The reality of the respiratory pause is that you should pause your breathing at the same spot every time. If that means right before you breath in or half way down it needs to be the same. I agree only letting half of your breath out each shoot would be hard. However, your respiratory pause is where you adjust your NPOA to, so it needs to be the same each time. Do what makes you comfortable.
Thank you very much for pointing out my confusing statement I will correct it.