Rifle Shooting Fundamentals, Things to Make You Shoot Better

It seems that every sport has its own set of fundamentals.  These are the things you must learn before you can become good at that sport.  Rifle shooting has its own set of shooting fundamentals.  Although they are less known than fundamentals in other sports.  Most people who go out shooting for whatever reason ignore these fundamentals considering the fact that they can hit the target the most important thing and only worry about when they have a “bad day” at the range.  Just like any sport if you work on the shooting fundamentals you will have far fewer bad days and many more great shots.  Which begs the question what are the shooting fundamentals?

What the shooting fundamentals depend on who you talk to.  NRA says one thing, Appleseed, calls them steps to taking a shot. In the UK the even call marksmanship principals.  Which one is right?  Which one do you follow?

NRA Shooting Fundamentals

1. Aiming
2. Breath Control
3. Hold Control
4. Trigger Control
5. Follow-Through

Appleseed Shooting Fundamentals or the Six Steps to Taking a shot

1. Sight Alignment
2. Sight Picture
3. Respiratory Pause
4. Focus your Eye
5. Squeeze the Trigger
6. Follow Through

UK Marksmanship Principles

1. Shooting Position
2. NPOA
3. Sight Alignment and Picture
4. Follow Through

Rifle Shooting Fundamentals explanation

If you look at the difference between the NRA and Appleseed fundamentals you’ll start to realize there are basically the same.  If you add in the UK marksmanship principles you’ll start to see a basic pattern.  Although the marksmanship principles are slightly broader.  They all state you need to work on aiming, breath control, trigger control, and follow-through.  This means these are the very basic rifle shooting fundamentals that you have to learn to become a good marksman.

1.Aiming your Rifle

When aiming your rifle you need to first concentrate on your natural point of aim.  This is defined as the place where your body, in its relaxed state, would place the shot.  It’s simple to understand but hard to get right, and most people try to muscle a rifle around to get it on target.  Now Appleseed teaches you to use a sling to steady your rifle.  However, without a sling you still have NPOA.  Even shooting from a bench on rest you still have NPOA.  Think of it like where the rifle naturally points itself while you’re holding it.  So if you hold your rifle out in front of you without looking at the sights where would it hit?  That’s your NPOA.

The problem is your NPOA is not always where you want to shoot.  So you need to fix that first.  This takes shifting your body around until your sight alignment and sight picture are on target.  Once this is done you have properly aimed your rifle.

Sight Alignment and Sight Picture.

Sight alignment is where your sights are aligned correctly.  This means if you are looking at a standard set of iron sights or peep sights the front post and rear ring or posts are aligned correctly.  If you are looking at a scope.  Sight alignment is wherever the crosshairs are pointing.  As the scope doesn’t have to be aligned you just need to worry about sight picture. The sight picture is what you see past the end of the gun, while the sights are aligned.  If you are using a scope it’s everything you see inside the scope picture.  When using open sights it’s everything you see downrange.

Proper Aiming

To properly aim a gun you combine your sight alignment with your sight picture to put the target in your sight picture with the proper sight alignment.  When using iron sights that means your target is just above the center post.  With a scope, the crosshairs are centered on your target.   Doing all of this while maintaining proper NPOA.

2. Breath Control

Now that your rifle has been aimed properly you need to control your breath.  Anyone who has ever looked through a high powered scope will see the crosshairs move.  In fact, they move a lot with each breath you take.  As you breathe in your body will move the crosshairs downward.  When you breathe out they will come up.  This is very clear when you are in the proper prone position. 

This means to get your shoot on the target you will have to pause your breathing before you pull the trigger.  Giving you a perfectly steady rifle when you pull the trigger.  The best way to do this is to watch your sights go up and down as you breathe.  Then as you breathe out and your sights are on target pause your breathing long enough to take the shot.  It may take a few times to get your NPOA perfect so that you don’t have to exhale too much or wait too long to take your shot.  As you perfect this fundamental you will actually build a cadence for taking each shot.  This, of course, is called the rifleman’s cadence.

3. Trigger Control

Trigger control is all about pulling the trigger without moving the rifle.  This is where you want to make sure that only the center part of the end of your finger is touching the trigger.  This will make sure your trigger finger looks like a C. This allows you to keep the rest of your finger away from the gun.  DO NOT allow your the side of your finger to be resting on the stock of your gun.  This is called dragging wood and will move your gun as you pull the trigger.  As you pull the trigger you want to squeeze the trigger in a controlled manner.  You should almost be surprised when the gun fires.

4.  Follow Through

Follow-through is where you prove that you are faster than a speeding bullet.  The most important part of the follow-through is not moving the instance you here the shot break. You need to hold your trigger finger back on the trigger and keep still until you see the shot hit the target.

This allows you to “call your shot”.   In other words, you know where you were aiming before you pulled the trigger and you can see where your shot hit.  If the two are not the same something happened.  Maybe you moved maybe your sights aren’t zeroed you’ll have to figure it out.  However, if you move it’s hard telling what happened.

Conclusion

As with activity, there are fundamentals you must learn before you can be truly good at it. Anyone can play golf.  However, without learning the basic fundamentals of the correct swing you’ll never improve your game.  The same can be said for rifle shooting.  Without learning the rifle shooting fundamentals you’ll never be that perfect marksman every shooter strives for.  So go out and practice your aiming, breath control, trigger control, and follow-through.  So you can become a better Rifleman.