Unfortunately, it appears that in order to be competitive not only in F/TR, but most other centrefire disciplines, you need to spend serious money..........
Having said that, the top TR winner at the Imperial is often brandishing a rifle such as an old Swing or a Paramount, which can sometimes be picked up for £1000-1500.
Pete
"Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum" Lucretius
You're offended? Please explain why your inability to control your emotions translates into me having to censor my opinions....
I'd say that good wind-reading skills would allow someone to compete with relatively inexpensive equipment.
However, getting good at wind-reading usually means lots of time, and hence money, spent on the range learning the skill!
The money spent on F/TR in recent years has gone on custom rifles capable of shooting 155gn bullets at high velocities accurately (or shooting heavy bullets accurately) which has led to an 'arms & ammo race' of sorts. It's a shame they couldn't have had a 'stock rifle' class in F/TR so those starting out with something like a standard Remington 700 could still compete and not end up right at the bottom of the results. Having said that, when I was in FT/R with my 700, there were some really good shooters from overseas who shot AIs very well, so it can be done if you have the skills and spend a little more on the rifle.
Personally, I realised that a 700 was never going to cut it, so I took the leap to a custom F/TR setup and then I was where I wanted to be in the results. I do believe there is a middle ground where you can be reasonably competitive with something like an AI as long as you're also capable at reading the wind. An existing experienced TR shooter will always have an advantage coming into FT/R because they should already have the wind-reading skills. That will count for a lot in anything other than dead calm conditions.
JSC wrote:I'd say that good wind-reading skills would allow someone to compete with relatively inexpensive equipment.
However, getting good at wind-reading usually means lots of time, and hence money, spent on the range learning the skill!
The money spent on F/TR in recent years has gone on custom rifles capable of shooting 155gn bullets at high velocities accurately (or shooting heavy bullets accurately) which has led to an 'arms & ammo race' of sorts. It's a shame they couldn't have had a 'stock rifle' class in F/TR so those starting out with something like a standard Remington 700 could still compete and not end up right at the bottom of the results. Having said that, when I was in FT/R with my 700, there were some really good shooters from overseas who shot AIs very well, so it can be done if you have the skills and spend a little more on the rifle.
Personally, I realised that a 700 was never going to cut it, so I took the leap to a custom F/TR setup and then I was where I wanted to be in the results. I do believe there is a middle ground where you can be reasonably competitive with something like an AI as long as you're also capable at reading the wind. An existing experienced TR shooter will always have an advantage coming into FT/R because they should already have the wind-reading skills. That will count for a lot in anything other than dead calm conditions.
For me it was the realisation that while trying to buck the wind, I was well into HME John. This was not so bad until I realised that certain folk were pushing 190gr bullets faster than I was from a near identical rifle and I thought "This is going to end badly". The big draw of CSR over FTR to me was simple. When I went home from an FTr shoot I was invariably in a foul mood and trying to work out where the next "Grand" was coming from. With CSR I can screw up left right and centre but A, Know it was me and B, fairly easilly identify what I need to work on...oh yea and C, still be in a good mood (if somewhat sore).
