Shooting advice for Women
1. Don’t Let the Guys Get You Down #Shooting is a male dominated sport, but don’t let it be intimidating. Find #ranges where you are comfortable shooting, take lessons, and shoot a lot – but don’t get intimidated. If it is something you love and are passionate about, it is worth pushing through, and today there are many more shooting opportunities dedicated to #women then even just a decade ago.
2. Get a Gun that Gets You Take advantage of reps or distributors at shooting ranges to try different guns and buy the one that fits you. There are several guns designed and built for women, and these typically work for most women. But it’s still important to try out several different types of guns before you buy. When you are talking about a purchase that could cost up to several thousand dollars, this becomes even more important.
3. Love Light Loads Practice is more important than power. Shoot lighter ammunition (1 ounce or less) that travels no more than 1250 feet per second. The key with clay target shooting is learning to place the cloud of shot in the right place at the right time. Faster ammunition doesn’t make this any easier, it’s all about lots of practice, which is a whole lot easier when the gun isn’t pounding you after only one box of shells.
4. Stand Strong Make your stance instinctive. Work on the stance and understand how to stand in relation to the target’s origin so you can pick your intercept point and break point. After you master these fundamentals, you can move on to mastering the “soft knowledge” of recognizing the variables, like wind, that are presented. Your basic foundation will allow you to adapt to changing presentations and be creative (this also helps when you move from the sporting clays range to the hunting field).
5. Get Your Cadence Down There’s a rhythm to shooting. Good shotgunning requires involves a consistent rhythm of the move, mount, shoot cadence. Learning that rhythm takes time and, again, lots of shots. I admit, I struggled with this part of the lesson, but it is logical and builds the consistency necessary to shoot well.
6. Relax Your Eyes Let your eyes do the work naturally. By allowing the target to move into your field of vision as you are looking toward where you will intercept the target, you can rely more on your fundamental skills. Relaxing the eyes relaxes the whole body which in turn brings you back to being an instinctive and more consistent shooter.
7. Shoot with Women Let yourself have fun! The bottom line to mastering these skills is to put plenty of rounds through your gun. Shooting by yourself certainly works – and there are many times this is a good option when you simply need repetition – but shooting with a supportive group is far more enjoyable. Ask your gun range if there are women’s shooting events or other women looking to shoot together. Do an internet search of women’s shooting clubs. Find a group that practices together, not just a league where it’s always competitive. Building a group of friends to get you out shooting regularly will make that practice a lot more fun.
