King's First Fullbore Trip to Bisley in 2025!

Feb 10

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A very brisk start to the early fullbore season in 2025, a small group of very keen King's shooters descended upon Bisley to have a crack at the 'big guns'!

On the 8th and 9th February, the Met Office had published weather predictions with lows of 0 and highs of 7 degrees Celsius, but despite this three novice members (Hannah, Benjamin, and Matthew), and two committee members - Natasha (President) and Siqi (Vice President) braved the cold to shoot some fullbore target rifle.

Target rifle is a discipline where you shoot .308/7.62mm calibre bolt-action iron sighted rifles at distances of: 300 yards, 500 yards, 600 yards, 900 yards, and 1000 yards. We travel to the National Shooting Centre, Bisley to do this as it is one of the largest and best equipped range complexes in the world - we shoot "short range" (300-600 yards) - which is still an awful lot longer than the 25 yards we shoot at Strand(!) - on Century range and "long range" (900-1000 yards) at Stickledown range.

Here's Matthew demonstrating the shooting position in a jacket and sling with our fullbore club rifle!

This weekend we were shooting 300 yards and 600 yards as an introduction for the novice fullbore shooters amongst us! Our President, Natasha, was happily situated as a wind coach for the weekend, breaking for an occasional shoot herself.

On the Saturday morning, starting at 300 yards, Hannah and Benjamin learned how to shoot in a jacket and sling, with a little rest underneath for some support at first. Both did exceptionally well! With absolutely no misses and most of the shots landing on the black, this was an excellent introduction to fullbore shooting! Siqi, a veteran of last year's BUCS Fullbore team showed them how to shoot in a sling and jacket without any extra support, and put in a great score.

Excitingly, we had our very first "possible" of the 2025 fullbore season - a 50.6 (out of a possible 50.10), put in by our President, Natasha, at 300 yards!

Here's a picture of Natasha's perfect score at 300yds - 50.6 (very much almost a 49.6 - shot 6 was just on the line, but in! Perhaps the group could have been centred a quarter minute down and right...)

Saturday afternoon, the stakes were upped and we moved back to 600 yards! A little more concentration was required on Natasha's part, while wind coaching, but nothing that the group couldn't handle! Visibility in the afternoon was equally as poor as the morning - with a fine mist covering the range, decreasing the saturation and contrast of the sight picture but we manged! Excellent shooting by our novices Benjamin and Hannah, both doing incredibly well and keeping all of their shots on the target!

Back at Bisley early doors on the Sunday, we had a full day of shooting planned for Matthew and Natasha. The lighting conditions were a tad more forgiving today, but the weather was not. Colder than yesterday, with a lot more drizzle, we soldiered on to get some good practice in. Unfortunately, there was no easy beginnings today - the NRA were only able to offer us 600yds targets all day, so we started on hard mode.

Despite the challenging weather, and wind, Matthew rapidly improved from shooting rested as a novice, to a full setup in a jacket and sling, shooting unsupported in fullbore for the first time. In fact, he did so well, that we began practicing training stamina and moved onto shooting 2 and 10s (two sighting shots, with 10 shots to count towards the score).

Natasha and Matthew made a good team, on the penultimate shoot of the morning, Matthew really got "in the zone", shot 10 great shots in a row - the final score was an amazing 49.4!! This was by far the best score of the weekend for a fullbore novice - well done to Matthew!

A close up of the plot card from Matthew's amazing shoot with a final score of 49.4 out of a possible 50.10! The only scoring shot out was in fact shot number 4 - which Matthew indicated had gone high, so an incredible call for a novice shooter too! Very impressive!

And here's an obligatory photo of Matthew looking like a cat who's got the cream next to his electronic target - congratulations!

All in all, reports from everyone that despite the cold weather and the early start, everyone had a great time - and by all accounts our novices are hooked and can't wait to come back to Bisley for more fullbore! That's what we love to hear and makes it all worth it.

Here's to an excellent fullbore season for team King's, we hope to see more of our members out on the ranges this year!