Thread: Benchrest shooting in NZ

Who here does it ?

What classes ?

Which ranges around the country ?

How many competitors on average at comps ?

Anyone doing smallbore benchrest ?

I do a heap of resting, especially at work. But not much on benches.

I wouldn't mind giving it a go in all seriousness. But like most shooting sports on the coast, there isn't much of a following or the places to do it.



Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

@Kiwi Greg

@ebf
Try Target Shooting NZ for Smallbore.
Google has a lot of help here.
Also 2017 World Benchrest Champs being run in Nelson, by NZDA, this year, so just across the Strait for you.

Originally Posted by R93

I do a heap of resting, especially at work. But not much on benches.

In any crowd there is always one "special" case

Always had the cleanest window on my bus as well

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

Akl branch Deerstalkers run bench rest shots at the Kumeu range. Look them up on their web site for dates.

Originally Posted by R93

Always had the cleanest window on my bus as well

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

And I heard no red crayons survived being around you either.

Can someone explain - in summary, small words, etc - the list of different shooting types in NZ? Ie what is bench rest - can I use a 338 or restricted to.....

Maybe needs a new thread.....

Originally Posted by ebf

Who here does it ? Me

What classes ? Light & Heavy Varmint, 10.5 & 13.5 Lbs

Which ranges around the country ? Tokaroa, Nelson, Murchison & recently some benches in Chch I believe

How many competitors on average at comps ? 10-15

Anyone doing smallbore benchrest ? I play at that as well, 50 metres outside, very frustrating

There are three teams of 4 shooting at the World Champs here in Nelson, 02-12 November this year,

Around 80 competitors from all around the world are participating

Originally Posted by Beaker

And I heard no red crayons survived being around you either.

Can someone explain - in summary, small words, etc - the list of different shooting types in NZ? Ie what is bench rest - can I use a 338 or restricted to.....

Maybe needs a new thread.....

Yes I guess you could use a 338 but its really going to beat you up

I tried to use a 30 cal but it wasn't consistent enough.

Starting to get on top of a couple of 6mms at the moment with some promising results



I have to work on my wind reading, it really makes a massive difference

Originally Posted by Kiwi Greg

Yes I guess you could use a 338 but its really going to beat you up

I tried to use a 30 cal but it wasn't consistent enough.

Starting to get on top of a couple of 6mms at the moment with some promising results



I have to work on my wind reading, it really makes a massive difference

You missed the middle by a Shit load though. x2...

Originally Posted by Dermastor

Akl branch Deerstalkers run bench rest shots at the Kumeu range. Look them up on their web site for dates.

Akl Deerstalkers Benchrest shooting is a waste of time if you want to compete seriously they never attend the Nationals held in Nelson or the North Island Champs held in Tokoroa,
Nelson is the home of Benchrest in NZ run by Nelson Deerstalkers there are benchresters in Christchurch as well, Your run of the mill varmint rifle is not going to cut it in real competition
a proper benchrest rifle will set you back up to $10.000 and will be capable of 5 shot groups under 0.100" all day, like Greg says wind reading is most important it wins matches,
a match is 5 groups of 5 shots time limit 7 minutes, here the classes shot are light and heavy varmint usually with the same rifle you can change barrels or add weight to make HV
though most don't, a competition is over two days 100 yds day one and 200 yds day two,

thanks for the replies so far guys

so LV and HV here are the same as light gun / heavy gun in the american videos ?

what are competitive group sizes for the different classes in NZ ?

front rest wise, is it predominantly co-axial rests ?

anyone know if there is anything south of tokoroa on the North Island ? Palmy ? Kaitoke does not seem to do this much anymore...

thought about it again, maybe a better option for "competitive scores" would be if someone could point me to any published scores for the last couple of NZ comps ?

if you asked a bunch of FTR shooters what a "competitive score" in NZ is, most of them would probably say 60.xx, which of course is slightly optimistic

Originally Posted by ebf

thought about it again, maybe a better option for "competitive scores" would be if someone could point me to any published scores for the last couple of NZ comps ?

if you asked a bunch of FTR shooters what a "competitive score" in NZ is, most of them would probably say 60.xx, which of course is slightly optimistic

If you can shoot consistently in the 2's & 3's then that's competitive, 0.200" & 0.300", remember that translates to 0.400" to 0.600" at 200 yards

That's 5 groups of 5 shots at 100 LV, 200 LV, 100 HV & 200 HV

Obviously less is more but much much harder than internet heros would ever imagine.....

This isn't a very representative set of results to post to be fair for two reasons, first there were only South Islanders there as the North had a shoot at Tokaroa & second the Gentleman that won broke 3-4 national records doing so, he shot exceeding well, hope he can do the same at the worlds



It is extremely easy for a bad group or two to really ruin your weekend