Thread: Newbie needs help setting up.

@Jackangus, I'd take Steven's cost estimates with a pinch of salt.

There are a lot of starter rifles floating around the clubs. If you show that you are dedicated and willing to put in the hard yards, people are amazingly generous.

I shot my first FTR season with a $ 400 rifle off Trademe. Toward the end of that season I upgraded the scope (got it at a good price from a forum member). It takes at least a season or two to learn different ranges and get your head around the peculiarities of wind calls at the different venues. You could turn up tomorrow with a $ 6 or even $ 10 K rifle, but unless you understand wind and how to make adjustments for it, your scores would be well below par.

During the off season I had a club mate help put my action into a old target stock (free), and re-barrel it with a second hand target barrel (free) I got from another club mate. All up I doubt if I have spent more than $ 1500 on the setup, but it did involve a lot of DIY work, favours and generosity from other people. So far this season I have won FTR 2 out of 3 shoots amongst the Welly clubs, so you don't need a $ 6 K rifle to be competitive...

It's like any other sport. you can spend oodles of $, but it is not an automatic recipe to success.