Full-Bore
Most of the fullbore shooting we do is during the summer and every year we have members who enter the Imperial Meeting. This is the biggest event in the fullbore shooting calendar and is a week and a half of shooting during which we stay at Bisley.
Fullbore shooting is always outdoors and unlike smallbore ranges the firing points are not covered so you are at the mercy of the weather. Waterproofs are strongly recommended. We shoot at ranges between 300 and 1000yds and as you can imagine the wind plays a big role when shooting over such distances.
Judging the wind is a bit of an artform in itself, there are many indicators on the range that you can use to judge the strength of the wind - flags, sand-splash, and mirage, but practice is required to get it right.
Scoring system and targets
The scoring system in fullbore shooting is different to the smallbore system. A "bullseye" will score you 5 points in fullbore, then 4 points for an "inner", 3 for a "magpie", 2 for an "outer", 1 for a "hit" and 0 for a "miss".
| Divisions | Long Range | 600 yds | 500 yds | 300 yds | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aiming Mark | 48 | 39 | 39 | 22 | |
| V Bull | 14.4 | 7.8 | 6.3 | 3.3 | 5V |
| Bull | 24 | 13 | 10.5 | 5.5 | 5 |
| Inner | 48 | 26 | 26 | 11 | 4 |
| Magpie | 72 | 39 | 39 | 16.5 | 3 |
| Outer | 96 | 52 | 52 | 22 | 2 |
| Hit | 118"wx70"h | 70"wx60"h | 70"wx60"h | 46@ square | 1 |
| Diameter in inches; hits are rectangular or square | |||||
Competitions generally consist of 10 shots with 2 convertible sighters (known as 2 and 10); however, two other courses of fire are used - 2 and 7 and 2 and 15. Having convertible sighters means that either your second sighter only or both sighters can be counted as scoring shots. The reason for this is that you must shoot ten consecutive shots to score. Therefore, it is not possible to convert the first sighter and not the second.
During the shoot, the score of each shot is displayed along the bottom edge of the target frame using a scoring panel. The panel is a wooden paddle that is black on one side and flourescent orange on the other. Along the bottom of the target frame are four holes. The paddle is placed on each hole to signal the score of the shot. The scoring system is as follows:
A seperate disc is placed in the shot hole to show the actual position of the shot on the target.
Wind Coaching
The wind plays a critical role in fullbore target shooting, much more so than in smallbore. When shooting at long range wind can be so strong that it can blow the shot completely off target.
