Nathan Fosters website has been a great bookmark for me, lots of ballistic, terminal performance and shooting info specific to hunters. I was reading on improving my marksmanship and this article stood out to me as opposite what I see other more experienced shooters do or suggest.
TLDR: holding your forend is more accurate than the crossed arm hold with heavier recoiling rifles.
The idea here is that properly controlling the forearm is more difficult to learn but more accurate, where the more popular crossed arm method came about from a gap in marksmanship training and stuck with us today.
I would like to hear everyone's opinions on this subject? If you were instructing someone on their marksmanship which way would you teach them?
link to article:
TLDR: holding your forend is more accurate than the crossed arm hold with heavier recoiling rifles.
The idea here is that properly controlling the forearm is more difficult to learn but more accurate, where the more popular crossed arm method came about from a gap in marksmanship training and stuck with us today.
I would like to hear everyone's opinions on this subject? If you were instructing someone on their marksmanship which way would you teach them?
link to article:
The crossed arm hand hold was not adopted because it was better; it was adopted because it was easier. Easier doesn't mean better, if anything, it means lazier. Humans are good at avoiding any form of discomfort. The traditional forend hold on the other hand requires effort, a level of discipline and practice. The payoff is the creation of transferable skills that will enable one to shoot all manner of rifles and cartridges comfortably and consistently - including those used by African hunters.
By developing and practicing methods of optimum forend control, the marksman becomes much more attuned to the rifle and able to understand how the rifle is likely to shoot from a variety of positions.
