Accuracy of the Long Straight-in Shot

the tester

A few posters said they can smack these balls in 10/10 or close. I highly doubt that. Even on muddy cloth and perfectly balanced slate, you should not go near that percentage. Try smacking this shot on a legit table and it will spit it back out. Last vegas has one of these. Its table #10. Try any shot on this table.

The pockets size can be pretty deceiving.
 
the rubber hit the road today

Nine foot GC IV, fairly tight pockets, cue ball jawed in one corner pocket and the object ball roughly halfway to the other corner pocket diagonally across from the cue ball, middle of a game. Nothing to it I can go ten for ten, um eight for ten, uh six for ten, well none for one anyway, I missed by several inches! No warm up on that particular shot, oddly enough after being in this thread for days I hadn't even tried the shot in practice. I was completely in the jaws with the cue ball and had to jack up a little but I didn't even rattle the pocket, plain missed.

Chris, nice picture of the PPC, looks like a Heavy Varmint Class gun. (13.5 pound) The Light Varmint looks much the same as the HV except even shorter and stockier. Although some of them have over a thousand dollar paint jobs on them, special jewelling and polishing, a lot of bling, the rifle itself isn't nearly as pretty as a nice sporting piece. The old Browning shotguns and rifles, the Ruger single shots, many sporting arms are truly beautiful. I always refer to my benchrest rifles as BB guns because they remind me of my old Benjamin pump from when I was a kid, another short and stocky rifle. I do agree with you, anyone that hasn't seen a benchrest rifle at work has a hard time believing the groups they can cut. Sounds like your Sako's actually shot very well for using factory ammo. There is probably at least a quarter inch smaller groups to be found using custom bullets and ammo and good windflags set up right.

I focus on one thing at a time because cars, horses, rifles, pistols, and pool all take a lot of time and most take a lot of money one way or another. I can honestly say that none of the other things have been nearly as lucrative as pool has been. Pool I'll always be in the black on. Rifles and pistols, I lost a little. Cars and horses, lets don't talk about cars and horses!

Hu
 
I'll follow Shooting arts here. I'm late coming to this one. I too will take the bet. And on a windless day I'll do it with a 22 LR with iron sights and no bench! I have a severly worked Anshutz 1413 (fort hose who understand, for those who don't it's a 2200$ hand made customized Olympic level match rifle). I may have slipped some but I can still lay in 5 inside an inch at 100 yards. Providing I can get good ammo.

I also have a Remington 700 in 223 Rem. It too is a custom NRA across the course match rifle. It too can do the Job. When shooting prone it can do the job. I might even be able to do it kneeling.

Before the pooh-poohing starts. I'll be using custom fitted heavy canvas and leather clothing designed for position shooting. I'll also be using shoes and slings, ect. specially designed for the task. I have been coached by world class shooters and coaches. Heck I've even got some help from Olympians.

Shooting arts and Tramp are not bluffing. It can be as easy as taking candy from,,,,, well you get the picture. Heck I saw less than 3" groups at 1000 yards at bench matches. It can be done.

But the pool shot lucky if I make 3 out of 10.

Mark Shuman
 
phread59 said:
I'll follow Shooting arts here. I'm late coming to this one. I too will take the bet. And on a windless day I'll do it with a 22 LR with iron sights and no bench! I have a severly worked Anshutz 1413 (fort hose who understand, for those who don't it's a 2200$ hand made customized Olympic level match rifle). I may have slipped some but I can still lay in 5 inside an inch at 100 yards. Providing I can get good ammo.

I also have a Remington 700 in 223 Rem. It too is a custom NRA across the course match rifle. It too can do the Job. When shooting prone it can do the job. I might even be able to do it kneeling.

Before the pooh-poohing starts. I'll be using custom fitted heavy canvas and leather clothing designed for position shooting. I'll also be using shoes and slings, ect. specially designed for the task. I have been coached by world class shooters and coaches. Heck I've even got some help from Olympians.

Shooting arts and Tramp are not bluffing. It can be as easy as taking candy from,,,,, well you get the picture. Heck I saw less than 3" groups at 1000 yards at bench matches. It can be done.

But the pool shot lucky if I make 3 out of 10.

Mark Shuman
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And military snipers got guys from a mile away. OUCH!
 
TATE said:
That's amazing shooting. The AR sounds like a really terrific sniper/varmint set up.

As I am sure you gather, I used to target shoot recreationally. I'm kind of sorry I didn't get the heavy barreled rifles but I like the beauty of sporting rifles. With standard barrels, taking my time (so the barrel would stay cool) and premium factory ammo, with the .223 I could sometimes shoot 10shots within a 1" group and maybe get one or two flyers. Once the rifles was zeroed, I was picking the staples out of the target

I used to think that was pretty good until one day a benchrest guy set up next to me. I could see through my scope he was grouping small, so I took a break and put my spotting scope on his target. I watched him for the full session watching his first hole get a little larger with each shot, then the second, third, etc. I couldn't believe how accurate he was. In fact, from 100 yards, I bet he could was more accurate than most people would be if they took their finger, put some ink on it, and repeatedly poked a spot on a piece of paper.

The accuracy of a fine tuned benchrest rifle, a powerful scope, and handloaded ammo, in the hands of an experienced marksman, cannot be disputed.

I bet most people here don't even know what a benchrest rifle looks like. Attached is a pic (from the internet) of a pretty cool looking benchrest rifle (6mm ppc).

Chris
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Somehow that whole set-up looks so artificial. Like it's no longer a sport, but all about having the best set-up. I like to see a guy who can take a pistol or a rifle in his hands and hit things (like a dime) that someone throws into the air. That to me is a sharpshooter.

Once upon a time they trained some baseball players, using BB guns to shoot at small objects. The very best shots got to where they could hit a tossed BB in the air! The Cincinnati Reds set a major league record with 221 HR's that year. And I think Frank Robinson was the MVP.
 
Thief

ShootingArts said:
Chris,

The key is what is accurate. My best aggregate(five 5 shot groups) with my factory Remington 700 .308 was a . 403 but over the long run it had trouble holding consistently under .600". My AR and my benchrest rifles all have custom barrels and are smithed to a level far beyond any factory rifle. Then they are tuned and tweaked from there. I won't detail all I do in handloading but it is as involved as building the rifle. Custom bullets, the projectile itself, is another huge component and finding which one your rifle likes. The last time I moved I had over 200 pounds of handmade bullets just for my 6PPC's. Then I'm set up to load at the shooting range so I tune for the conditions of the moment. The result was not just a best aggregate of under .125" for my 6PPC but a best aggregate of five 5 shot groups that every group was under .125". That is still considerably better than the official world record the last I knew.

Another key is a set of windflags that you know well. Without my windflags out I am shooting blind. With the windflags out I'm getting the feedback how to steer my rifle. Even with the AR-15 which just happens to have a custom barrel from the same maker as my benchrest barrels and a trigger by a benchrest supplier, I can count on placing a bullet within at worst under two-tenths of an inch from where I aim it. The AR is scary accurate, most groups in the .2's with windflags out. It shoots about .05" behind my benchrest rifles with far less money or work in it. The outside extremes of my group can be almost an inch and still hit a dime. That gives me an allowance of .75" inch of error in reading the wind on my part. That just isn't going to happen at 100 yards.

Not directed at Chris but I notice some folks skeptical about the rifles, some going so far as to call BS. I'll say it again, the window is wide open for anyone that wants to bet against me hitting a dime ten times out of ten at 100 yards with a rifle, including the AR. Do a little homework first though, I'm stealing with this bet.

Hu
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He is not BS'ing anyone here. When I was a cop in a Chicago suburb we didn't carry shotguns, we had an AR-15 in the trunk. Well, I never shot a weapon before the police academy. And then it was time to use that rifle at the academy and it was crazy. I was a newbie and from 75 yards out I was hitting center target at least 1/3 of the time. I felt like freakin Jesse James. I was ready to join the military just to be in the sniper unit. I never had to use or get to practice with that AR 15 again, but imagine how good someone would get if they actually owned one, practiced with it, had the technical skills to master it. WOW, how good would they be??I'll put ALL my money on HU. Please, send all your money to ME now.
I promise not to spend a penny on babes, booze or billiards !!!!!!!!!
 
well if you are just gonna waste it

ChicagoRJ said:
He is not BS'ing anyone here. When I was a cop in a Chicago suburb we didn't carry shotguns, we had an AR-15 in the trunk. Well, I never shot a weapon before the police academy. And then it was time to use that rifle at the academy and it was crazy. I was a newbie and from 75 yards out I was hitting center target at least 1/3 of the time. I felt like freakin Jesse James. I was ready to join the military just to be in the sniper unit. I never had to use or get to practice with that AR 15 again, but imagine how good someone would get if they actually owned one, practiced with it, had the technical skills to master it. WOW, how good would they be??I'll put ALL my money on HU. Please, send all your money to ME now.
I promise not to spend a penny on babes, booze or billiards !!!!!!!!!
Click to expand...

Well if you are just gonna waste the money on foolishness like bills or food clothing and shelter, why bother? :D


Phread,

I did get out of rimfire benchrest. The endless hassle of chasing the magic lot of ammo for your rifle and the constantly changing classes around here where I needed eight or ten scopes at a thousand a pop just got to be too much. I let a shooting friend have my Suhl cheap when I quit the .22 stuff. I got it complete with the Olympic sights when I bought it. My brother was with me when I went to test fire it. He fired the first group, a .17" five shot group at 50 yards with the iron sights. I put the rifle away and told him I wasn't touching it until I had a 36X scope on it! With everything tuned perfectly one day I buried the competition in unlimited class with it. Just the local guys but the local guys went to the nationals a few weeks later and came back with five or six world records, they are pretty tough!

I'm not competing with the benchrest rifles right now and the last trip west I just took a couple of AR's and a couple thousand rounds of ammo. Scored some one shot hits on small targets standing offhand at over a hundred yards and lobbed in a couple of shots where you know the target was plain unlucky, the bullet was coming down like a mortar round!

I've got an itch to do some serious shooting again, can't decide between the rifles or pistols. Both are a lot of fun in their own way. Of course pool is too but I like a little more noise sometimes. :D

Hu
 
searcyD said:
A few posters said they can smack these balls in 10/10 or close. I highly doubt that. Even on muddy cloth and perfectly balanced slate, you should not go near that percentage. Try smacking this shot on a legit table and it will spit it back out. Last vegas has one of these. Its table #10. Try any shot on this table.

The pockets size can be pretty deceiving.
Click to expand...

I've got a 9 foot Brunswick metro with 4.5 inch
pockets. Is that legit? I don't care how deceiving
the pockets look, dead center is gonna go everytime.

I can hit 10 in a row with some warm up
so I'm sure there's ALOT of posters on here who
could also do it. Cause like I said I ain't no Efren
 
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Thanks Neil!

Neil said:
I was going to hold this part back, but I decided to post it... The final "trick" to making them, in addition to what I already said, once you are on line, and KNOW you are hitting the cb dead center, forget about the cb. Make the top of the ob your cb and try to hit it with your tip. You don't need to exagerate your follow through, just let it stop where it's supposed to, but shoot like you are going to hit the ob with your tip.
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Just want to say that Neil's advice in this post is pure gold. It won me a game tonight. I had the exact same shot we're talking about in this thread on the 8-ball, with the 9-ball blocking maybe 1/4 of the pocket (playing 9-ball on a 9 ft GC-IV). A stop shot wins the game, but it's a real tester and the 9 in the way makes the aiming tougher. Using Neil's advice of focusing on the curve at the top of the ball (and using a short stroke), it went in perfectly and I won the game. Thanks, Neil!

CueTable Help

 
Neil said:
I really don't understand your post at all??? Maybe it's just that YOU should not go near that percentage because you firmly believe you can't. It's just a shot on a pool table! Pros SHOULD go ten out of ten on it.

As far as what you state about it coming back out on a "legit" table... if you can't make a ball from corner to corner without it spitting back out, that is NOT a legit table, but nothing more than a gaff table.

I'll guarantee you one thing, if you believe you can't make it, you are right, and you never will.
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Im with you on this one neil. Its just a shot. Like a freethrow in basketball. Some pros can make 90% over the course of a SEASON. So any good highschool player can get hot and go 10 for 10. Its not like your supposed to draw the cueball back all the way or follow it in after the ball. Those would be hard. This one just takes a straight repeatable stroke. And how does he know the posters on here's skill levels?

Like i said I use these to warm up. Make sure im stroking straight and hitting it where I want. I dont nail every one but will hit 5 or 6 in a row everyday. A litte focus and im sure I could hit 10.
 
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searcy, this is one of those things where... just cuz you personally can't do it... and nobody you know can do it... and nobody you've seen can do it...
doesn't mean it can't be done :)

I don't know what numbers an actual pro can put up, but the guys on here claiming 6/10 or better aren't lying just to look good, and they aren't unknown pros. They're regular GOOD pool players. B's and A's. There may only be one or two where you play but the world is full of 'em.

PS when people say they smack 'em in, the pocket isn't gonna spit it out unless you're talking warp speed. We're just talking hitting it crisp vs. rolling it in.
 
CreeDo said:
searcy, this is one of those things where... just cuz you personally can't do it... and nobody you know can do it... and nobody you've seen can do it...
doesn't mean it can't be done :)

I don't know what numbers an actual pro can put up, but the guys on here claiming 6/10 or better aren't lying just to look good, and they aren't unknown pros. They're regular GOOD pool players. B's and A's. There may only be one or two where you play but the world is full of 'em.

PS when people say they smack 'em in, the pocket isn't gonna spit it out unless you're talking warp speed. We're just talking hitting it crisp vs. rolling it in.
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If this Searcy is anything like Denny Searcy - he can make this a lot. He's probably thinking about shooting this with a jawed cue ball, where you have to shoot jacked up. That's a lot more difficult and would be low percentage.

The cue ball can't be jawed or this is a whole different shot - I'm talking cue ball placement 6" from either rail. Most good players would be favored to make this ball even on a tight table - but it definitely takes a good stroke, a lot of concentration, and it's a difficult shot.

It's a shot worth practicing.

Chris
 
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Neil said:
I really don't understand your post at all??? Maybe it's just that YOU should not go near that percentage because you firmly believe you can't. It's just a shot on a pool table! Pros SHOULD go ten out of ten on it.

As far as what you state about it coming back out on a "legit" table... if you can't make a ball from corner to corner without it spitting back out, that is NOT a legit table, but nothing more than a gaff table.

I'll guarantee you one thing, if you believe you can't make it, you are right, and you never will.
Click to expand...



I can't read the vibe of your post. You seem to be a pretty sensible guy so I'll give you a chance to explain yourself before I make any judgments. Further, if you can give me reason to change my view on this particular topic, I'll give you credit for being more knowledgeable, and will probably agree with what you say thereafter.

About the shot, we obviously have conflicting opinions. You shoot it a certain way, and it is completely different than how I would shoot that shot. You use the tip to aim for a line that runs from the the furthest spots from each other. I can't imagine the line vividly enuff, let alone make one out of those balls in that particular circumstance. You either smack that ball or you cut it. Guys that play the game right will cut that ball. And there is our difference.

The GC table # 10 in vegas is nothing like the the barbox you missed on. how did you miss? j/k.

You think a barbox takes more of a legit stroke than a gc with proper cut? And on low friction, clean cloth, you can send it straight?....both balls? 10/10?

Not even great imagination and photographic memory can make this shot easy. But if you're doing it....carry on.
 
kinda like a stick from a great maker

jay helfert said:
Somehow that whole set-up looks so artificial. Like it's no longer a sport, but all about having the best set-up. I like to see a guy who can take a pistol or a rifle in his hands and hit things (like a dime) that someone throws into the air. That to me is a sharpshooter.

Once upon a time they trained some baseball players, using BB guns to shoot at small objects. The very best shots got to where they could hit a tossed BB in the air! The Cincinnati Reds set a major league record with 221 HR's that year. And I think Frank Robinson was the MVP.
Click to expand...


Jay,

It is a lot like a cue stick from a great maker. Folks can and do buy all the latest and greatest toys. They can't buy wins. A wealthy friend of mine got into benchrest. The best of everything from the best names in the business. Then on one of his first trips to the range he meets the greatest short range(100-300 yards) benchrest shooter that the world may ever see and the guy takes him under his wing. Most benchrest shooters would think they had died and gone to heaven but Ron still couldn't win, couldn't even shoot well. It takes a lot of knowledge and a lot of work. Once he figured out that he couldn't buy a win or have somebody hand him all the knowledge needed to win he quit.

Although the equipment means you can shoot very tiny groups it also means everyone else can too. One shot a few tenths of an inch from where it was supposed to be can mean a ruined event. The "x-ring" at 100 yards when shooting for score is a dot about the size of a #2 pencil lead and nobody is worried about the score or even how many x's they hit, they are keeping up with how many x's they have missed! That is why a dime at 100 yards seems like such a slam dunk, it is dozens of times larger than the x-ring.

Hu
 
searcyD said:
. Guys that play the game right will cut that ball. And there is our difference.

The GC table # 10 in vegas is nothing like the the barbox you missed on. how did you miss? j/k.

You think a barbox takes more of a legit stroke than a gc with proper cut? And on low friction, clean cloth, you can send it straight?....both balls? 10/10?

Not even great imagination and photographic memory can make this shot easy. But if you're doing it....carry on.
Click to expand...


Im confused:confused:. Im leaving now. yall have fun in this thread.



<-------seriously doesnt know how youd cut that ball in. But who cares. im off to practice.
 
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