Midnight Sun Rifle Challenge pt7

1. Work on your fitness, I talked a good fight but didn’t do enough. Not nearly enough.
2. Book everything long in advance, we could have halved our travel and hotel costs. 
3. EU firearms pass. If you live in the Met police area its child’s play, their paperwork game is strong, other forces may vary in their application of the legislation 
4. Develop a load and record its data to 5m increments, choose a powder you can defiantly buy regularly and stockpile bullets. Even Spud1967 ran out of SST’s during our practice period.I’m trying to horde enough to last the life of the barrel. 
5. Be very sure you’ve set your zero stop correctly. If you don’t have a zero stop get a proper scope.
6. Travel early – the money you saved on early bookings will be well spent acclimatising. Norway looks like a nice place to hang out. We were both battered by the time we arrived and I’m sure it added to our woes. 
7. Dress light but windproof – knee and elbow pads are a great idea. There are cheap alternatives to Snickers work pants but the way the knee pads are held in place on the Snickers floor layers trousers makes them the best. Of course Crye precision come with fantastic looking knee pads. 
8. Lightweight boots – learn from ultralight hikers, a pound off your feet is worth three off your pack
9. You need a Jerven bag
10. Take your own 10 power binos – more time studying the targets will help
11. Take Compeed it didn’t save my competition but it did save the day for a lad who wore wellies. Its the best insurance £3 will buy you. 
12. Shoot off a rear bag, if our bipod-only strategy was any good the Vikings would be doing it.
13. Bring a shooting sling that you’ve adjusted to a perfect fit, and use it. 
14. Water isn’t hydrating enough – bring Dioralyte (isotonic salts).
15. A rifle scabbard like those made by Vorn, that keeps the centre mass nearer your belt are a much better idea than the barrel-down designs. That wobbling weight between your shoulders is fatiguing. Putting your bag, and therefore rifle down moderator first is a bad bad idea. 
16. Paint some engineers blue/red on your cases if you plan to retrieve them. It’ll save a lot of time. 
17. If you’re planning a build: 6mmBR, 6XC, or 6mmSLR (if you can face the 1500 barrel life) [or perhaps 22 Nosler or 223 Valkyrie?] are all potential 1200m alternatives to the 6.5mm rifles.
18. A First Focal Plane scope; with an unfussy reticle, that reads in Milliradians is minimum bid. As ever; spend whatever it takes to get a good, robust scope, then drop the change on a rifle.

A suburban dad blogging about: Gear Freakery, Prepping, Rifles, Archery, Deer Hunting, Fishing, Urban Hunting and Homesteading, Locavore Cooking, and some Storytelling.