2025 Nightforce elr steel challenge & Krg extreme
- Thread starter Schw15
- Start date
To be honest it takes quite a bit of confidence to sign up and shoot one of these matches. I hope you are able to shoot it again next year.
This was my 4th year shooting both the KRG and Nightforce ELR matches. Every year I get my butt kicked one way or another but learn what I need to work on so I can return, do better and try to not make the same mistakes as the previous year.
Everyone we ran into, and especially in our squad, was very helpful. Seemed to all help each other find targets and those of us with LRF binos verified yardages with each other. We definitely plan on being back next year, ended up putting almost 5k miles on the truck in a week, but it was well worth it.
Most of the 22 hour ride home was going over our mistakes and the easy points left on the table. I’m going to check tonight, but I wish there was a way to download the stage scoring into Excel to be able to sort through teams just to compare how you did amongst others.
Started unpacking and got to the first chore, brass lol. I will say I learned a lesson, I had bolt lift and extraction that could only be completed with Thor’s hammer on Saturday. I had decided to paint marker right above the rim of the case to mark my brass. What a dumb idea. Got home Saturday night and luckily had the borescope, saw blue paint in the edge of the chamber. Cleaned it all out and ran fine even with the rain Sunday.
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Well things started off almost ok before the match I tried to rest my 0 after a site in session at the range but I couldn’t get 2 of the four screws to loosen (this is on a NF stave) so the best I could do was to be 7 tens of a mil off no good but workable during the match I saw the Nightforce folks and they were able to get the screws to move so ok now I am at the 7 station and when I got up I slipped some of me hit the scope and it separated from the rifle all four stews to the rifle to the rail broke which put me out of business I will get that resolved when I get home. Next year I will bring a spare probably a Remington 40x in 300 prc so we will continue our continuous improvement plan!
That sucks for you, but I’ll take a lesson from your hardships. I thought about bringing a spare gun but didn’t this year. You pretty much confirm that next year I will.
I used the gen 2 10k's. I would scan around the target, especially at the base. And really had minimal issues. I was clipped in to my tripod though. There were times when I thought 12x could have been useful, but for the entire match there was only one target that I couldn't find with the bino's.
No issues finding the targets just ranging them. Some were hard to pickup up with accurate ranges and i would second guess then. It cost me big time unfortunately but something I need to improve on or update my gear to be better
I'm using 10K Gen 1. I've adjusted my laser and know where it hits best so I was fairly confident in my ranges.
I did pick up a sig Cert so I will probably upgrade to the G2.
Is that the new rifle mounted one?
I run the vortex Fury non AB model and a Bushnell legend spotting scope for matches. I usually do not have an issue ranging targets with the binos and rarely use the spotter. I purchased it specifically for movers. The spotter has not let me down on them. The binos have been great but I am leaning towards a pair of SIG 10k gen 2 binos if my year straightens out.
It's taken a few years to get set up the way I like. Now I need to upgrade. Go figure.
It's taken a few years to get set up the way I like. Now I need to upgrade. Go figure.
I saw a couple people with this setup, I think one was a NF CFS with a Vortex on top of it.
I RO'd stage 19, one of the stages where the book ranges on some of the targets was incorrect. I wrote on the stage description board that ranges should be checked, but many people did not check ranges.
I shot the match on Thursday and Friday in different but equally challenging conditions and my observation was that many of the targets were difficult to range with our Sig Kilo 10Ks. Of the different rangefinders out there that shooters were using, my observation was that the Kilo 10Ks worked the best, but even then at the ranges we were shooting, the laser beam size was so large that very often the return that the rangefinder read was not from the target. We needed to range all around the target to try to get similar ranges and then make an educated guess as to what the target range was which worked fairly well for most of the stages. On my stage 19, I shot a 7 (3 first round hits and 1 2nd round hit) using our range guestimates. The 3rd target range was off and many shooters did not confirm ranges and ended up shooting way low. The 4th target was skylined, so if you did not see your miss, chances are you shot over the target and bullet went over the back side of the hill.
Another observation was when shooters missed targets, they made minor corrections and ended up missing the 2nd shot in almost the same place. If you are way low and the target is .5 mil tall, your correction should be at least .5 mils and probably .7 to 1 mil. Same for wind, if you miss on wind most targets were at least .5 mils wide so your minimum correction should be around .5 mil correction unless your miss was just off the edge.
I learned from being an RO by watching the best shooters and what they did and will return next year to RO again. My last observation to make in this post was that I lost count of how many shooters had poor fundamentals. Most common was their body was at a 45 degree angle to the gun, not square behind it and as a result the recoil control was non existent and they couldn't spot their misses.
I shot the match on Thursday and Friday in different but equally challenging conditions and my observation was that many of the targets were difficult to range with our Sig Kilo 10Ks. Of the different rangefinders out there that shooters were using, my observation was that the Kilo 10Ks worked the best, but even then at the ranges we were shooting, the laser beam size was so large that very often the return that the rangefinder read was not from the target. We needed to range all around the target to try to get similar ranges and then make an educated guess as to what the target range was which worked fairly well for most of the stages. On my stage 19, I shot a 7 (3 first round hits and 1 2nd round hit) using our range guestimates. The 3rd target range was off and many shooters did not confirm ranges and ended up shooting way low. The 4th target was skylined, so if you did not see your miss, chances are you shot over the target and bullet went over the back side of the hill.
Another observation was when shooters missed targets, they made minor corrections and ended up missing the 2nd shot in almost the same place. If you are way low and the target is .5 mil tall, your correction should be at least .5 mils and probably .7 to 1 mil. Same for wind, if you miss on wind most targets were at least .5 mils wide so your minimum correction should be around .5 mil correction unless your miss was just off the edge.
I learned from being an RO by watching the best shooters and what they did and will return next year to RO again. My last observation to make in this post was that I lost count of how many shooters had poor fundamentals. Most common was their body was at a 45 degree angle to the gun, not square behind it and as a result the recoil control was non existent and they couldn't spot their misses.
Another observation was that many shooters timed out because they took too much time to find targets. What I did was find large landmarks like hills or sandy patches that I could find in the scope easily and then navigate from there to the target. Things like hills with different colored soil or rocks and bare patches of a different color, or sand patches that could be easily found with the bare eye make for good landmarks. I'd find them with with my eyes, quickly orient my rifle to them then drop down behind the scope to find the target. It also helped that I had a red dot sight mounted on my rifle so I used the red dot to quickly orient the rifle before I dropped behind the scope and it worked remarkably well. on 90 % of the targets when I dropped down to the scope my target was in the field of view at the 15-20x magnification that I shot the match with. I didn't need to take time zooming in and out and hunting for the target which many people did and used up a lot of time.
I would always start on 5, get my landmarks, then zoom up to the 10-15 range depending on stage.
What was the best ranging device out there. Seems people that did ranging had trouble. Just wondering what people had good, and bad with.
I've used sig 3000 and sig 6k both have issues sometimes there. Usually my 6ks work great had my range and else where but at nightforce and krg sometimes they dont like to pick targets. People around me usually run sigs and the Vortex fury and when I have issues they seem to have issues so idk if the higher end ones work better
I’ve had really good luck with an impact 4000 series on top of a spotting scope with a reticle in it as long as I don’t forget the remote for it at home
From what I could observe from shooting the match then ROing it, Serge with a Vectronix Vector IV had the best LRF of anyone shooting the match, but then again at a retail price of over $10K it should be good. Also I think a squad of the .mil guys had Vector 21s or 23s but I didn't have time to ask them. I saw a few Impact 4000 LRFs but did not get a chance to ask the guys using them how well they were working. Most everyone else had Vortex Furies, Sig Kilo 10Ks, and Vortex Vector-Xs. My opinion was that the Sig Kilo 10Ks worked slightly better than the others but they were by far the most common LRFs at the match so I can't say definitively. I will say that the glass in my Sig Kilo 10K Gen 2s is A LOT better than the Gen 1 Kilo 10Ks. The image quality is sharper and much less blue than the Gen 1s and because the blue is less, image contrast and target identification is much better.
On our shooting days, my squadmates had Sig Kilo 10K Gen 2s and with judicious ranging and guessing the best range from the numerous range readings we took, nobody in my squad had any misses to gross errors in elevation.
On our shooting days, my squadmates had Sig Kilo 10K Gen 2s and with judicious ranging and guessing the best range from the numerous range readings we took, nobody in my squad had any misses to gross errors in elevation.
Seem like the sig 10ks are prolly the most affordable and best overall.... never had a pair the 6k are nice but I know the 10k offer so much more
Yea just wasn't able to make it this year. But will be there next year. Just wanted to upgrade myself for next year. Have the terrapin x, that is used for 23, and 24. Just looking to upgrade for 26.
Wasn't there either, but yes, last year they were pretty spot on. Remember of just maybe 1 that my squad had doubts about.
Yeah i think there was 1 that i think was off at krg but everything else spot on. Nightforce there was a lot off
I did the same, started on 8 every stage (have an 8-40) and possibly hit 20x once. Seemed like most of my shooting was 15-18. What really helped was moving by binos as close to the shooting position as possible to get the same viewing angle and then finding my landmarks with the naked eye.
My Sig 10k Gen 2 binos were great imo. I would compare ranges with the posted ranges to see if I was close or to let me know which target number I was on, but as stated before I used the ranges that the binos showed and had success.
Might hold off till beginning of the year. I'm sure something, or someone might surprise us in the beginning of 26. But will have a good backup option.
I just got fused again so my recovery time takes a bit. But, will be ready for krg, nf, idaho, and heart mountain. Thats my goal for next year
Yes saw though they changed it between krg, and nf this year. Instead of August of last year. Will have to link if you like for that one
