A Beginner Tries NRL Hunter, Part 3: Match Day 2 And Debrief

Welcome back to the series “A Beginner Tries NRL Hunter.” Part 1 ended with our team (consisting of my brother Barrett and I) finding some success, but also being plagued by some gremlins. Let’s pick up after the last stage of Day 1.

Competition Shooting @ TFB:

• Self Defense versus Competition Shooting
• TFB Review: Nightforce 4.5x Competition Service Rifle Scope
• My First Pistol Match: CMP Excellence In Competition .22LR and Service Pistol
• Getting Started in CMP Service Rifle Competition

Getting Ready For Day 2

At the end of Day 2, we had experienced some success but had also run into some issues. On the last stage of the day, my elevation turret slipped loose and came off entirely. This issue with another scope had ruined a service rifle match for me before, and I was not enjoying reliving that experience. Thankfully, this happened on the last few shots of the last stage of the day, so I had a chance to rectify the matter before it ruined more stages.

After the stages were done on Day 1, it was time to work on the guns. We needed to reattach my elevation turret and reconfirm the zero, but the more troubling issue was why the Seekins was not shooting well. Thankfully, the Buckskin Hills Shooting Complex has numerous range bays available that were not being used for the match. Several other bays were occupied by our fellow competitors working on issues of their own. We first worked on my gun, and it was a quick process to get the turret back on, check the zero by shooting some sticker targets and a pop can, and make sure it was tightened down properly. But then we turned to the Seekins.

On paper, it would shoot a few shots together, then throw others wildly without any rhyme or reason. We started with the scope because, more often than not, strange, bad groups tend to indicate an optic issue. But the screws were all tightened properly, and our related hypothesis that perhaps there was a tracking issue did not pan out. The ammo, factory Hornady Match loads, was posting SD and ES numbers that were well within the normal range.

We then decided to make sure the scope base was still tightened to spec. It was, but this brought us to the actual culprit: the tensioning screw that holds the barrel in the Havak HIT. The HIT has a switch barrel design. By loosening one screw at the front of the scope base the barrel slips out, and tightening that screw holds the new barrel in place. That one little screw was not torqued to spec. We tightened it down, and immediately the groups closed up. But how would we make sure it stayed in place? Like any good tailgate gunsmiths, we added some blue Loctite and torqued it down the appropriate amount. Hopefully, that would be enough to keep things in place for the second day of the match.

When we finally headed back to the hotel, our work was still not done. Besides a trip to Walmart for some aloe vera for our very sunburned hands, and dinner at the local steakhouse, we still needed to get the gear cleaned and prepped for the next day. We repacked ammo, wiped down scopes and rifles, and got clothes, water, and snacks ready for the next day.

One priority item I needed to handle was cleaning my magazines. Because the Scout holds five rounds and a shooter could shoot as many as eight in a stage, I had performed a lot of magazine changes. And rather than retaining my mags in a pouch, I just dropped them in the powdery moon dust sand that made up most firing points. That did save some time during the stages, but it left me with some filthy magazines.

On the last stage of the day we had to fire prone at some targets from 700 to 900 yards away while laying more of that moon dust, and when I went to change magazines, the one in the gun was very difficult to remove. That powdery dust had packed itself into the gap around the magazine base and wedged it into the gun! It came out with a little extra force, and once the magazines were clean again, this issue did not reappear, but this was a great example of the ways that things can go wrong when you actually get off the shooting bench and out into the field in real conditions.

We had a breakfast of ibuprofen and Red Bull on the tailgate of the truck as the morning light brightened, then grabbed our gear and rolled out. Unlike the first day, where everyone gathered for the briefing before heading to their stages, on the second day, we all started out right where we left off. Everyone loaded up their gear and started walking to the stage where we left off the day before. This was a surprisingly impactful thing to watch, with more than a hundred shooters dispersing out onto hillsides and down trails and dirt roads, each carrying a rifle they owned, capable of engaging a target at 1,000 yards or more, and all the support equipment necessary to make those shots happen. This is a hunting-oriented event, but I was still struck by the fact that this crowd was probably more competent and better equipped than the entire sniper programs of some countries. But these shooters are machinists, electricians, and mechanics who were doing this on their own dime because they wanted to spend a weekend training these skills.

A Rocky Start

The first few stages of the day were a mixed bag. Our flow as a team kept improving, but something was off. My dope was wrong. After a few stages, I realized that every miss was going high and made a half MRAD correction. Just like that, I started making hits again. My hasty rezeroing job was only partially successful, but adding .5 MRAD onto my dope worked fine.

Barrett’s gun was also struggling. Remember how the barrel locking screw was loose and causing all kinds of accuracy issues, and we resorted to Loctite to keep it in place? That didn’t work. The erratic groups came back after a few stages, and the offending screw was once again loose. With no other alternative, we started tightening that screw using Fix It Sticks torque wrenches before each stage. This was a pain, but it worked.

Finishing Strong

With the scope fixed on my rifle and the barrel torqued down each stage on Barrett’s rifle, we started to see some success. Almost immediately, we started scoring double-digit points on stages. The points we lost were attributable to shooter error, poor stage planning, or time management errors.

This was when we hit the high point of the entire match. One stage featured four sasquatch targets in a troop line running right to left. We shot that stage clean, eight shots and eight first-round hits! That was the kind of feeling that makes a guy want to shoot more of these matches.

The final stage of the match for us was an array of four targets from 530 to 720 yards from a prone position. The plucky little Steyr Scout Mk 2 racked up some points despite being a short and light .308, ending off with a respectable score of 11 or 13 for the stage (my notes have both numbers, I’m not sure which is right). Thankfully, that last stage was close to the truck, so we did not have to walk far to call it a day.

The last portion of the match was the lunch and awards ceremony. Our match fee included a catered lunch in the gym of a Christian school, and it felt great to sit in some air conditioning and eat. NRL Hunter matches put a lot of effort into having good prize tables, and the High Desert Hunter was no exception. In descending order, the highest-ranked shooters and teams collected their trophies and then chose items from the tables. We finished up in the middle of the pack for the teams class, and each got something useful.