Clay Target Q&A
With Russell Mark, Olympic gold and silver medallist
Questions: russell@corporateshootingstars.com.au
Q I was told recently that 90 per cent of shotgun shooters need a custom-made stock to shoot clay targets competitively. In your opinion, is this true?
Peter Firth, Vic
A To be honest Peter, I would think that 90 per cent of shooters actually don’t need a custom stock and can get the original stock modified. These days, most manufacturers offer an adjustable comb on their stocks and I would certainly recommend that any new shooter to the sport try one of these.
The most critical dimension in any stock is the height of the comb below the barrel line and this varies enormously from shooter to shooter depending on their build. Once this is correctly established, then the amount of cast (bend of the stock to the left or right) is important to correctly align your eye down the barrel of the shotgun. Both height and cast can be corrected with an adjustable comb. After that, the length of the stock needs to be accurate but this can easily be adjusted by adding a spacer in the stock or fitting a shorter recoil pad.
A custom stock is generally a great idea after you have shot the gun for a good 12 months and the temptation to change the settings on the adjustable comb every time a clay is missed has worn off.
Unfortunately, clay target shooting is a sport where a missed target is 99 times out of a 100 due to human error. However, most competitors believe that a new stock, cartridge, shooting jacket, lense color and so on will reduce their ability to miss. It is a hard lesson to learn.