drjoker wrote:Yeah, I already read that after googling it. Ok. My bad, should've been more specific. How many inches is the clay disc in length so when a book or we page states lead by x ft, I'll know how much to lead in feint of the clay. Specially, he diameter of the clay discs they use at elm fork. Thanks.
Hmmm, maybe I'll just call them?
As far as I know, they are a standard clay bird, nothing special about them. I'm guessing somewhere in the 4"-6" diameter range. Believe me.......these things are moving fast, like on the order of 40-50mph, and they look tiny. It won't much matter if you're supposed to lead by 2 ft or 2.25 ft at a given distance because your shot dispersal pattern will cover the deviation. Your leads are going to be approximations at best. And all it takes is one or two pellets to bust a clay. You'll be shooting (assuming 12 gauge) 350-400 number 7.5 or 8 pellets in the vicinity of 1,200 fps per single 2-3/4" shotshell. If just one or two of them connect solidly, bye-bye birdie. That means that you should probably think in round numbers of feet of lead, and not worry about fractions of feet.
Personally....... and this may be why I'm not very good at it..... I find it difficult to make the computations in feet in my head fast enough to consistently get the leads right, and I'm much more of an instinct shooter that way...... quite the opposite of when I am shooting a rifle.
And then there's the follow through technique. In Skeet, once you start swinging your barrel to track the bird, you don't want to stop swinging until
after you've made the shot. But as someone who came to shotgun sports late in life who prefers using "ambush" lead in a rifle, I am always having to remind myself to keep the barrel moving. Probably half or more of my misses are due to my stopping the swing right at the moment of pulling the trigger. Unfortunately, the bird doesn't cooperate by hovering.........
