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Holy Heck. That Was Frustratingly Fun: Air Rifle Stangskysting.

Stanskyting is a Norwegian speed shooting event in which the object is to hit a target with as many shots as one can in 25 seconds. Bolt action rifles with iron sights are required for civilians while the military use their iron sighted service rifles. In either case, only five round may be loaded in just three magazines. Any additional rounds must be fed individually, However they do start with one round chambered and a full five round magazine loaded. The competitors shoot from the prone shooting position.

The event is named after a military officer in charge of training troops prior to and during the Great War: Georg Stang. The latter part of the word “skysting” translates to shooting.

After being introduced to this sport by the video link at the end of this post, I thought that our local airgun club should at least try this. Well, last evening at our Outdoor Airgun and Rimfire Benchrest and Speed Silhouette Match, I brought some 1/5 scaled targets to try. I’m not sure that these target are quite the right geometry, but they seem close enough to the photos I could find, and have the correct height and width. Put it this way, they are close enough for the folks I shoot with.

If anyone has specific geometry dimensions for these particular targets, I’d be most interested in that information.

The Småen, or head target is to be shot at first and has a maximum distance from the shooter of 175 meters, with typical distances closer to 150 meters. I thought for the first outing, that the 1/5 scale targets at 30 yards would be reasonable.

The 1/4 target, a simulation of head and shoulders above a trench, is shot at no more than 250 meters. Again, I thought a reasonable distance would be 50 yards for this somewhat larger target.
As it turned out, we never did get to shooting this one; we were too frustrated and determined to get better at the smaller yet closer one.

The top shooters in Norway can get off all sixteen shots, and sometimes one or two more. We, on the other hand, had trouble with getting through just the first magazine. I did manage to get through my second magazine (once) for a total of 11 shots fired, but only 10 hit the target. The other two attempts left me with double loading and other mistakes which cost me a lot of time, and misses.

Due to the positive frustration some of us never got to shooting any benchrest scores. It was just too fun trying to beat ourselves at this game which we seemed to both win and lose.

Right now, only two of us have correct iron sighted rifle for this game, and both are Benjamin Armada’s. But, since this match follows our club rules, scopes are allowed. My highpower match rifle copy does have a problem with the front sight moving (shown in my avatar) so I changed over to the Airforce sights that I bought some time back. These mount nicely on the Picatinny rails with 1" scope rings.

Blueflax used Magpul back-up sights on his .22 Armada. However, he has found a bit of an elevation problem in that the front sight does not have quite enough adjustment. But, by the time of our next match, he should have Airforce sights as well.

Here is what my Armada looks like with the Airforce sights on it. I have removed my match rifle sight mount from the shroud extension shown in my avatar.

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A closer look at the rear sight.
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A closer look at the front sight.
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The link to the video: You don't need to watch the whole thing to get a gist of the sport. But you just might get enthralled enough to watch the whole thing and then others.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cnAwRJc7Sw
 
Riflemen, and women they are. I just fancied myself as somewhat one as well, for I do O.K. in highpower rifle, and sporting rifle.

However, the airguns used are not nearly as smooth in bolt action, nor have easy magazine changes, but their bolt stroke length is a whole lot shorter. I thought this would make up for the other failings. I found out, though, that skill is the primary factor with this game. Humbling it is.