Not really pertinent to the detailed nature of the thread, but I’ll share a story:
I don’t spend much time on social media apps, only really get on Facebook here and there, and only have it because it’s a means to keep family close after our son was born. But I happened to notice a post by an old high school friend I hadn’t seen in over 15yrs on Sunday last week. It was a picture of a benched rifle, stating he was working to get better at 400yrds that evening, working his way to 1,000.
I messaged him to offer that we should get together at one of our properties (knowing we own land within 15miles of each other back home, even though we live about an hour and a half apart these days) and shoot together. We’d have him at 1,000 in a half day... Then I mentioned, “heck, there’s a precision rifle match the following weekend not far from us, why don’t you come out there and shoot?”
Sourcing a 10rnd AICS mag and 140rnds of ammo in a small Kansas community within a couple of days was a bit of a feat, and he had to download strelok, but it all came together in time.
I asked him this morning before the match - “how long were you expecting to shoot that rifle before you took it to 1,000?” He hadn’t before thought about it in that regard, but he finally conceded - “ya know, I might never really have done it, but it took me a year with the rifle to feel good at 400, so a long time...”
Almost as if scripted for a movie, the long range troop line stage came up as our last in rotation, so he had 90 rounds of other stage obstacles, south of his 1,000 yard objective, before he’d finally have a chance to break over a grand with what would be his last two shots of his first match. Spotting and calling for him, I saw him hit the downwind edge, then slip off of the 984yrd plate with his second shot, so I coached him, “hold an extra minute of wind on the next one and send it.”
“Dammit!!” - rang out as he yanked the trigger and pulled his shot two full targets out into the field...
Settle in, breath, and ask this last one a little more nicely...
DING!
“Impact!”
He shot some very solid stages in the day, and despite twitchy winds and extremely challenging positional stages, and despite the fact almost every target he engaged all day was farther than he’d ever shot before today, he didn’t blank any stages and finished some stages with respectable scores topping more experienced shooters in our squad. And of course, he achieved what he thought might have been a “tomorrow never actually comes” goal of crossing over 1,000yrds.
Just a matter of deciding - “yes, today I’m going to go do it” when opportunity knocked.