Excuses

[r1lover]

I like Air Supply's comment best, especially "The import thing is as mentioned earlier the difference between an excuse and a reason".

Sometimes I'll say things like:

- Man, the breeze feels like it's right to left but did you see the grass blow left to right down range just before I shot?

- Aaargh, I rushed and yanked the trigger.

- I took too long to shoot that off hand target and wobbled. I should have stopped, waited and addressed the target again.

- Geez, I wonder if that pellet had a bent skirt? (I am always forgetting to look at my pellets before I load them).

Comments like these are intended as (hopefully) useful pieces of information for my partner or others listening and oftentimes more experienced shooters will hear my lament and weigh in with a valuable tidbit to help me shoot better next time.

Any time I hear someone else offering reasons/excuses on the range I try to take something positive away that will benefit me. If nothing else I will at least be the company to their misery.

 

[Firewalker]

"It was because I was SO concerned what centercut thought of my group!"

Go ahead, post all your reasons, just post your groups! Shoot more, post more pics, ignore the negative Nancy's!

Sheesh!

 

[FelixS]

Why is it that almost all groups or target scores, no matter how good (or bad) seem to have an excuse added in to explain why they aren’t perfect? Just about every post I’ve seen over the past month starts out with “I was shooting in hurricane winds” or “the bench was so wobbly it would barely stand up” prior to or after the presentation of the group or targets.
Listing your shooting conditions is one thing, but phrasing it as some excuse for what you shot is something else.
Even some of the very best shooters do it - here’s this 100Y group 25 shots of 0.53 inch C2C, but it was swirling 15 to 20 mph winds and very cold….
Am I being too dramatic or picky?

The elephant in the room.

 

[JungleShooter]

THIS has been SOOOOO helpful!!
Thanks to your contributions I now have a whole new set of excuses, rationalizations, reasons, and causes at my disposal when I feel the need to explain why I missed (the bulls, or the killzone, or the chalk piece).

Most of the time, I feel, it's the bad air from my SCBA tank that's to blame for my miss.
Yupp!
Those pesky air molecules just wreak havoc with my projectiles.


Matthias