How Russia Outshoots Us

The particular American specialty is shooting .22 rifles in the prone position. The English Match at Caracas called for 30 shots prone at 50 meters and 30 shots prone at 100 meters. We won this match by one point over the Swedes. For once the Russians took third, with 2,370 against our 2,373. However, the highest individual score was not shot by a member of our team but by Gil Boa of Canada.

SLOW-FIRE AND RAPID-FIRE

Our pistol shooters did better than our rifle shooters at Caracas. The two most important matches shot under international rules are the slow-fire free pistol and the rapid-fire silhouette. Free pistols are as strange looking to most Americans as free rifles. They are not made in this country. A free pistol commonly has a stock built to fit the shooter's hand. One of the Russians had one that fitted around his hand so closely that he had to tug to get it out of the grip, like a man taking off a glove. The free pistol almost invariably has a "set" trigger. A lever on the outside of the action sets or cocks the trigger. It then requires little more than a breath to fire it. Some free-pistol triggers are set so fine that if the pistol is pointed straight up the mere weight of the trigger will fire the gun. The entire U.S. team shot free pistols made by Hemmerli of Lenzburg, Switzerland.

Our best free-pistol shot, Huelet Benner, won with a score of 553. Torsten Ullman, who has been one of the world's great pistol shots for 20 years, shot a 552. A Russian also shot a 552 but was outranked by Ullman. The Russians won the team match.

It did seem likely that our team would win the center-fire pistol match. This was down our alley—something we know about. It seemed even more likely when the Russians practiced openly with outmoded French Nagant revolvers, far inferior to our Colt and Smith & Wesson revolvers. They weren't doing too well either. Came the day of the match and the Russians appeared with Smith & Wesson K-38 target revolvers made in Springfield, Mass. and Winchester .38 Special ammunition made in New Haven, Conn. They did not win the individual honors. Torsten Ullman took first. Benner and McMillan of our team took second and third. But the Russians won the team match.

In the skeet match at Caracas—a type of shooting invented in this country and little known elsewhere—two American skeet shooters, C. Crites and K. Pendergrass, took first and second. On the other hand we are as much out of the running-deer match as Europeans are out of skeet. There is no such thing as a standard running-deer range in this country. No one who has not been to South America or England or Europe has ever seen one. The Norwegians are specially good on the running-deer target. Their team was first in the ISU matches at Oslo in 1952 and first in the Olympic matches at Helsinki. Their man Larson held the world record, but not any more; a Russian holds it since Caracas.

What does all this come down to? How do the Russians do it? The answer is now clear despite Russian censorship. The word has come back to many Europeans and a few Americans. The Russians intend to win the next Olympics and they probably will. They will do it because sports are subsidized by the Russian government. The shooting story is the same as the story in every other sport. If a man does good shooting in his village he is moved up. If he does well where the competition is greater he is moved up again. As a result of this program the Russians have a pool of shooters generally estimated at 500 men.

The program is guided by experts. Some years ago the Russians sent men to every important shooting match in Europe. Their job was to observe the methods of shooting that paid off. They ended up with some ideas—good ideas. It is not for nothing that every Russian rifle shot adopts the same positions in standing, kneeling and prone. There is no individual choice; the position considered best must be used. It is not for nothing that he wears a heavy leather coat winter or summer. The coat offers more protection against recoil at the shoulder and more protection to the elbows in the prone position than our light cotton jackets with elbow pads. The Russian wears his coat no matter how hot it is because he must always shoot in the same clothes, a sound rule. The Russian wears boots rather than shoes because they offer more support in the standing and kneeling positions. Finally, it is not for nothing that a Russian rifle shot gets full-time pay for working half time and shooting half time. The Europeans say that some of the Russians fire as many as 75,000 shots a year. The ammunition is free and so are the rifles.

Few of our shooters could take the time to fire 75,000 shots a year. And it might not do one of ours too much good if he did. Beyond a point, a shooter does not improve when practicing by himself; he needs the spur of shooting against men who are better than he is. The Russians provide the necessary competition year in and year out with the plain result that Bogdanov is 10 points better over the 300-meter course than he was when he won the Olympic championship in 1952. He is only 28 years old. With a man as good as Borisov pushing him he may go further.

The prize is worth shooting for. When a Russian shooter comes home victorious he gets a vacation of three or four weeks in the Crimea with his wife and children.