Seated shooting
If you are confined to a wheelchair, what difference does gunfit, length and weight have on your shooting? Richard Faulks finds out
Jean-Paul Gaudin has featured in an article I wrote about the work he’s doing advising game shoots and shooting grounds on how to make our sport open and inclusive for wheelchair users. He also has a YouTube channel called The Seated Gun that features his exploits in the field.
Dan Parker has been featured on the cover of the magazine. They are both selfmotivated tenacious characters. Both have had unfortunate spinal injuries and now shoot game, pigeons and clays from a seated position. JP has been shooting seated for the past 10 years and Dan for the past 18 months. We thought they could swap ideas and techniques that may help each other.
Dan has a T4 complete injury and JP’s is now a level L1 incomplete. Simply put, JP has more use of his lower body than Dan. Dan has adopted a single-handed shooting style as he feels he needs his left hand to balance himself while taking the shot. JP still has some sensation and movement in his lower limbs but, most importantly here, he has more upper body movement and strength due to having all his core muscles.
This enables JP to move further and keep his balance better when shooting, which is something that Dan struggles with. Dan had simply shot one-handed following his accident as he didn’t think he could shoot two-handed because of his balance. JP became convinced, that with some advice, guidance and confidence building, Dan would be able to shoot double-handed if his positioning to the targets was incorporated into his shooting. This would enable him to get on to the targets better too.
We met at EJ Churchill’s uber-smart shooting ground, which has great facilities for wheelchair users, mainly because JP advises there and acts as an ambassador for the ground. First, we all sat down and went through the experiences and reasons for each individual shooting style. It became clear that there are pros and cons to each shooters technique. A single-handed approach will enable a wider arc of fire from the static seated position. Shooting using both hands will aid a smooth and controlled shot but will restrict body rotation.
Options
Dan and JP discussed many things that may help Dan with his shooting and Rupert Haynes and Sean Bramley, Churchill’s head gunfitter and head coach, kindly joined in with their many years of combined knowledge to discuss options and ideas.
Dan shoots a pretty Caesar Guerini 28bore. It’s not the lightest gun but it is one he feels confident with and shoots very well. Gunfit is important for any shooter and Dan noted a couple of things that he was finding difficult. He shoots with his right hand and had a problem keeping the butt of the gun in his shoulder on targets to his right.
Most of the gun movement is generated from his arms, so the gun tends to slide across his chest after a certain point in the swing. A rubber pad has helped to keep the gun better located, but it’s still an issue for him. Rupert took a good look at Dan’s gunfit and thought a shorter stock may help alleviate some of this problem. A shorter stocked 28-bore was found in the shop for Dan to try. It was around 1in shorter, which made things better between the 12 to three o’clock position, but got a little too close to Dan’s face in the nine o’clock position. It was something that he could try on some clays when they went out to shoot. JP also thought adding weight to the stock might help seat the gun better.
Dan is the son of a gamekeeper and has shot from an early age. “It took me a good year and a half to get comfortable with a gun again and build up muscle memory,” he admitted. But he’s very open to the idea of shooting with both hands again if
possible. Balance is a major issue, though. Another idea from JP is to have an elastic strap around Dan’s upper body and the back of his wheelchair. He could lean into it, then free up his left hand that he uses to brace and rotate his upper body. JP had seen other shooters use this technique.
Falling out of a chair because you’ve overstretched is not just embarrassing and muddy, it can be very dangerous to somebody with impaired movement. Injuries will take far longer to heal than somebody able-bodied, so you can see why feeling confident about stability is so important to somebody shooting from a chair.
“This not about the technique, it’s about the confidence,” JP emphasised. “If you can get the balance right, you can work on the technique.”
After a long discussion, comparing their restrictions and why they both adopted different shooting styles, Dan and JP are keen to try shooting some clays to experiment further. After all, there’s only one way to find out what suits you best.
Before we set off to shoot some driven clays, Sean Bramley arrived and added more ideas and advice. “I’d seriously consider a glove grip,” he said. “You’re holding it with all of your hand and it’s more manoeuvrable, you can make it do what you want it to do and you’ve got control.”
A glove grip on a shotgun is a carved and shaped grips that are custom-made to fit your hand, and around parts of your hand, to ensure that you always grip the gun in the same place. Rupert at Churchill recommends Manuel Ricardo as a company that will custom-make a stock for you, but there are many other stockers out there.
Sean also advises that the angle of the chair will be more critical with two hands and it’s something that has to be experimented with. JP sets himself up for the most likely flushing point on a game day and focuses on those birds only. “If they’re not in that 30-degree arc of fire, they’re probably not your birds anyway,” he pointed out.
He angles his chair to give his weakest side a better chance, so he doesn’t have to stretch as much, and will sometimes angle himself on a drive to be side-on to the birds and adopt the rainbow technique, which turns a driven bird into a crosser.
Dan said: “I always try to shoot things earlier now. The first shot in the chair is a lot earlier.” This is to compensate for the restricted swing in the vertical plane and Dan shows JP how well he shoots with one hand… It’s impressive and very few targets get through. JP is keen to see just how far Dan can swing the gun with two hands before he feels like he’s going to overbalance. Dan takes a few shots with both hands while JP holds a hand in front of his chest for stability and to allow Dan to find his body’s limits.
It’s a slightly hesitant start for Dan and there are a few misses, but there is a great deal going through his head. It’s obvious that the changed shooting style will take a bit of adjusting to, but he’s very open to help and guidance and can see the advantage of using two hands. It doesn’t take long before Dan finds a rhythm and can concentrate on the targets and less about his balance.
Next he tried the shorter and lighter gun. This proved to Dan that his gun is possibly a little too long, but it also showed the light gun was too short for him. This was useful information and a possible adjustment needed to his gun, so the time wasn’t wasted. After 40 or so clays using both hands on the gun, Dan really did start to look smooth and he certainly was accurate, but his neck was starting to ache on one side. He was using muscles that hadn’t been used for a while and would need building up.
Body strength
JP spends two hours a day in the gym to keep up his body strength and Dan keeps fit through his gamekeeping work but he may need to work on specific muscles for his shooting. JP advises him to work on upper shoulders, upper chest and core body strength, plus “rather than carrying on and live with what you can do, you might need to come backwards to go forwards again”.
So the long and short of shooting singlehanded or double-handed boils down to control or arc of fire. Dan was shooting beautifully after 40 to 50 shots using both hands and he looked effortlessly smooth and unrushed. He shot exceptionally well singlehanded as well.
So here’s the dilemma for Dan. Work at shooting double-handed and accept that his shooting may go backwards before going forwards again, or stick to shooting single-handed. “I’m going to stick to doublehanded shooting over the summer and try to take that on into the game season, but might have to slip into old habits if a good wide crossing bird presents itself,” he decided.
And who can blame him?
“Dan could lean into the strap then brace and rotate his body”