only shoot 1/2 & 3/4

Recently I have been advised by 2 instructors, a county shooter and a GB shooter that I should tighten up and just put in 1/2 & 3/4 for sporting clays as it really helps focus lets you judge how accurate you are. This rather than shooting say sk and 1/4 unless there is a very distant target.

I'd appreciate your thoughts

Try it and see if it works for you is the only answer really.

I doubt this will see your scores improve

I keep hearing this theory put forward by some of the 'top shooters'. All I would say is it counts as a kill if you take off the nose or the ass of a clay, balls of dust are very nice, but don't give you any extra points .

there is a school of thought that states that practicing with tight chokes improves your aim and I can see how that might work, however, when shooting a competition you want the most open chokes you can get away with, any tighter and you are making your pattern diameter unnecessarily tight. Just what those perfect chokes might be are what keeps this forum going.

I would have thought that the key to good performance for most people is performing with confidence and for most confidence will come with seeing good results in practice.

I'd certainly be going into a Sunday registered with more confidence having done well on a Saturday practice session. Having shot an 85-90/100 in practice using a skeet and cylinder but having some chippy kills would do a lot more for me than a 70-75/100 with a lot of smoked targets from a full and full would.

I personally find myself quite overwhelmed in a competitive environment and taking choke/ barrel selection out of the equation does a lot for my limited capacity for thinking in the moment. I settle for a pair of 3/8's as a result and only ever take them out for cleaning.

Only way to be sure is to try and see what works best for you.

Thanks for all the replies

I would say both are talking complete rubbish

k80ben said:

I would say both are talking complete rubbish

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Didn't you shoot/win a comp, thinking you you were shooting 1/2s, then got home and found you were using 1/4s? Makes me think it's a head game.

The one or two missed targets because of a too open choke might play a little roll if you are at 95/100 on a course with lots of far birds. Otherwise than that you just missed because of other reasons.

I wouldn't want to be shooting with a pattern that was overly tight and there is a lot of variation with gun/ choke and cartridge combo as well. I pattern checked my fiocchi fblus at 40 yards with 1/4 choke in a dt11 and I was getting a 30" usable pattern, and on pellet count bang on 65% (3/4) Imagine how tight that would be with 1/2 or 3/4 in.

Personally ,I`d have to looking at some extreme range targets to think I needed 1/2 & 3/4 . They`ll certainly show how on the ball you are on normal stuff !

If you chip the front or back of a clay you know you are slightly in front or behind, if you miss completely with a tight choke you have no idea were you are unless you shoot in the top 10%, so as said shoot the most open chokes you can, I personally don't think chokes make that much difference with modern cartridges, also johnny carter has just done a YouTube about shooting long distances and done some pattern testing

Recent post on TGS with James Bradley Day re the chokes he uses. It's mixed in with a discussion about 7.5 & 6.5 cartridges and their hitting power.

As with Jonny (above) the Fblus are 7s and I've not seen any reason to move from 1/4 & 1/2 other than using a 6.5 (or Rossa) for confidence.

The TGS post also discusses clay presentations & makes and whilst its a bit too much to think about its an informative watch for 15 minutes.

I have been shooting for over 60 years now. I can recall lugging a pair of fixed choke Remmie 1100's, complete with a spare barrel around Sporting shoots, in the early 1970's. That gave me Full, 1/2 and Skeet choke options. Then along came Beretta with a drop in choke system........manner from heaven ! I could now spend most of my time between stands, changing chokes
A short while later Winchester produced their 'Winchoke' system. How good was that ? Now I could have differing chokes in ONE gun, it took longer to get between stands because I had to make TWO choices.
Eventually after many gun changes, I got a gun that came with 2 x 1/4 chokes and a few others too. I shot some Skeet and had put in the 2 x 1/4 chokes. My next outing, like Ben, I thought I had put 1/4 & 1/2 in the gun. I did a 100 bird Comp at Hodnet, which can be a 'testing' ground. I ended up in a shoot off for second place, nerves beat me and I finished third. It was only after I got home and was cleaning my gun, I realised I still had the 2 x 1/4 chokes in. That was 36 years ago. To this day I still shoot 1/4 & 1/4 chokes for all my clay shooting ( I have a fixed choke trap gun for trap disciplines). My competition days are well over now and I just shoot for fun. However, I still like to keep score of my performance on the day, just for my own amusement. I still manage to hit 75% + although I do admit to carrying a box of Express World Cups 6 1/2's in my range bag, 'just in case'. I bought 250 World Cups around 15 years ago, I still have 125 of them
If tight chokes give YOU confidence , then use them, BUT, do not be afraid to try more open chokes, possibly as an experiment. You could be pleasantly surprised.
My current gun, Classic Doubles, 30" multi choked, ported barrels, with 2 x 1/4 Briley extended chokes. Weight, exactly 8lbs.

AW13 said:

Recently I have been advised by 2 instructors, a county shooter and a GB shooter that I should tighten up and just put in 1/2 & 3/4 for sporting clays as it really helps focus lets you judge how accurate you are. This rather than shooting say sk and 1/4 unless there is a very distant target.

I'd appreciate your thoughts

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I think you may have misheard or misremembered. The default standard is ½ and ¼ not ½ and ¾.
¾ Is very tight.
It's ¼ on your first shot and ½ on your second because the second clay is usually further away, you kill the near one first.

Nickredhill said:

I think you may have misheard or misremembered. The default standard is ½ and ¼ not ½ and ¾.
¾ Is very tight.
It's ¼ on your first shot and ½ on your second because the second clay is usually further away, you kill the near one first.

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Nope - definitely 1/2 and 3/4.

Shot a round today with my trusted 1/4 & 1/4. They will be left in unless I encounter an very long range target.

When I got my K80 it was fixed full and full. Had multi chokes done (Teague) and must admit tended to leave 1/4 and 3/8 in and flicked over barrels if needed. At a shoot with a very well known top shot ground owner I admitted I was struggling with a particular target. He asked me what chokes I used, I told him and he said open it up on close stuff, what’s the point in having different chokes if you’re not going to use them?
Made sense so ordered a couple of super cylinders and use them on closer stuff keeping the 1/4 and 3/8 in for regular stuff. Do have a half choke but it’s only been in my gun half a dozen times but going by the recent targets at Owls, some lovely long edgy ones it may come out a bit more!

Really close, fast targets were my bogey targets and by using the super cylinders it’s given me the world of confidence. I do think it’s all in the head sometimes but if it works for you, why not?

Finally, we were shooting at some long way up tower birds and Phil said have a go, I replied I’ve got super cylinder in but I’ll try! Well, they were showing a bit of belly and I’m not joking we were gobsmacked at how they broke. Go with what you are comfortable with, we are not all the same and we all do things differently.

AW13 said:

Nope - definitely 1/2 and 3/4.

Shot a round today with my trusted 1/4 & 1/4. They will be left in unless I encounter an very long range target.

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Leave them in and change the cartridge, it's easier !

@donna
Interesting comment on close targets. Thankfully close targets are not really an issue for me, I straighted a low very fast incoming overhead today which could only have been about 4 or 5 meters high and very close fast crossing rabbit which was about 10 meters away.

My bogey targets are the distant seemingly slow crossers that are 40+ meters away. Obviously these need more practice!!