By Ryan Taylor

July 27, 2015

A typical range day was underway. A few friends, significant others, and a scorching 98 degree day were all gathered for some R&R. I had in tow, a recently resurrected from the death, of saltwater emersion and pitting, a Remington Mod700. The revived rifle is still nothing to be proud of, but it is functional, and I was ready to give it a try.

The day before, in preparation for the festivities, I picked up three boxes of Hornady's American Whitetail .243 WIN 100gr. InterLock BTSP loadings. Having no prior experience with this particular line, it was a crap shoot in my mind, with my only confidence coming from Hornady's reputation for quality loadings.

In no time I was settled in behind the rifle gearing up to send some metal downrange. With two cartridges in the box and one in the pipe I centered the bullseye, and squeezed of the first report. I flinched! The crack of the rifle startled me, and I did my signature face jerk away from the stock, followed by cursing myself for being such a startle crazed scaredy-cat. Upon inspection I was surprised to find the round had actually landed on paper, and there lied a ragged hole about two and a half inches high and an inch left, not bad for a freshly mounted scope.

Recovered a little from the first round, I squeezed off number two. Completely off of the paper it flew. I scanned the target and there was, still only one lonesome hole. Discouraged I decided to prove to myself that I wasn’t that inconsistent even while flinching. The third round flew down range at 2960 feet per second into the same abyss as the second. Absolutely no hint was given as to where these errant rounds were winding up. Slightly disgusted I waited around for a "cold line" so that I could go play detective at the 100 yard line, searching for my missing holes.

As I walked to the target I joked with my wife that obviously the three rounds went through the same hole, considering my mad rifle skills. This brought out her usual injection of reality, at which point I was convinced that a single hole was not the case. When we walked up to the target there was indeed only one hole, in a neat tiny cloverleaf, three rounds one on top of the other. I may never break off another sub one quarter M.O.A. group in my life, but by some miracle I did that day. The group measured 0.175 inch center to center. I must say that my rifle is now officially married to the American Whitetail Hornady loading. As they say, I’m a believer.
-Ryan Taylor