Autumn brings with it the start of the shooting season, and a chance for many to spend more time outdoors. Writer and countryside enthusiast, Patrick Galbraith, took the opportunity to do exactly that, one bright Monday morning in September.
“I drove down to Purdey at the Royal Berkshire to face my demons,” he shares, after his first shooting outing of the season, a partridge day in Norfolk, hadn’t gone so well. “It wasn’t that I was totally failing, but as my girlfriend’s father delighted in pointing out, I was killing almost everything with the second barrel. What I couldn’t work out was whether I was ahead of them with the first shot and then connecting when I slowed up, or whether I was behind them initially and then swinging through,” he explains, getting into the detail of it.
Arriving down the winding country-lane driveway, flanked by fields and trees on either side, you’re immersed in the beautiful Berkshire countryside from the moment you get to Purdey at the Royal Berkshire – despite the fact that it’s just an hour outside London. “Unusually for me, I arrived early and took the opportunity to go for a wander with my young spaniel,” Patrick continues. “I must admit that I’ve never found the Purdey grounds to be a particularly easy day out — and I mean that in a good way. The targets are about as close to the real thing as you can get, and give you nowhere to hide.”
Steve Turner was booked to give Patrick a lesson, an instructor who’s been in the business for decades and lives and breathes the culture of the countryside. “I’m going to really offend some people by saying this, but there are lots of instructors out there, often jolly retirees who’ve done a course on instructing and who love their shooting, but are frankly useless when it comes to actually helping you become a better shot,” Patrick notes. “Steve, it became abundantly clear from the off, is one of those rare coaches who really gets it. It isn’t just that he’s stood on a peg countless times on pheasant days — he’s done it all. He knows his ducks, he knows his pigeon shooting, and he knows his wild partridges. His treasure trove of theory is based on practical experience.”
“To kick off, he had me stand under a straight oncomer to assess where I was at. After six shots, he said that it was clear I’d done a fair bit of shooting, but he wanted me to ‘come into the target a bit tighter’ – essentially he wanted more of a positive connection and for me to shoot more deliberately. The four birds that followed this advice turned to dust, and we then moved on to crossers. I explained to Steve that the previous weekend, I’d been ‘second barreling everything’ and he told me that the problem was obvious. As noted earlier, I was starting a long way behind birds, swinging for too long, then checking my swing, before shooting them much more fluidly with the second barrel. Again, his guidance was spot on. The right to left crossers that followed felt easy, and Steve then had me shooting the bird with my first barrel before shooting a clay fragment with my second – it’s a trick that does wonders for shooting positively.”
“Like most people, I don’t enjoy missing, but it happens. What I found really interesting about Steve was how convincing he was when he told me it wasn’t a problem, and to simply move on to the next shot,” Patrick sums up, reflecting on the fact that having a skill for shooting is not at all what a day at Purdey at the Royal Berkshire is about. Whether you’re a pro or a complete novice, there’s a lot of fun to be had either way. “I often end up in a mire of misery when I start missing, but Steve had me cheerily reverting back to basics to start getting it right again. Great teachers, I always think, are able to make you believe in yourself, which is half the battle.”
Call +44(0) 1491 672 900 or email [email protected] for more details or to book a lesson at Purdey at the Royal Berkshire.
