Rifle training at the pistol range

We like our shooting range, but as with most indoor places, the maximum distance for the target in each lane is 25 yards.  That's more than plenty for pistol training (at least for me), but doesn't really allow much for rifle practice.  At least, I've always found rifle shooting at 25 yards to be unsatisfying.  Easy, sure.  But where's the challenge in that?

Well, High School geometry tells us that there are two ways to bite off this problem.  One is to increase the distance to the target, which isn't an option.  The second is to reduce the size of the target, to simulate what a full sized one would look like at distance.

And so I picked up some reduced size NRA targets at the gun show.  The target contains five bullseye rings, each about 3 inches in diameter.  They're designed for practice at five yards, with a .22 rifle.

Five yards?  I skoffed.  Well, I'll try it once before putting it back to something more challenging, like 25 years.

The target never got past five yards.  It was hard.  The bullseyes are really small, so even small variations from breathing or whatever throw the bullet way out in to 7-ring (or 6, or 5) land.

I taped a penny to the target - you can see it above my thumb - for scale.  This was quite a good challenge, and I plan on doing much more of this.

I think that these reduced bullseyes are supposed to simulate regular targets at 50 yards, so moving them out to 20 yards would simulate 200 yard shots.  There's a whole world of challenge in that.