Gary Eliseo Runs ‘Mad Minute’ Drill with Modern Tubegun
The Top Shot TV show recently featured the “Mad Minute”, a high-speed drill requiring shooters to place as many hits as possible on a steel plate set at 200 yards. The time limit was one minute, and shooters were using historic Lee-Enfield bolt-action rifles. Top Shot’s “Mad Minute” was based on a British Army training drill. Soldiers were expected to get at least 15 hits on an bullseye target at THREE hundred yards. Top Shot cheated a bit, placing the target at 200 yards (instead of 300 in the real British Army “Mad Minute” drill). Still the two Top Shot shooters managed only six (6) shots each in one minute. Consider that a “passing score” for a Brit soldier was 15 hits, you have to give credit to those WWI-era Tommies.
Watch Gary Elesio Shoot the ‘Mad Minute’ (Starts at 4:47 on Video)
Elesio Gets 24 hits on 300-yard Target in One Minute
Using an Eliseo RTM Tubegun chambered in .308 Winchester, Gary Elesio attempted the “Mad Minute” last weekend. Gary ended up with 24 hits on a bull target set at 300 yards. That’s four times as many hits as the Top Shot competitors. Gary actually had 25 hits in 25 rounds fired, but the last round hit just after the 60-second time period expired. Note how Gary pulls the trigger with the middle finger of his right hand. This allows him to work the bolt faster, using his thumb and index finger. The straight-through (inline stock) design of the Tubegun allowed Gary to maintain his cheekweld and head position throughout the minute-long drill.
Gary told us: “This isn’t easy. I came away very impressed with the training of the Tommy soldiers if they could make 15 hits in one minute. We had some skilled shooters who brought their own Lee-Enfields and they only did as well as the guys on Top Shot — making six or seven hits in a minute. The problem is that, with the cock-on-close operation of the Lee-Enfield, the gun would push away when the shooter closed the bolt, so the shooter would lose his sight picture, and have to re-center the rifle. I am truly astounded that the record for the ‘Mad Minute’ is 38 shots. That is hard to do with an AR, much less any bolt gun.”
Gary Hopes to Beat the ‘Mad Minute’ Record in the Future
The record for the “Mad Minute” — 38 shots on target at 300 yards — was set in 1914 by Sergeant Instructor Alfred Snoxall*. In the subsequent 98 years, that record has never been broken by any shooter with a conventional bolt-action rifle. Gary told us: “As long as that record still stands, I’m going to keep working at it. I know I lost a few seconds with mag changes. I think with some additional training, I can increase my score. Still, 38 hits is phenomenal. I am very, very impressed at what that guy did — it’s really mind-boggling to do that with an Enfield. Contrary to what has been written, those old Enfields are not that easy to shoot fast. Our club shooters found that out.”* There is some uncertainty concerning the size of the target used by Snoxall. Some internet reports say the target was 12″ x 12″. Other posts, from England, suggest the target was 36″ by 36″. If the target was a 12″-diameter bull, Snoxall’s achievement is even more amazing.
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‘Mad Minute’ and British Marksmanship with the SMLE (Lee-Enfield) The original military requirement of the ‘Mad Minute’ saw the soldier ready to fire with a round in the chamber, 9 in the magazine, safety on. This course of fire is still followed by the GB Historic Breechloading Arms Association and other bodies in their recreated ‘Mad Minute’ competitions. The first 10 would go quickly, but reloads were critical, this not done by a magazine change as Gary did with the RTM or in a modern tactical or semi-auto rifle, but through slick use of ‘chargers’. It is this aspect which fouls so many of my colleagues up as it’s very easy to cause a jam and a large part of 60 seconds can go in sorting it out! As well as the training Gary mentions and commends, there were pay incentives / penalties for certification or failure, and there were valuable monetary and kudos benefits in achieving very high hit counts in the 20 + range. Tommies could draw their rifles from the armoury any time when off duty and spent hours in barracks practising using inert rounds and dry firing. For instance, a common practice was to balance a halfpenny coin on the foresight blade between the sight protecting ears and take shot after shot prone on the barracks floor until the trigger was pressed and the ‘shot taken’ without the coin falling off its perch. Charger clips were selected for those that just held the rounds firmly enough to stop then falling out, were sand-papered and polished with a stove / fireplace polish called ‘Zebrite’ so that the rimmed rounds would slip through the clips like corn through a goose. If you’re unfamiliar with the cock-on-closing Enfield action, it seems clumsy. With intensive practice it is very smooth and can be operated incredibly quickly. The trick is to whip the bolt back onto its stop and initiate a rebound movement that takes it and the cartridge well into the chamber thereby reducing the effort required to close the bolt and chamber the round.
None of this is to detract from the skill many of these guys had and the fantastic results they got both in rate of fire and accuracy out to 500/600 yards. That came from long days of live firing at full distances — far more practice than I’ll warrant US doughboys got at that time. The result was when the small British Expeditionary Force acted a blocking force against two advancing German infantry corps in Belgium in the autumn of 1914. Kaiser Wilhelm predicted confidently that his highly trained ‘Landsers’ would sweep this ‘contemptible little army’ aside. Instead, the Germans advancing in the open at ranges they felt was safe from rifle fire ran into a wall of lead of such a rate and accuracy that regimental commanders explained their failure to advance and massive casualties through the British having far more automatic weapons than their intellignce had briefed. The British survivors of that period adopted the self-styled title of ‘Old Contemptibles’ as an ironic rebuke to Wilhelm, one still used today. By Christmas 1914 that small and highly professional British army had been destroyed through attrition and army rifle competitions aside never achieved those riflecraft standards again — but of course that’s what a machinegun is for and it was criminal that BEF battalions (600-1,000 men) went to war with an establishment of only two Vickers-Armstrong machine-guns — a fraction of that in the opposing German units. |
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Tags: .308 Win, Gary Eliseo, Lee Enfield, Mad Minute, SMLE, Speed Drill, Tubegun
I’m surprised at people only getting 5 or 6 hits in 60 seconds with their own SMLEs. I run an annual 100 yard military rifle competition and most people get off 12-16 shots, the better shots nearly all within the 8-10 rings. And …. we don’t practice in the intervening 12 months and don’t prepare ‘chargers’ specially for the event.
That’s staring on the firing line already prone with an unloaded rifle, bolt open and 5-round charger clip in the action slots. The original military requirement saw the soldier ready to fire with a round in the chamber, 9 in the magazine, safety on. This course of fire is still followed by the GB Historic Breechloading Arms Association and other bodies in their recreated ‘Mad Minute’ competitions.
The first 10 would go quickly, but reloads were critical, this not done by a magazine change as per Gary E with the RTM or in a modern tactical or semi-auto rifle, but through slick use of ‘chargers’. It is this aspect which fouls so many of my colleagues up as it’s very easy to cause a jam and a large part of 60 seconds can go in sorting it out !!!
As well as the training Gary mentions and commends, there were pay incentives / penalties for certification or failure, and there were valuable monetary and kudos benefits in achieving very high hit counts in the 20 + range. Tommies could draw their rifles from the armoury any time when off duty and spent hours in barracks practising using inert rounds and dry firing. For instance, a common practice was to balance a halfpenny coin on the foresight blade between the sight protecting ears and take shot after shot prone on the barracks floor until the trigger was pressed and the ‘shot taken’ without the coin falling off its perch.
Charger clips were selected for those that just held the rounds firmly enough to stop then falling out, were sandpapered and polished with a stove / fireplace polish called ‘Zebrite’ so that the rimmed rounds would slip through the clips like corn through a goose.
If you’re unfamiliar with the cock-on-closing Enfield action, it seems clumsy. With intensive practice it is very smooth and can be operated incredibly quickly. the trick is to whip the bolt back onto its stop and initiate a rebound movement that takes it and the cartridge well into the chamber thereby reducing the effort required to close the bolt and chamber the round.
None of this is to detract from the skill many of these guys had and the fantastic results they got both in rate of fire and accuracy out to 500/600 yards. that came from long days of live firing at full distances – far more practice than I’ll warrant US doughboys got at that time. The result was when the small British Expeditionary Force acted a blocking force against two advancing German infantry corps in Belgium in the autumn of 1914. Kaiser Wilhelm predicted confidently that his highly trained ‘Landsers’ would sweep this ‘contemptible little army’ aside. Instead, the Germans advancing in the open at ranges they felt was safe from rifle fire ran into a wall of lead of such a rate and accuracy that regimental commanders explained their failure to advance and massive casualties through the British having far more automatic weapons than their intellignce had briefed. The British survivors of that period adopted the self-styled title of ‘Old Contemptibles’ as an ironic rebuke to Wilhelm, one still used today. By Christmas 1914 that small and highly professional British army had been destroyed through attrition and army rifle competitions aside never achieved those riflecraft standards again – but of course that’s what a machinegun is for and it was criminal that BEF battalions (600-1,000 men) went to war with an establishment of only two Vickers-Armstrong MGs a fraction of that in the opposing German units.
I once read an article,written by a Canadian, that told of rapid fire drills being shot with the rifle butt tucked under the arm against the ground. He was in the equivalent of our U.S. ROTC and that is method they were taught. Can anyone from UK verify this?
Gary is an outstanding shooter and a stand up guy.
“Gary is an outstanding shooter and a stand up guy.” Mark
….. and makes outstanding stocks. I know , I have two now. But for single-shot F, not rapid / tactical / service.
Incidentally, when it’s said that nobody has ever beaten that 38 hit record with a bolt-action rifle, I’d readily believe that for a conventional turnbolt rifle without QD hi-cap magazines. However, I’m quite sure that it has been broken in recent years by GB Service / Practical Rifle shooters using the widely found straight-pull manually operated AR-15s used here and developed since all semi-autos other than .22 rimfires were banned in 1989. They can shoot nearly as rapidly as the US version, some say as fast, using right-hand pistol grip hold / trigger operation allied to a left hand bolt handle, and with high capacity magazines. I’ve put c. 30 shots into a 200yd target centre ring in a minute with my .223 Rem Southern Gun Company Speedmaster SSR-15 and I’m REALLY slow compared to a keen and well practised Practical Rifle shooter
Laurie,
Gary also shot a “Mad Minute” with an semi-auto AR last week. Dennis Santiago, who was in the pits, said Gary had “50 rounds fired and 49 hits in the black. He could have gone a few more but that’s all he loaded.” Gary told me: “This just demonstrates how much easier the modern military rifle is for the average person to shoot.”
Gary is a true craftsman. One of the finest
Best demonstration of rapid fire I ever saw was at a Texas State Service rifle Championship individual rattle battle in the early 80’s. A USAR shooter lay down at 600 yards with an M14, one in the chamber and a 20 round magazine. 50 seconds later, he had fired 41 rounds and had 39 hits. Amazing shooting.
Ah, seeing the pic of the SMLE No.1 Mk 3* that the editor has inserted brings back happy memories!
My early centrefire rifle shooting was all classic arms and I owned three 0.303 Lee Enfields + an ERA manufactured Pattern 1914 with a ‘Fat Boy’ stock alongside a large collection of Mausers, Schmidt-Rubins, .30-06 Springfields etc over the years.
My favourite Lee was a 1943 made ROF Ishapore (India) SMLE, near mint and a very good shooter especially after I fitted a Parker-Hale or AJP aperture rearsight and was bought in 1986 for £125 (maybe $300 US at that time). The Indians and Australians continued making SMLEs after the centre of empire and US factories making rifles under the lend-lease programme switched to the WW2 Number 4 variant of the Lee-Enfield.
It had a tight bore – so tight that unusually it would shoot well at short ranges with handloads using cheap 147gn Samson brand (Israeli)0.308″ FMJBTs. It was a lovely rifle to shoot and I regret ever having sold it.
Unlike UK made versions that had walnut furniture, this far eastern version had a lighter coloured wood, presumably from some local variety of tree. It had apparently been soaked in oil for months as it leaked the stuff copiously from the forend and hand-guard wood as soon as the barrel got warm. Hot summer days would see me constantly having to unhook the sling from my arm and wipe both rifle and left hand with a rag otherwise I couldn’t grip the thing properly.
Every year the Wellington Service Rifle Association of New Zealand hold the ANZAC day commererative shoot. The most popular event is “The Mad Minute” The New Zealand version starts with only 5 rounds in the magazine and 10 rounds available in stripper clips; getting all 15 rounds away is quite straight forward and we usually see the first shooters finishing in less than 50 seconds. P14, SMLE, No4 and No5 rifles are all used and one year a guy completed the event shooting a single shot Martini Enfield!
We shoot prone unsupported, no slings or rests but we do only shoot at 100 yards. Still we often see all 15 rounds on target with the better shooters scoring 10 V bulls on the Figure 12 target.
We also run this match for non 303 rifles, the Mauser style rifles, the Swiss Schmidt Rubins and the occasional M17 or O3 Springfield all do quite well.
Aside – Notice as Gary is cycling the bolt on his RTM that his cheek never leaves the rifle. This is due to the straight through design of Gary’s tube gun. Accurate Shooter made a comparison with one of Gary’s kit guns and the Colt M2012 (retail @$3,900) but I would go a step further and compare it to the Tubb 2000 (retail @$5,000). Comparable ergonomics and similar capability to retain cheek weld during rapid fire…at half the price.
Just to add a colonial twist to the British Army marksmanship skills story – had it not been for the Anglo Boer war a few years earlier where Afrikaner Boer farmers and their 7×57 Mausers had shown the Brits a thing or 2 about marksmanship, it would never have become a priority for the British peacetime army, and the “Old Contemptibles” would have been skewered by the lancers…
The club shooters that participated with SMLE’s the day we ran the Mad Minute get together all discovered various problems with their No.1 Mk III’s. The most common problem was a sticky magazine and the other issue was the inadequacy of surplus ammunition. The enthusiasm was there but the equipment was not up to par.
I had to give up on shooting at 300 yards because the bullets in the 1952 head stamp Mk VII ammunition I brought were disintegrating in mid-air about 250 yards out. Even when I did my run at 200 yards one of the rounds didn’t make it and another round hang fired. Gary was my spotter when I did it and was calling out the gray puffs in the air. I stopped at 10 rounds fired and thought the better of it. Seven hits. All in all. hey I did try it with real cordite stick rounds.
The SMLE is a good gun. I was able to easily get over 10 rounds out and 100% hits the week before when I was setting up the range using a No.4 Mk I but that gun has an AJP micrometer rear sight and I was using new factory ammo for that test.
The mad minute test day is about running the older No.1 Mk III. Next time I’ll use better ammunition and I think I’ll take some cues from the British Army about tuning my stripper clips and making dummy rounds. Sierra makes 174gr. Match Kings for the .303 but not all SMLE barrels like the bullet. They have ungodly long throats. Best I’ve been able to get one to shoot is about 1.25 MOA after a lot of tinkering.
My goal is to get to a 20 hit Mad Minute with the SMLE. It won’t be easy. The whole object of these events we do at the BRRC is to expand our knowledge as riflemen. Everyone should take a stab at it. The learning curve is worth it.
And confirming that just for fun Gary had a go at it using an AR-15 with an ACOG off a bipod. 50 rounds fired and 49 hits in the black. He could have gone a few more but that’s all he loaded.
Yes a modern semi-automatic will easily outrun the rate of fire of the old SMLE as will a modern bolt gun like an Eliseo RTM fed by AICS mags,topped with a good scope, bipod and 1 pound trigger. These are givens.
The true revelation of the day is just how good those British soldiers were with the SMLE No.1 Mk III.
Final notes from me.
I pulled the target down at 60 seconds as Gary was firing shot number 25 with his bolt gun. It impacted in the frame at the top of the target. Took the photo of the target using my iPhone after I plugged it to run it up.
For anyone that wants to try this, the course of fire we used was as follows,
(5) sighter shots, individually pulled and marked.
(10) 3-second exposure targets randomly coming up from a selection of 4 targets in the pits. This is a rendition of what’s called the McQueen Challenge.
(1) 60 second “Mad Minute” run. You can start with as much ammunition as your gun will physically hold.
There you go. Now go shoot!
In skandinavia we have this competion called “stangskytning” it’s similar to the mad minute but we only have 25 seconds to hit the target 200-300m distance with a 6,5×55
heres a clip of it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsYpMzuArbc it is børklop whos shooting he is truly mad,
we had a couple of club members bring out their AR service rifles and they could knock out nearly 30 hits with ease, i’m impressed with the level of training it took to master the SMLE, as well as how much easier the modern rifle handles. BTW we also organized a “stang shoot” last year after seeing the amazing abilities of the some Norwegian riflemen videos, another eye opening experience for sure!
Stang! Yes sir we’ve attempted “Stang” shooting at BRRC. It is a great format. And we’ve watched lots of YouTubes of these events. Everyone is just amazed at the rate of accurate fire competitors are able to deliver in 25 seconds. We are all in awe of those guys that do it with the Krags.
Just posted a Stangskyting video this morning. If the shooter in the video could maintain his pace for a full minute he could (just barely), make 38 hits in one minute. But that’s with a modern rifle — not a WWI-era SMLE!
Well in denmark we usually get 12 or 13 rounds off, but the Swedes or the Norweagian (fjællaber) are just insane! Distances are from 125m to approx. 250m
From the Australian perspective, I would echo Laurie’s comments but add one significant point. The Army reforms that came out of the problems encountered during the Boer War made this Golden Age of individual musketry possible – but the era was more or less over by Christmas 1914 with the end of the BEF and trench fighting.
That being said, Australian shooters have a special love for the SMLE; clad in an Australian timber called coachwood and often oiled far too much. We are also seeing a return to SMLE shooting competitions.
The key to the Mad Minute is the stripper clip reload. You can start with one in the chamber and 10 in the mag (I once had a mag that could hold 11!) but you will stand and fall on the reload and tuning the stripper clip for the rifle and then practising this is so important. I find the sitting position faster than prone too for working the bolt. (Hint #2: a little Break Free on the bolt helps too!)
We in the States are familiar with the use of stripper clips. Before the advent of the AR15 many shooters either shot the M1A or a bolt rifle in our High Power matches in which we have 2 rapid fire stages. I started out shooting bolt rifle using stripper clips. I discovered stainless stripper clips would work much better than the common steel variety. I would also cull and tune them to find the slickest ones. I now use one of Gary’s stocks in an RTS variant with AI mags for these rapid fire stages.
It might be of interest that at one of my visits to Bisley, i witnessed a gentlemen who gave a demo of how fast a person could shoot the SMLE….it was insanely fast…trigger pull was done with the middle finger, “The Finger”.
Quite entertaining it was
Roy
My quest continues.
(1) Got my middle finger shooting technique up to snuff. Nailing targets this way is not a bad technique that makes a lot of sense for shooting rapid stages with a bolt gun. No mods to the SMLE trigger. This is a test to be mastered “as-issued”. (2) Am patiently cleaning the bore of my No.1 Mk III to get decades of gunk out of the grooves layer by layer. There’s a lot in there but it looks better after every gentle cleaning. (3) Replacing the cracked forestock. The glue repair in the old one came apart spectacularly the last time I shot it. It was also the first time I’d shot it. Ordered one from Numrich and they sent a brand new replica walnut one. (4) Assembling dummy rounds and setting up the BeamHit laser to build speed with accuracy.
Anyone in the U.K. or Oz with more info on tuning SMLE clips please post. I’d appreciate any tips.
The best way to savor history is to experience it.
“that came from long days of live firing at full distances – far more practice than I’ll warrant US doughboys got at that time”
This is untrue and rather poor research.
http://www.bobrohrer.com/sea_stories/krag_rifle_qualification_course_1902-1903.pdf
The US 200-300 bull was 8-10 inches up through WW1 and WW2. The 600yd slow fire also included a rapid fire for accuracy, during which 5rds were fired in 30sec emphasizing total accuracy, not an irrational expenditure of ammunition.
Further research reveals that there was also a 800, and a 1,000yd line on bullseyes that were noticeably smaller than those used today by the NRA.
The XTC course literally has roots in the early US Army and USMC rifle qual courses.
Why Gary and Laurie Holland weren’t aware of this is pretty disappointing.
They also exaggerate the amount of practice that the “Tommies” received in this period. Once WW1 had broken out everyone from Lord Kitchener could notice the lack of emphasis on marksmanship…..which entirely contrasts with the American mentality of the period and Pershing’s instistance that everyone be able to nail a Hun at 600yds.
What no one likes to bring up is that the Germans at Mons WERE being shot at by machine guns and on top of that artillery. The BEF then went on full retreat for 2 non stop weeks, totaling 260 miles.