Gary Reeder
you young guys take heed. Shooting the real big
Wednesday, September 18, 2019, 17:58

thumpers may be exciting to you and your friends but go easy on them. Whatever you do today and for the next few years will come back to bite you in the butt later. In years past I did all the shooting and it was not uncommon for my guys to load big caliber revolvers like 475 Maximum, 500 Maximum, 500 S&W and such and hand them to me for me to test fire them and sight them in. This would go on for a couple of hours, gun after gun. The Contenders and Encores in even larger calibers were mixed in with the bunch. At the time I felt I was pretty invincible. The recoil hurt but the sting and thump went away after a while.

8 weeks ago a local surgeon who specializes in hand injuries told me that 30 years of heavy recoiling handguns had done a lot of nerve damage to my right hand. I had 2 surgeries that he says will bring most of the use of the hand back, eventually. I started doing a little bit of shooting this week on a 257 Raptor Contender barrel. And it is not there yet. The cuts were in the base of my right hand and at the base of my 3rd finger. Even the recoil of the 257 Raptor and a 120 grain bullet hurt like hell. I have about 10 days or so to work with the hand before the HHC, so I am doing my best to get where I can shoot at least a couple of rounds at the hunt.

The gist of this whining is even if it is exciting to shoot the big stuff, keep it to a minimum. You may not think you are doing damage to the hand but you are, little by little. The nerves in the hand go pretty quick. And it takes a good while to get the hand back to normal, if ever.
My worry now is next May I have a very special hunt in Africa and the biggest round I can come up with in a handgun will be needed. I have that second Cape Buffalo hunt and possibly an elephant, if my PH John gets a permit. I used my 450 GNR loaded to max with a 500 grain Hornady DGX bullet for my Cape Buffalo last year and will hopefully use the same gun and load for the next buffalo. For Elephant John said I need a super hot 416 caliber round in my encore using a 400 grain solid. He recommended the 416 caliber rather than the 458, which sort of surprised me. John said my 416 GNR based on the 50 Alaskan isn't hot enough for a good clean kill so I am working on developing another 416 caliber round. This one is based on a 50-110 case necked to 416. It is the 417 GNR and Sean is doing the testing right now and he says it is a real thumper.

So again all my heavy recoiling rounds shot thru 30 years or more may keep me from completing my final bucket list. We will see. I have a bit over 7 months to get the hand ready. So when you shoot some of the heavy recoiling rounds, go easy and keep the shooting to a minimum. Remember, we aren't invincible.