After teaching many Appleseeds, I will go a little bit differently than my brothers in Liberty. Not that they are wrong at all.
-3 mags at least in case one of your mag malfunction. 3 is good, 4 is great.
- if you can, bring 2 rifles. You have no idea how many people we have that got major malfunction with their rifle. Many shooters never shot a whole day with their rifle and they get bad surprises.
-beforre leaving home, check all your screws. If you have a 795 and use iron sights, do not forget to loctite the front sight a couple days before. The screw WILL loosen.
- I am of those who believe shooting AQT with a rimfire makes it soooooooo easy. Too easy. The basics are based on the 6 steps, steady hold factors, NPOA and rifleman cadence. Recoil is part of that whole process. I saw often people scoring AQT with a .22 and failing miserably with a 223(that has a little recoil, but recoil however)
- I do not believe an AQT at full distance is harder than an AQT at 25. You just have to know your come-ups and gage the wind if it is more than 10 miles per hour and it is perfectly ok. Shooting at 500 is as easy for me than shooting that tiny target at 25. I can hit in rifleman cadence with my ar mounted with an ACOG any shoulder type size target from 1 yard to 500 yard prone with no effort.
The current average shooter has no fundamentals but he thinks because he urinates vertically he does not need directions while driving and he has nothing to learn about shooting. My advice: go to the Appleseed and consider that first one as a tryout. The next one you will go, you will know what to expect and you will do a lot better.