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I’m currently publishing a series of posts that highlight the gear the 200 top-ranked shooters in the Precision Rifle Series (PRS) are running in long-range rifle matches. (Learn about the Precision Rifle Series.) This group of competitors represents the best precision rifle shooters in the country. This article will focus on what shooting bags they use to help them get steady from prone and positional shots.
Best Shooting Bags
Shooting bags have come a long way over the past 8-9 years. In 2015, the top competitors were all using lightweight square bags and oversized bags to fill big gaps in their bodies when shooting from an improvised position (view the “What The Pros Use” bags article from 2015).
Since that time, there have been two big innovations related to shooting bags that have changed the game:
- The Game Changer Bag Design: The Game Changer was released in 2016 by Clifton Reasor of Reasor Precision. Naming a new product “Game Changer” is a bold move – but he was absolutely right! That V-shaped, saddle bag design changed the game. Within 12-18 months of the introduction of the Game Changer bag, PRS match directors had to start shrinking target sizes because shooters were able to get substantially more steady from barricades and props using that new bag.
- Sand Fill Bags: Over the past 5 years, most shooters have moved to sand-filled bags, especially for shooting from improvised positions. If you compared how steady your rifle was on the same exact model of bag, but one had lightweight fill, and the other had heavy sand fill – you’d see the sand bag gave you dramatically less wobble. Multiple PRS Champions have told me that they consider a sand-filled bag as part of the non-negotiable, must-have gear to be competitive in the PRS.
Today, virtually all of the top-level competitors are using bags made from waxed canvas. Waxed canvas has a flexible, responsive texture that is very malleable. When you drop a rifle on top of a waxed canvas bag, the material instantly conforms to the rifle’s contours. Two-time world champion and PRS Champion Austin Buschman suggests rewaxing your bag regularly. He might do it a few times during a match. When waxed regularly, the bag also has a little bit of a grip or stickiness to it, which can be helpful when putting it on a barricade, post, rocks, etc.
In a JTAC training class, Austin Orgain explained that they’d tried a lot of different thicknesses of waxed canvas material, but to get it supple enough to really contour to the rifle, the manufacturers have to use a thinner canvas material. If they used a thicker material to make them more durable, they wouldn’t work as well. So even the best bags won’t last forever, which is why pro shooters see bags as consumables. (Pro Tip: Carry some Shoe Goo to repair holes during a match.)
How Many Bags Do You Carry At A Match?
In my survey of the top 200 ranked shooters in the PRS, the first question I asked was: “How many shooting bags do you usually carry with you at a PRS match (including a plate bag, if applicable)?” Here is their answer:
85% of pro shooters carry either 2 or 3 bags. Now, one of those bags might be what we refer to as a “plate bag,” which is a special kind of bag that you can attach to your rifle. Here is a look at what a common bag combination might look like that you’d see a pro shooter carrying at every match:
Clearly, the few people who only carry 1 bag use the same bag as a rear bag when shooting from a prone position and a positional bag when shooting from a barricade. But it is common for shooters to carry one bag that is primarily used as a rear bag under the buttstock when shooting from a prone or modified prone position and another positional bag that is placed under the forend when shooting off a barricade or prop. The rear bag is typically larger, and the positional bag typically has a sand fill.
I specifically asked shooters in my survey what brand, model, and fill they used for their rear bag and what brand, model, and fill they used for their positional bag. I’ll cover the complete breakdown below, but first, here is a look at how many shooters used the same exact bag for their rear bag and positional bag:
64% of these top-ranked competitors said they use the same exact bag for both their rear bag and positional bag (same brand, model, and bag fill). However, 7 of the shooters in the top 10 said they use a different rear bag and positional bag.
Last year, I interviewed two-time PRS Champion Austin Orgain and two-time IPRF World Champion Austin Buschman. I talked to both of them extensively about their preferences on shooting bags. They independently told me that they both strongly prefer a sand fill in their positional bag and consider a waxed canvas sand-filled bag as part of their non-negotiable, must-have gear. But, neither of them like to use a rear bag with sand fill – and they each had the same reasoning. Here is how Orgain explained it: “I don’t like sand fill for a rear bag. I like the poly fill that has the little plastic beads in it for a rear bag. I feel like whenever I’m trying to use a rear bag with sand as I try to squeeze it so it takes up more space, the sand always feels like it is trying to fall out on me. A sand bag in the rear just doesn’t make me feel super steady. With a poly bead rear bag, when you squeeze it, everything seems to stay there where you want it to, and you do not have to keep squeezing a little more to keep your rifle where you want it.” They also both prefer a larger rear bag, which is why they both carry a rear bag and a different positional bag.
We’ll look at the fill that these pro-level shooters are running in their rear bag and positional bags later in this article, but hopefully, that gives you a little context on why some shooters might prefer to carry multiple bags with them at a match.
Best Rear Bag
Brand & Model
The chart below gives a full breakdown of what bags the top-ranked PRS shooters said they primarily used as their rear bags in matches.
Over 99% of these pro shooters were using either an Armageddon Gear Game Changer or a Wiebad Fortune Cookie! Both bag designs have a saddle or V-shape that a shooter can place over a barricade to create a flat shooting surface. There are a few sizes of those two bags available, and the photo below shows all of the models that were used by more than 5 of these shooters as a rear bag:
77% were using one of the Armageddon Gear Game Changer shooting bags. There are a few different sizes of Game Changer bags, and of those using a Game Changer as their rear bag, 40% run a Schmedium Game Changer, 33% run the original OG Game Changer, 22% run a Plus One Game Changer, and 5% run a Pint-Size Game Changer.
23% were using one of the Wiebad Fortune Cookie shooting bags as their rear bag. Again, there are a few different sizes of Fortune Cookie bags, and here is the breakdown: 48% were using the Tator Tot Fortune Cookie, 28% were using the Max Fortune Cookie, 23% were using the Mini Fortune Cookie, and 3% were using the Micro Tator Tot.
Here is Austin Buschman’s take on a rear bag: “When I first started, I used a really small rear bag, and then I eventually learned you almost can’t have a big enough rear bag. You can always use the corner of it if you need to get down really low, and if you need to get up really high, then you can stand it on its end and fluff it up. I can go to almost a foot high with my Wiebad Max Fortune Cookie if I had to on a stage, and I can go down to the dirt on the low end if I need to.”
There was only 1 shooter who wasn’t using either a Game Changer or a Fortune Cookie, and that was Keith Baker, who said he was using a “Baker Bag.” I tried to find any info online about that bag but couldn’t come up with anything. I also reached out to Keith but hadn’t heard back from him before I published this. I assume it is a custom bag he developed for his own use – but if I get more info, I’ll update it here.
Fill for Rear Bag
Now let’s look at what fill these shooters said they were using in their rear bag:
67% of these top marksmen use sand in their rear bag, including 5 of the shooters in the top 10.
17% selected that they used “Ultralight Beads” in their rear bag. Git-Lite and SpexLite are two very popular lightweight bag fills and are likely what most of those shooters are using. Some other shooters specifically said they use SpexLite or Git-Lite, but many of them simply said it was some type of “Ultralight Beads.” It isn’t always clear what type of ultralight fill a manufacturer uses when you buy a bag, so I’d suspect many of these shooters might not know the specific brand of the fill. If you add in the other 2 people who specified SpexLite or Git-Lite, then 18% were using an ultralight fill in their rear bag.
13% of these shooters said they were using “Poly Beads” as the fill in their rear bag. That was the fill material in bags for the longest time, and it is somewhere between sand and ultralight beads in terms of weight.
For example, here are the approximate weights of the Armageddon Gear Schmedium Shooting Bag with different kinds of fill:
- Heavy Sand: 9.2 lbs.
- Standard Poly Beads: 4.0 lbs.
- SpexLite Ultralight Beads: 1.2 lbs.
- Empty Waxed Canvas Bag (no fill): 0.3 lbs. (5.0 ounces)
Those 3 most popular fill types are standard options that you can order a bag with, but you can see there is a variety of other bag fill types that some of these top-ranked shooters are running. However, all of those other options were just said by 1 shooter each.
A few experimented with some kind of mix of sand, standard beads, and ultralight fill, likely trying to “strike the right balance” between how stable a bag was and the overall weight.
Glass Bag Fill
Pro shooter Sheldon Nalos said he used “super fine glass beads, like what you would find in a weighted blanket.” The photo shows what 1 lb. of fill looks like for standard plastic poly beads compared to the same weight of micro glass beads. Here is a link to micro glass bead fill on Amazon.
Recently, Wiebad started offering glass-filled bags. Here is what they say about it: “Similar to our current Heavy Sand Fill in weight, the Glass Bead provides a less granular feel when handling and using the Fortune Cookie. Smaller grains of medium provides rapid settling of the media inside the confinements of the outer shell.” I also saw this Instagram post from pro shooter Corey Voges a few weeks ago, where he shared his experience trying Wiebad’s bags with glass fill:
One of the big differences between Wiebad and Armageddon Gear shooting bags is that the AG Game Changer bags allow you to replace or adjust the amount of fill through a spout on the end. Wiebad’s bags don’t have a way to access the fill – without ripping seams and then sewing them back up later. With that said, a Game Changer bag typically comes overfilled, meaning the bag contains more fill than what most pro shooters would say is the ideal amount of fill to use. But you can open up the port, remove some of that fill, and adjust it to whatever level you prefer – or even replace it entirely with a different fill. In contrast, the Wiebad bags come with a pretty ideal amount of fill out-of-the-box, but you can’t adjust it (easily).
Edge Sand Bag Fill
The last fill type I want to touch on briefly is Edge fill or “Edge Sand” fill. Austin Orgain told me he’d been trying out that fill, and here is what he told me about it: “I really like sand in a positional bag, but I’ve also been playing around with Wiebad’s new Edge fill. The Edge fill is supposed to be similar to sand but helps in wet conditions. Sometimes, when a bag with sand in it gets wet or waterlogged, it gets really hard and doesn’t work very well to shoot off of. Imagine a sand castle that is packed really tight and almost turns into a brick. The Edge fill is supposed to be better in the water, but so far, I still like the sand fill better if I’m going to be in dry conditions. I feel like the rifle sinks into the bag a little better, and the bag forms to it a little bit better.” So, that is something to keep in mind if you are shooting in wet/rainy conditions.
Finally, if you want to dive deeper into the science and performance characteristics of bag fill, I’d highly recommend you listen to this Miles to Matches podcast from Chad Heckler & Francis Colon: Miles to Matches Ep. 109 – Bag Fill with David Schabel from SpexLite. I found it very interesting!
Best Positional Bag
Now, let’s shift our focus from the rear bag to what positional bag these guys were running. As I mentioned in the introduction, some of these guys are running the same bag for both – but some prefer to carry a bag that is specifically optimized for positional use. Here is a complete breakdown of what all of these pro shooters were using for their positional bags:
Brand & Model
Once again, the Armageddon Gear Game Changer shooting bag is the most popular option among these top-ranked shooters. 71% of the pros were using a Game Changer as their primary positional bag. 54% of those running a Game Changer were using a Schmedium, and 34% were running a Plus One Game Changer. There were also 9% using an OG Game Changer as their positional bag, and 3% said they are using a Pint-Size Game Changer (including Andy Slade, who placed 2nd overall in the Open Division and won $30K at the 2023 AG Cup).
28% of these shooters use a Wiebad Fortune Cookie as their positional bag, including 5 of those in the top 10. Of those using Wiebad bags, 59% were using a Tater Tot Fortune Cookie bag, 24% were using a Mini Fortune Cookie bag, 12% were using a Max Fortune Cookie bag, and 4% were using a Micro Tater Tot bag. One interesting note is that 4 of the top 10 shooters said they use a Mini Fortune Cookie, which makes it the most popular positional bag among the top 10.
PRS Champions Clay Blackketter, Austin Orgain, and Austin Buschman say they all run the Wiebad Mini Fortune Cookie on most positional stages because the mini isn’t as tall as other bags, which gives them minimal clearance above the barricade. Having your rifle closer to the barricade basically creates a smaller fulcrum, which they believe helps you stay on target better through recoil.
Fill for Positional Bag
Here is the breakdown of what type of fill these shooters are running in their positional bag:
93% are running a sand fill in their positional bag! That includes all of the guys in the top 10. In fact, there is only 1 guy in the top 25 running anything but sand. While a few are experimenting with other mixes or fills, it seems like a sand-filled bag is a must-have for positional shots.
Plate Bags
Plate bags are basically a way to attach a bag to an arca rail on the bottom of your rifle’s forend. Having a bag attached to your rifle can shave a few seconds on stages where you have to transition between multiple positions.
You will also occasionally see pro shooters running a plate bag in the front and a bipod behind it on a stage. That helps on stages where some of the shots need to be off a bag and some could be prone or modified prone off a bipod. Most pro shooters would prefer to take a shot from a bipod and rear bag if there is any way possible to do that on a stage. You can see Austin Orgain running such a stage below and using a plate bag for the shots off the side of the truck bed before he stood up to take the last shots from the top of the truck cab using a modified prone position with the bipod in the front and a rear bag. I took that photo as I watched him shoot the stage, and I can’t remember for sure – but I bet he cleaned it! 😉
Unfortunately, I didn’t specifically ask the shooters what plate bag they were running on the survey, so I don’t have hard data to report on that. However, I shoot with enough of these guys and travel to enough pro matches to confidently say that there are two brands of plates and bags that are most popular:
- Gray Ops Mini Plate PRO paired with either Armageddon Gear’s Mini Plate Pad bag or Wiebad’s Plate Bag.
- Area 419 RailChanger X paired with one of these compatible bags from Area 419: OG Game Changer Bag, Pint-Size Game Changer, or the Cole-Tac D-Bag Plate Bag.
Orgain said that the way he uses his plate/bag combo the most isn’t actually on his rifle. It is when it’s mounted directly to his tripod, and he rests his binos on top of the bag and uses it similar to a positional bag to steady his binos to find targets, watch wind downrange, and spot impacts for other shooters. Some people like to clamp their binos into a tripod, but resting them on top of a bag can make transitioning between targets faster and may take out more of the micro-vibrations from the tripod and help the optic be more steady.
There are a ton of shooters who use a plate bag to rest their binos and spot shots for other shooters at a match. You typically need a double-arca adapter to attach a plate bag to the top of a tripod, like what most of the shooters below are using.
Waxing Your Bag
Austin Buschman teaches that we need to rewax our waxed canvas bags, because it lubricates the fibers and makes it into a different bag. He can tell the difference in how the rifle recoils between a freshly waxed bag and one that is dry or dirty. Many of these pro shooters wax every inch of their positional bag, especially the seams, which can extend the life of the bag.
“I wax my positional bag pretty often,” Buschman explains. “I like it to be real tacky. I use Otter Wax, which looks like a little bar of soap. I might rewax it right before a positional stage if I want it to be a little bit more tacky. And I make it a point not to drop it in the dirt if I don’t have to during the day because I don’t want to mess up the tacky wax surface. On some stages, it might be better for me to use that same bag for some positional shots and then also use it as a rear bag, and if that’s the case, I don’t worry about it and let it get dirty. But, most of the time, I’ll use my other bag as my rear bag, and this one is primarily for positional shots.”
Coming Up Next
If you enjoyed this content, there is more to come! Over the next few months, I’ll be publishing a ton of data on what the top precision rifle shooters are using. Check out the other “What The Pros Use” articles that have already been published this year.
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The part that seems most surprising is the overwhelming use of sand fill , and almost no glass sand blasting media , treated with silicone it has a particular feel better than most sand fills ,only ones that seem to come close are the water filter sand media with silicone treatment both feel almost liquid vs grainy.
Interesting. I haven’t personally tried that, but it’s an interesting idea. I think we like how the grainy sand “locks up” once in position. I’m not sure we’d want it to be completely fluid … but then again, I haven’t tried what you’re referring to. It might be great. Sand is certainly the dominant choice at this point. I was a little surprised to see so many people using sand-filled rear bags, because I’d come to the same conclusion Orgain and Buschman had about a bigger bag filled with lighter weight beads feeling easier to use for a rear bag. But, lots of these guys are using the same bag for rear and positional, so that probably explains some of it. If I could only have one bag, it’d be sand … but I don’t mind carrying the extra, since it’s so light.
The glass fill options do sound interesting. I wonder if they’ll gain popularity over the next year or two.
As always, thanks for sharing your thoughts! 😉
Thanks,
Cal
A Pintsize Gamechanger bag bought of Andy Slade at the worlds in Italy ,filed with sand filter media and silicone treated is also near fluid not grainy, best feeling fill i ever tried. Glass blasting media is super fine once you add silicone it turns from grainy to near fluid In US you might be seeing that with new Drenger precision Fenrir being new hottnes in international PRS ,i think they are being imported through the StrikeWithoutWarning folks , but are otherwise Swedish design.
Cal, I enjoy your articles. Super informative and data driven. Do you have any statistics on the growth of PRS for the last 5 years? Could be by number of PRS registered members but a better metric might be total attendance by year at PRS matches. I’m asking as I have a theory that one of the reasons for the decline in traditional positional service rifle competition (think Camp Perry national matches) is people picking up PRS as they find it more enjoyable. Feel free to email me anything you have or point me in a direction of someone who may have that data. I appreciate it. Tim Silvers, President, Alaska Rifle Club
That is a great question, Tim. I’d be curious to see data on that myself. I can tell the sport has grown over the last 10 years, but I really don’t have any hard data I could point to. I will be at the PRS finale this weekend up in Idaho, and I’ll try to remember to ask the PRS Director that question when I see him. He might have access to some kind of data that could answer that question. It does seem like the hot sport right now!
Thanks,
Cal