Natural Point of Aim (NPA)
NPA is one of those concepts that's easy to over-explain. Keep it dead simple and physical, not theoretical. The one-sentence explanation
“Your body should naturally point at the target — so you're not using muscle to hold it there.”
The analogy that works well with new shooters
Ask them to point at something across the room with their arm, then close their eyes, relax their arm, and open their eyes. If their finger drifted away from the object, that's them not naturally pointed at it — they were holding it there with muscle. NPA is the same idea, but with the whole body and rifle instead of just an arm.
Why it matters (say this part explicitly)
If a shooter uses muscle to force the sight onto the target, that muscle gets tired over the course of a hold, and it moves — usually right when they're squeezing the trigger. A muscled position always drifts. A natural position holds still because there's nothing to get tired.
The Exercise: “Settle and Check”
This is the standard NPA drill, and it doubles as a feet/position lesson.
- The shooter sets up their stance and raises the rifle to the target as normal.
- They close their eyes.
- They take one relaxed breath, let their shoulders drop, and let the rifle settle wherever it wants to go — no correcting, no holding it in place.
- They open their eyes and look at where the sight is now pointing.
Then: – If it's still on target → good, that's their NPA, leave it alone. – If it's drifted off target → don't let them nudge the rifle with their arms/shoulders. Have them move their feet (small pivot, whole body) to redirect the natural point, then repeat the check.
Repeat until the sight settles on target with eyes closed, 3 times in a row, without correction.
Coaching cues while they do this: – “Don't push the rifle back — walk your feet to it.” – “If you're using your arms to hold the sight on target, we haven't found your NPA yet.”
A good add-on for new shooters specifically
Have them do the drill for elevation too, not just left-right: – If the sight settles high or low, that's usually fixed by their front leg bend, weight distribution, or (for hip-supported standing) elbow/shoulder shelf position — not by pushing the rifle up or down with the arms.
Once new shooters get used to “eyes closed, settle, check, adjust feet — not arms,” NPA stops being an abstract term and becomes just a habit they run before every shot. That's really the whole goal at this stage — the physics explanation can come later.
*With Claude AI help*