I agree Steve, a very informative article. Thanks Pete and Belly for putting it together.
I can attest to PVM's wind reading skills. I was looking through some notes I made from a practice day at Little River back in April this year. We were shooting at 300yd in a 5-8mph wind right to left. Five mozzie targets were shot under match conditions. Peter suggested I read the flags while he shot my rifle and I was to call when he was to fire. He shot a 2.16" group scoring 57.01. Pete then called the flags while I shot and the group was .95" and 59.01.
This experience demonstrated the importance of flag reading to me yet I still find myself at times so intent on the target that I will neglect to take a final check on the flags, miss a big change resulting in a really wide shot. So no matter how painstaking I've been in putting my loads together a lack of attention to the flags has put paid to my score.
Having said that Little River conditions can be that flukey at times that even when watching the flags closely it can be damn difficult to decide when to shoot.
Nick