At a total price of $504.78, the long range Savage Axis has been a success. It proved itself in the last 600-yard F-Class match, even if the score wasn't very high. Now, with a few modest upgrades, I think we can increase the rifle's potential.

First, the Good: The stock shape is comfortable. The trigger job turned one of the worst triggers on the market into a fine device. It's a tad heavy for match use, but otherwise brilliant. The Axis action and barrel seem to be precise and reliable. The scope holds zero and tracks perfectly.

Now for the Bad: The Simmons scope's glass is awful, displaying a massive astigmatism when the elevation and windage turrets are tracked away from the center of the objective lens. The thin buttpad on the stock leaves the length-of-pull slightly short and the recoil is not absorbed well; it hurts to fire this rifle. The rounded forearm does not lend itself to stability on a rest.

The Fixes: A Pachmayr Decelerator buttpad will increase the length of pull and tame the recoil. An EGW 20-MOA base should get me looking through the objective's center, where the astigmatism is less pronounced. A bipod will stabilize the rifle side-to-side. We might even add some lead weights to further stabilize the whole rig.

Onward and upward!

-The Social Regressive

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