If I shot 3 inch groups off from a bench with a scoped rifle using a rest I would flat out be upset with myself. Especially if I knew the rifle could do better. I could live down 2 inch groups, but not 3. That is pretty big to me. Of course if my gun never shot better than that I certainly would not be bragging it up. I'm talking 3 shot groups by the way. I'm guessing your buddy got lucky and hit a nickel or something once and assumed it was repeatable.

I think the difference in a big game rifle and a varmint rifle is the way they are set up. Varmint or target type rifles are a bit easier to shoot well. They have higher powered scopes and better triggers most of the time.

Big game rifles tend to have lower power scopes with fixed parallax, thick reticles and heavier trigger pulls. Take my .17HMR for example. It can easily shoot 1 inch groups at 100 yards if the wind is calm. However it has a 20 power adjustable objective scope, light trigger and is pretty quiet with no recoil. I have a 400 dollar varmint scope on a 200 dollar rimfire. I can't just see my target, I can read the fine print on it.

Compare that to a high powered rifle or slug gun that has a lower power scope, heavier trigger and you know is going to kick. It becomes a bit more tricky to shoot well. Also a bit more of a process to find the ammo it likes.

I would be impressed with a .22 lr that can shoot 1 inch or under at 100 yards though. It can be done, but most out of the box can't do it that I have seen. 50 yards would be a better test for a 22lr in my opinion.

I used to have a savage 110E when I was about 18 or 19. It had a cheap 3-9x32 bushnell scope on it. With winchester silvertips I had no problem shooting under 2 inches with it at 100 yards. And I only weighed like 90 lbs. It darn near knocked me down every time I shot it. If I had a centerfire I couldn't get to shoot better than 3 inches I would be looking to get rid of it. Unless I just was not a very good shooter.

I had an AK that couldn't shoot better than 4 inches at 50 yards though. And that was scoped! I didn't keep it very long. Come to think of it my SKS was not all that accurate either.

Paul