Braxton Oliver: World Champion on bold calls, death metal and the targets still left to break

North Carolina shooter Braxton Oliver has established himself as one of the leading Sporting competitors in the world. Fresh from winning the 2026 World English Sporting Championship in San Antonio, Texas, he speaks to Sporting Gun about family legacy, preparation, hunting, and why death metal helps him focus under pressure.

Who is Braxton Oliver?

I’m 29 years old and from North Carolina. My family owns and runs Hunter’s Pointe Sporting Clays, where we’ve now been for around 14 years, although our involvement in shooting grounds goes back over 40 years through my grandfather’s original club. He started out with trap and skeet before adding sporting clays in the early 1990s.

At Hunter’s Pointe we’ve got a sporting course with four traps per stand, a five-stand compact layout and two Helice rings, so there’s always plenty going on. Day-to-day I do a bit of everything really – coaching, lessons, target setting and general maintenance around the ground.

We probably have over 70 traps in total, so keeping everything running smoothly is a full-time job in itself.

Winning the 2026 World English Sporting Championship

It was an incredible feeling. That’s a title we’ve chased for a long time as a family, particularly because my grandfather was both a Veteran and Super Veteran World Champion himself.

To win the overall World English Sporting title and add our family name to that history meant a huge amount to me personally.

Inside the super final

The first two days went extremely well and put me in a strong position heading into the final day. I struggled a little more on the last day, but still managed to qualify for the six-man super final alongside Gebben Miles, Derrick Mein, Phil Gray, Dylan Thompson and Karen Miles, who became the first lady ever to qualify for the super final.

Right from the first stand there was a difficult sim pair. Everyone else elected to shoot the A-bird target first, but I decided to reverse the order because I felt I could see the B-bird more clearly right out of the trap. The lighting conditions weren’t ideal for anyone, so I trusted what my eyes were telling me.

Fortunately, it worked perfectly. I managed to break the first two pairs, which immediately gave me a lead over the rest of the field. From there, the key was simply staying composed and remaining mentally disciplined all the way through the closing stands.

It absolutely was a risk, but I told myself beforehand that if I wanted to win a World Championship, I probably needed to do something slightly differently from everybody else. I trusted my instincts, committed to the decision fully, and thankfully it paid off.

The National Shooting Complex course

The Worlds were held at the National Shooting Complex in San Antonio, which is also where we shoot our US Nationals every year.

Because we know the venue so well, I really appreciated that the organisers moved things around and presented targets in areas we don’t usually see used for major events. It gave the competition much more variety and stopped it feeling predictable.

There were definitely presentations we wouldn’t normally associate with that venue, which made it a more interesting championship in my opinion.

How Braxton Oliver prepares for a major

About two weeks beforehand, I went around our course at home and set targets that I felt would resemble the sort of things we might see in Texas. Over the course of that week, I gradually increased the difficulty and focused heavily on quality over quantity.

The week immediately before the Worlds, I actually backed off quite a bit. I’ve had situations in the past where overshooting before a major event hurt me mentally and physically, so this time I wanted to stay fresh and relaxed heading into the championship.

Overall, I probably shot around 500 to 600 targets during that preparation period.

It varies a little across the year, but I’d probably shoot somewhere between 10,000 and 15,000 registered competition targets annually. Including practice, lessons and preparation, the overall figure is probably closer to 30,000 or even 35,000 targets per year.

Career highlights and Team USA

I’ve been a seven-time member of Team USA across Sporting and FITASC disciplines, which is something I’m very proud of. I also won the Jack Link’s Cup in 2023, which is one of the larger prize-fund shoots in the US and attracts many of the top shooters from around the world. Beyond that, I’ve won multiple state championships and various regional and signature events over the years, although obviously the World Championship now sits at the top of the list.

Learning to shoot from Larry Corbett

My grandfather, Larry Corbett, taught me from the beginning. He was a swing-through shooter and that became the foundation of my shooting style as well.

Over time I’ve evolved and picked up bits and pieces from other top shooters, but fundamentally my style still comes from him. Nowadays I use a mixture of swing-through, pull-away and maintained lead depending on the target presentation.

Guns, cartridges and kit

I’m sponsored by Krieghoff, Remington Ammunition, BarePelt and Alamo Sporting Arms. My main competition gun is a Krieghoff Parcours, usually with a modified choke, shooting Remington Nitro cartridges in 1⅛oz No. 7.5s at 1,235 feet per second.

Aside from that, I keep things fairly simple. Pilla glasses, moulded earplugs and not much else really.

Mindset and advice

The best piece of advice I’ve ever been given is to remind myself that there’s always another tournament. Whenever I have a disappointing stand, round or a bad weekend, I remind myself that there’ll always be another opportunity the following week. That mindset helps prevent one poor performance becoming mentally bigger than it needs to be.

For anyone new to shooting, my advice is simple: don’t be afraid to ask for help. There’s a huge amount of knowledge within shooting and most experienced people are happy to share advice if somebody genuinely wants to improve. Whether it’s a local instructor, experienced shooter or coach, asking questions is one of the quickest ways to progress.

Hunting and life outside competition

Hunting has always been a massive part of our family life. We grew up hunting whitetail deer as kids, then doves and quail, and got heavily into waterfowl hunting as teenagers. Nowadays the whole family still takes an annual trip somewhere different in the US for duck hunting each year.

That said, my favourite quarry species will always be whitetail deer. Here in North Carolina there are so many different ways to hunt them, but I’ve always loved simply sitting in a stand in the woods early in the morning or late in the evening, watching everything come alive around you.

At this stage of my life, I’d probably choose clays over hunting if I had to pick one, because I don’t feel like I’m finished competitively yet. There are still titles I want to win and goals I want to achieve before I slow down and spend more time in the field.

What’s left on the bucket list

Winning the FITASC World Championship is the major one. If I could say I’d won both the English Sporting and FITASC Worlds, I’d feel like I’d completed everything I truly set out to achieve competitively.

I’d also love to win one more North Carolina State Championship – my grandfather won it three times and I’ve currently won it twice. Outside competition shooting, experiencing a traditional driven game shoot in the UK is definitely high on the list, along with one day doing a serious elk hunt out West.

The death metal playlist

Probably my taste in music would surprise people the most. I listen to music while I shoot and I’m a huge metalhead – we’re talking death metal, deathcore, hardcore, black metal, all the really heavy stuff.

During the World Championship I was listening to bands like Minus Youth, Sanguisugabogg and The Acacia Strain. A lot of people find that surprising, but for me it helps block everything else out. Once I’m actually in the stand it just becomes background noise and helps me focus completely on what’s in front of me.