Great advice.RECIT wrote:DJM,
If you have never shot at distance before go and buy a Savage 10 or Remington 700 is choice caliber. Get a good midrange scope and go shoot it. Experience and training play as much of a part as equipment does in the long range game. If you are wanting to work up 1k yards then I agree the .308 is not the round to do it. 600yds and under and .308 it a great round. Not saying .308 is not capable of 1k shooting, there are just a lot better rounds for that specific purpose.
Both the Savage 10 and the Remington 700 are great starter platforms and are fully customizable. If you feel your skills are worth the extra $ after having some success at long distance then you might want to empty your savings for a GAP or Accuracy International set up.
I recently purchased a model 10 flcpk in .223 and it will be better shooter than me for a long time to come. I put a vortex viper 4-16 44 hd on it and am very happy with it.