My first experience with center fire rifles was with varmint rifles and I approached my M 1917 Enfield in .30-06 with some apprehension, starting out with light, cast bullet loads. I gradually schooled myself to deal with recoil in a way which allowed me to manipulate a powerful rifle almost as easily as a far less powerful one.

The last Cape buffalo I ever shot was at about 50 yards and running from left to right at top speed. I fired four shots from my .505 SRE (100 fp of free recoil) and hit him all four times in the shoulder, with a group which I could cover with my hand.

I was and am 5'8" tall and weigh slightly over 160 pounds. I am also a long time competetive shooter, accustomed to using iron sights out to 1000 yards range. Thousands of rounds fired down range have inured me to recoil and taught me how to recover quickly from each shot with a powerful rifle. They have also taught me not to brace myself against anticipated recoil and concentrate on the target, whether stationary or moving.

If you are not already a hand loader, I encourage you to become one. Getting the amount of experience needed is prohibitively expensive at today's ammunition prices. Shoot and shoot, and then shoot some more.