If you get a chance, try to find some of the books written about Beurling, a Canadian Spitfire pilot in Malta. I believe he holds the record for the allies for the kills/time, he got most of his kills in only a few weeks before being wounded. I think it was 27 kills in just two weeks. He was also an incredible shot, particularly when it came to deflection. He had his own system he designed using canopy cues at stuff like that, but he was also a very strange duck. He rarely made friends, but when his squadron leader asked him to explain his shooting, he actually spent an afternoon training him on how he did things. The next flight up, his CO shot down 3 aircraft, and then 2 the next day. Gives you some idea on his ability I guess. He also was known for incredible long range shooting, having claims and film of shooting down L/W aircraft at over 800 yards. Sounds like some of our Aces High super pros - good at deflection AND long range shooting.
I remember reading in one of the books about him that one day he was in a fight with an Italian fighter, and decided just for the heck of it he would hold fire and only allow himself a single 3 or 4 shot burst with his 20mm and only take the shot if he could be sure he would hit the pilot in the head. His 1/4 burst struck the enemy pilot right in the head, and then he just flew home. Beurling was responsible for killing a number of famous high scoring German Aces as well, I'll have to look them up.
Also, an interesting factoid, he heavily customized his Spitfire. He had all the .303's removed as he felt they were useless and just extra weight (sound familiar). He also had several other screwball things done to it, again, I'll have to dig into my library of books about him to remember exactly what they were.
