Well a 338 Mag actually will burn 99% of its powder in only 20 inches, so 21 is fine. A longer barrel give a bit more velocity but only because it’s keeping the pressure behind the bullet a bit longer. As a gunsmith I have cut and crowned more barrels than I can count, and I have choreographed the velocity in an awful lot of them. A 338 with a 24 or 25 inch barrel only gives up about 100 FPS when it’s cut back to 20” as a rule.
So I would not worry about a loss of velocity very much
Recoil on the other hand can be a consideration if the SAKO is simply too light for your liking. Recoil is the mathematical energy of the bullet weight and its velocity overcoming the weight of the rifle itself. “Kick” can be something different. Recoil is the energy of the backwards thrust of the gun/round. Kick is how it feels.
Kick feels different to different people. Stock fit and weight of the rifle affect kick A LOT!
In 1988 my wife started shooting rifles. She was only 5 foot 3 inches tall and weighed 116 pounds. She grew up in Pheasant country hunting with her dad and carried a 12 gauge for years but never owned a rifle, and neither did her dad or brothers. When she started shooting rifles I laid out several for her. Her favorite was a custom Mauser in 375H&H and she shot it VERY well. From sitting she could hold a group at 100 years of 3” and often a bit less, so she was obviously not flinching. But she also shot a light 30-06 I had at the time that she hated and said it kicked way too hard. The 375 weighs 10 ¼ pounds and the 30-06 weighed 6.5 pounds. Recoil from the 375 was a lot more but the 30-06 kicked her harder. The 375 fit her well and was slower in its impulse but that little 06 didn’t fit her well and had fast sharp recoil.
The reason for the preceding “article” is to point out a simple fact. No one on this forum is going to be able to answer your question Micksis, because none of us know anything about you. Only you will be able to answer it, and only after you shoot the rifle. We can all make guesses, and some may be well educated guesses, but they are still guesses. You alone must find out how that rifle will fit you and how it will feel. None of us know how tall you are, how big, what your build is, how much experience you have or how recoil effects you. Some people (like my wife back in 88) are small and yet a 375H&H is fun for them. Other men are large and still the sharp kick of even a 30-06 is distracting to them to a point that good marksmanship is difficult. It’s just how different people are wired I guess, and it has nothing to do what “how tough a man is”
So Micksis, you are going to have to make this decision yourself.
