Flexible supports for rifles, spotting scopes, and the like

1. A bipod for supporting a piece of aimed portable equipment, comprising:

a pair of legs; and

a yoke coupling the legs together and to the portable equipment, the yoke having

a resilient section interposed between the portable equipment and the legs, the resilient section being formed of an elastomeric material and sized to allow the portable equipment to be manually tilted forward, rearward, and to either side relative to the legs, and

a neck section and a pair of spaced apart leg extensions depending from the neck section, such that the legs are attached at a proximal end thereof to the leg extensions, and the leg extensions are formed of an elastomeric material, wherein each of the leg extensions includes a downwardly-opening socket and each of the leg extensions is removably press fit into the socket.

2. The bipod of claim 1 in which at least a portion of the resilient section is interposed between the legs to allow the legs to be moved independently of each other.

3. The bipod of claim 1 in which the legs are detachably coupled to the yoke.

4. The bipod of claim 1 further comprising a detachable coupling mechanism that releasably couples the yoke to the portable equipment.

5. The bipod of claim 4 in which the yoke is molded to at least a part of the detachable coupling mechanism.

6. The bipod of claim 4 in which the detachable coupling mechanism includes a first mating part and a second mating part, the first part including a detent and the second part including a detent groove that engages the detent.

7. The bipod of claim 1 further comprising a rotatable coupling device for coupling the yoke to the portable equipment, the coupling device allowing the portable equipment to rotate freely relative to the legs about a generally vertical axis.

8. The bipod of claim 7 in which the coupling device is detachable.

9. The bipod of claim 1 in which each of the legs includes multiple telescoping leg sections for manual adjustment of the length of the legs.

10. The bipod of claim 1 , in which the neck section includes a bending region, the bending region having a horizontal cross section with an aspect ratio of less than 2:1.

11. The bipod of claim 10 , in which the horizontal cross section of the bending region is circular.