Ive never had a 243 but Im very pleased with my ruger 1, its small, light, consistant, dont think you can go wrong with it. Mine  was custom built for 7stw before they were available over the counter so its quite a few years old now and still does the job very well, I might be abit bias tho... I have three ruger firearms, and a big black newfoundland cross we call Ruger.

I have never owned or used a Ruger #1but I have known some others that have and all were impressed by them.  I knew a fellow who bought one in 25/06 and was going to have it rebarreled to .243/06 as he had a rifle and dies for that wild-cat.  The 25/06 shot so sweet that he could not make the change.

A predator rifle should be very accurate and as you mentioned a Ruger #1 can be a short barrelled handy pointing gun. But having a quick second and third shot may also be really handy.  If you call in 2 or more coyotes it would be nice to be able to get more that one.

Once I was following a deer track on a snowy day.  I stopped and sat against a tree to rattling antlers hoping he was close enough to hear and come to me.  I wasn't there long and 5 coyotes came trotting into the clearing.  I had a bolt action and got it on the face of the closest one and waited till he looked at me with surprise.  Bang I killed him and had the bolt worked and was on the next one and rolled him before he knew what was going on.  I got one more on the run before they got out of the clearing.

If I had a single shot I doubt I would have been so successful.

I don't know why I didn't skin them all right there because it was a real pain to drag them all out to my truck at once.

I just bought myself a new walk around varmint gun.  A CZ 527 Lux in .222.  It is a joy to carry and has an amazing set trigger and shoots better than I can.

Love my #1. I'd rather have a gun I enjoyed and shot well then something where I was more worried about the rare times I might have been able to kill more then 1 had I had a different rifle. If that is the worry get a semi auto.