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Federal Premium has introduced the Gold Medal Grand, a shotshell line geared toward clay-target competitors. It boasts a two-piece wad updated with new Soft-Cell technology that compresses slightly as the shot fires. Doing so lessens shot deformation, resulting in rounder pellets that produce consistent patterns. The cushioning effect also reduces felt recoil. Grand loads are the first shotshells utilizing Federal’s proprietary Catalyst primer, which contains no lead styphnate, but instead incorporates an aluminum component that produces a hotter firing temperature, thus promoting more efficient ignition of the propellant charge. Available in No. 7½ and 8 loadings, white-hulled Gold Medal Grands promise to become a fixture on trap, skeet and sporting clays fields. federalpremium.com
In 2024, former owner Gregg Ritz purchased Thompson/Center Arms. Now the company has introduced a modern take on its classic Contender/Encore concept: the ENCORE PROHunter.
While it's certainly a saturated marketplace these days, the AR-15 has never been more popular with American firearm enthusiasts, and many manufacturers are continuing to feed the need with new options loaded with new features.
Like any hobby or pastime that is in any way even vaguely related to machines or technology, firearms attract a (possibly) disproportionate number of “right-brained,” STEM-oriented personalities who like numbers.
Slingshots are fun, but they can also be a legitimate backup defensive tool—in 2023, a 13-year-old Michigan boy saved his 8-year-old sister from being kidnapped by using a $3 slingshot to fire a marble and a rock at the assailant, striking him in the chest and head.