The coveted Golden Bullseye Awards, now in their 22nd year, were created as a way for us to publicly recognize the firearm industry’s best-performing, highest-value and most innovative products from the previous year. Some years there are runaway standouts, but more often than not, there are numerous contenders worthy of accolade within a given category, and the selection process to nail down a slate of recipients can require no small amount of rigorous discussion on the part of the editors. This year we were blessed with a sizable crop of great new guns that could have won an award, but below you will find our consensus winners.
“Last year was one of massive new-product introductions from the recreational shooting sports industry,” said NRA Publications Executive Director Doug Hamlin. “As a result, the editorial staff had some tough decisions to make to identify the best all-new products.”
2024 Ammunition Product Of The Year: Federal Force X2 Shorty
What’s not to like about an effective but soft-recoiling buckshot load that separates into two segments upon impact, simultaneously doubling the resulting wound channels while reducing the risk of over-penetration? It turns out not much, as contributor Frank Melloni revealed in “’Little Guys’ To The Rescue” about Federal Ammunition’s recently introduced Force X2 Shorty shotshells.
By integrating FX2 buckshot into its lineup of Shorty shotshells, the company created a potent new ammunition for shotguns capable of cycling and firing these 1¾" shells—while taking advantage of the increased onboard capacities that these truncated loads make possible.
Melloni’s gel testing of the six-pellet 00 buck payload demonstrated that the FX2 got the job done: “All but one of the pellets split as intended, and one even fractured a second time. Most of the pellets split after penetrating between 2" and 3", demonstrating an uncannily consistent design,” he said.
“For the most part, pellets that broke in half did so nearly perfectly, as confirmed by their retained weights. After adding it all up, I sincerely believe Federal hit its mark in what it wanted to accomplish and dialed these pellets in just right to get there.”
For successfully merging two of its already proven lines to create a new high-capacity, easy-to-shoot option for 12-ga. home defenders, we named Federal’s Force X2 Shorty shotshells Ammunition Product Of The Year. For more information, visit federalpremium.com.
