Guns

The Franchi Aspire is going to be particularly favored by the upland bird hunting community.

Franchi’s Aspire is a great looking sub-gauge over/under that, with a suggested retail price of $2,299, won’t scare your plastic credit card into melt-down mode (let’s call it a mid-priced shotgun). While over/under birds guns in that price range are usually coming out of Turkey, the Franchi Aspire is Italian made, in close proximity to many of the other great Italian shotgun names – yes the legendary town of Brescia.

I learned of the CZ Sporter shotgun improbably. I was at the last station in a registered shoot at the Colorado Clays Sporting Club in Brighton, Colorado, a thirty-minute drive from downtown Denver. The station had five true pair of overhead tower shots coming from behind like F-16s. I was shooting my favorite Italian over/under masterpiece but I wasn’t hitting the targets solidly and even missed a few. The joy of shooting felt like a week-old soufflé.

If you’re still shooting that beloved Browning over/under you’ve owned since college, be prepared to have your socks knocked off with the company’s new 20-Gauge 725 Sporting.

Although still a member of the fabled Citori family introduced in 1973, the 20-gauge 725 Sporting marks a departure from classic Browning over/unders characterized by broad beaver tail forends, bulky receivers and labored handling. To paraphrase that Oldsmobile meme, the 20-gauge 725 is “not your father’s Browning.”

Entering the new gunsmith workshop of Rich Cole, I immediately recalled my days as a graduate student at the University of New Hampshire when we lived in the picturesque, riverfront town of Portsmouth.

Once the press conference is over in Tuscany, Italy and the pretty girl has held up the shotgun while everyone clamors around with a camera, there’s a much more defining moment. It’s the moment when the gun is in your hands, and the arm of the trap is cocked and loaded with the first clay you’ll shoot with it.

In the James Bond movie “Skyfall,” Agent 007 (Daniel Craig) uses a .500 Nitro Express Double Rifle to kill dangerous game of the two-legged variety from the little-known London gunmaker, Anderson Wheeler.

Silicon Valley has popularized the term “disruptive innovation” to capture the impact of an unexpected advance in value, ingenuity and adoption on a prevailing product segment.

Superb handcrafted shotguns and rifles from James Purdey & Sons have been venerated by shooting aficionados and royalty alike ever since the company opened its doors at 4 Princes Street, near Leicester Square, London, in 1814.

The Invictus is a shotgun, but where did that name come from? Seems like an unusual name for a shotgun. One clue to find out the meaning of Invictus would be to go to the maker — Caesar Guerini. They’re based in Brescia, Italy so that gives us a clue. Digging a little deeper, Invictus has its roots in Latin. You remember Veni, vidi, vici don’t you? Caesar’s “I came, I saw, I conquered!” The translation from Latin to English for Invictus is “unconquerable.”

Following our initial story about the Professional Sporting Clays Association’s anticipated televised tour on NBC Sports, we requested a list of shotguns used by the 60 Pros we’ll see in action beginning April.