CHALLENGE ACCEPTED!

Six top shooters face 10 tests of their talent – as Ian Harford reports from America’s shooting reality tv show… on the American Airgunner Challenge

The all-new American Airgunner Challenge is fast, furious and ferocious! So, why? ‘We wanted to do something different and fun that no one has ever seen done with airguns. This is a 10-challenge competition with six well-known personalities from the airgun world doing something that every outdoor sportsman loves – shooting guns and competing,’ says Rossi Morreale, American Airgunner founder and host.

HOW IT ALL STARTED

“Hey babe, I’ve had a call from Claire West! She said, ‘as you’re in the US on holiday in the next couple of weeks, do you think you could nip over to Arkansas and shoot in the American Airgunner Challenge? It’s an airgun competition with each of the brands sending a representative shooter. Sadly, Richard Leonard is unable to make it on behalf of Air Arms, so what do you think?” said my wife on the end of the telephone!

As it was Claire, and she asked so nicely, plus I’m a huge Air Arms fan, then why not?

I’d be in the US having completed a motorbike tour with an old friend, checking off his bucket list; it sounded like fun, it’s a ‘plane hop’ away, and it’s just a little airgun adventure with some great guys. Let’s go for it!

PLANES, TRAINS, AUTOMOBILES

A flight delay, a cancellation and a stopover later, I arrived in Fort Smith, Arkansas – ‘where the new South meets the old West’. Little did I know that I would be among some of America’s biggest names in shooting, and competing in one of the airgun industry’s biggest competitions, on one of the major stages in the world – American TV.