This weekend, Ben Gossett had a dominant efficiency on the 2024 PRS Professional Collection Finale close to Bliss, Idaho. Day 1 had rain, sleet and even a bit hail – and Day 2 had winds as much as 20 mph! Nature threw every little thing it had the highest shooters from world wide, however regardless of difficult situations and a difficult course of fireplace Ben Gossett solely missed 12 photographs of the 212 attainable over two days!
Ben got here into the finale weekend sitting in fifteenth place total by way of PRS season level standings. On the finale, the highest 150 ranked shooters within the Open Division are squadded based mostly on their rating. The highest 12 shooters have been in Squad #1, and Ben was in Squad #2.
These squads are each filled with actually world-class shooters which are able to profitable any match on any given weekend (and Squad #3 for that matter). However, over the previous 12 seasons of the PRS, the entire Golden Bullet winners (i.e., total season champs) got here from Squad #1. That’s till Ben Gossett in 2024!!!
Ben received the PRS Professional Collection Finale match by 5 factors over the following shooter. That was greater than sufficient to make up for his deficit that he got here into the finale behind the squad 1 shooters. So not solely did Ben win the finale, he earned sufficient factors to return from behind and change into the 2024 Professional Collection Season Champ!
Under is a breakdown of how the 2024 PRS Professional Collection season factors for the Open Division shook out after the finale:
There have been years the place the PRS Champion was decided by a single shot, however you can see within the chart above that Ben received by nearly 5 factors over final 12 months’s season champ, Kahl Harmon. Kahl is Ben’s teammate within the US Military Marksmanship Unit (USAMU). Meaning a member of the USAMU has taken house the golden bullet back-to-back in 2023 and 2024 – and so they additionally went #1 and #2 this season. Whereas the AMU workforce has been aggressive within the PRS for the reason that early days, these are each firsts.
PRS season factors are based mostly in your greatest 3 matches based mostly on a 100-point scale for every. So in the event you received 3 two-day Professional Collection matches, you then would enter the finale with 300 factors. In case you received 2 matches and had 95% of the winner’s rating in your third match, you’d enter the finale with 100 + 100 + 95 = 295 season factors. There are a number of extra particulars, however that’s the gist of it. 😉Lastly the highest 150 ranked shooters within the open division are invited to the Professional Collection Finale match on the finish of the season the place they’ll duke it out head-to-head on the identical course of fireplace and situations. The finale match counts for 40% of your season factors, which is as much as 200 factors.
I all the time suppose it’s fascinating to take a look at how folks have been ranked going into the finale in comparison with the place they landed for the season. This 12 months, Nathan Toungate, the shooter who earned tenth total for the season, shared a few of his evaluation with me associated to motion in standings pre/post-finale. The breakdown beneath exhibits the season factors earlier than the finale, what they earned on the finale, and their whole season factors. It contains the entire high 25 shooters based mostly on the ultimate season standings.
You possibly can see there was a number of shuffling occurring between the place somebody stood on Saturday morning when the finale began and the place they stood 32 hours later when the finale wrapped up! There have been a complete of 20 shooters who entered the finale with a minimum of 295 factors! And you’ll see that Ben may have entered the finale with 4.792 fewer factors and nonetheless received the season. If Ben had solely had 292.429 coming into the finale, he would have nonetheless landed on high for the season! 23 shooters entered the finale with over 292.429 factors, so whereas everybody would love to begin the finale with 300 factors – they clearly all had a shot at it!
You possibly can view the 2024 PRS season standings for all 900+ Professional Collection shooters right here.
About Ben Gossett
Workers Sgt. Benjamin Gossett is a full-time gunsmith for the US Military Marksmanship Unit (USAMU). He’s not an armorer however explains his day-to-day is “primarily constructing precision bolt-action rifles and likewise engaged on worldwide competitors firearms, from Olympic air rifles, .22 LR smallbore rifles, to entice and skeet shotguns.”
Gossett enlisted within the Marine Corps out of highschool in 2010 and was assigned to the 2nd BN 4th Marines in Camp Pendleton, CA. He’s a embellished veteran, and his awards embrace the Fight Motion Ribbon, Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal, Nationwide Protection Service Medal, Afghanistan Marketing campaign Medal-Marketing campaign Star, International Battle on Terrorism Service Medal, Navy Sea Service Deployment Ribbon, and the NATO Medal.
Ben graduated from the Colorado College of Trades with a level in gunsmithing in 2016, after which he was recruited to hitch the Military to change into the gunsmith for the USAMU. He began with the AMU in January 2017 and earned a spot on the USAMU taking pictures workforce – a really excessive honor.
Ben has been competing within the PRS Professional Collection since 2015, making him one of many OGs!
“The primary match I shot I feel I completed nearly dead-last and my aggressive nature couldn’t deal with that, so I actually put every little thing into PRS-style matches from that time on,” says Gossett. “I shot my first national-level PRS match in March 2015 and completed eleventh and was completely hooked to the sequence and fell in love with the neighborhood.” – Ben Gossett
Ben has 36 high 5 finishes in two-day PRS Professional Collection matches! He received his first national-level two-day PRS match on September 13, 2019 – adopted by one other win the very subsequent weekend!
“I had a bunch of high finishes main as much as that and simply couldn’t appear to seal the cope with a first-place end till it lastly occurred in Alabama in 2019,” remembers Gossett. “It was an enormous confidence-builder in my taking pictures profession and I really feel like I lastly was in a position to shoot to my true potential.” – Ben Gossett
Ben has received a complete of 12 two-day PRS Professional Collection matches. Since his first main match win, Ben has competed in 46 national-level PRS matches, profitable 26% of these and ending within the high 5 in 61% of the matches he shot! The dude is a stud within the PRS world and a menace to win any match he enters.
Ben’s most notable victory (earlier than the golden bullet) was the 2022 Armageddon Gear (AG) Cup. The AG Cup is the precision rifle match with the best payout yearly, so it all the time attracts the perfect shooters on the earth to compete. It’s a distinctive, 3-day competitors that’s formatted a bit in a different way – largely so as to add drama in hopes of attracting extra TV viewers and rising the game. An enormous group of shooters is lower after day 1, and one other group is lower after day 2. Solely a small variety of shooters are nonetheless within the competitors at first of day 3 – however the scores additionally reset to 0 on day 3, which means it’s anybody’s competitors to win. As a result of the competitors is restricted to the perfect professional shooters within the sport, the course of fireplace is designed to be far harder than typical PRS matches (i.e., tiny targets, powerful positions, and really quick stage instances).
In 2022, Ben Gossett was one of many few shooters to qualify for Day 3 on the AG Cup. Even with the stress of scores resetting and the $30,000 payout driving on that in the future’s efficiency – Ben Gossett cleaned each single stage on Day 3! He didn’t miss a single goal all day!!! It was arguably the best precision rifle taking pictures efficiency in a match up to now. It earned Ben the nickname “Mr. Clear”!
In January 2023, PRS Champion and two-time IPRF World Champion Austin Buschman cleaned the Leupold Metal Basic PRS match, which was the primary time {that a} shooter had an ideal rating and didn’t miss a single shot in a two-day PRS Professional Collection match. Not lengthy after that, I used to be speaking to Buschman, and he talked about that a number of folks had known as him “Mr. Clear.” However each time, Austin corrected them by clarifying that what he did on the Leupold match was under no circumstances near what Ben did on Day 3 of the 2022 AG Cup match. The targets and levels that Ben shot on the 2022 AG Cup match have been extraordinarily difficult, and even the world champ was nonetheless blown away by the truth that Ben acquired by means of the complete day with out dropping a single goal. It was a special occasion when years of follow and expertise all got here collectively for probably the greatest shooters on the most important stage.
In case you didn’t watch Capturing USA’s televised episode of the 2022 AG Cup, I’d extremely advocate you watch it beneath:
Anybody who has met Ben would agree that he’s actually one of the crucial humble folks you’ll meet. He’s one of many guys within the sport that everybody roots for. When these of us who shot the PRS finale seemed on the dwell scoring to see that Ben was main, I guess the overwhelming majority thought, “Good for Ben! That’s superior!” I do know that I did! It put a smile on a number of faces on the PRS banquet to see Ben get introduced with the golden bullet.
You may get a glimpse into who Ben is by watching his acceptance speech on the 2024 PRS Finale banquet (sorry for my shaky recording!):
Ben and his spouse dwell in Georgia with their very energetic sons.
Ben Gossett’s Rifle, Ammo & Tools
Listed below are all the main points in regards to the rifle that Ben competed with to change into the 2024 PRS Season Champion:
Ben handloads his match ammo, and right here is all of his load knowledge and specs:
Vital: It is best to all the time reference complete reloading manuals, begin with the minimal really useful masses, and work your method up. Simply because this load is secure in Ben’s rifle doesn’t imply it is going to be in yours. There are a ton of things that modify from them to you, together with actual chamber/barrel dimensions, brass specs, reloading scales, powder heaps, and many others., so it’s essential to comply with security precautions. Failure to comply with secure loading practices may lead to gun harm or extreme private damage (together with loss of life) to the consumer or bystanders. The writer has not independently verified the accuracy of the information and can’t be chargeable for errors in revealed load knowledge. PrecisionRifleBlog.com and Ben Gossett assume no accountability for using this knowledge. The data is for use on the sole discretion of the consumer, and the consumer assumes all dangers.
Under are a few of his different taking pictures equipment that Ben makes use of at matches:
To study extra from Ben, I’d extremely advocate watching this video beneath from MPA’s Winner’s Circle with Phil Cashin. Phil interviewed Ben after he received the 2024 Hodgdon Punisher Positional PRS Match.
Lastly, right here is one other video interview with Ben from Consider The Goal with legendary F-class shooter Eric Cortina:
Congrats to Ben and all the opposite shooters who completed on the high of the 2024 leaderboard! The extent of competitors within the PRS continues to rise yearly, so to finish up on the high is sort of an accomplishment! You guys deserve a number of weeks off earlier than we hit it once more! 😉
PRS Golden Bullet Winners
Under is the total record of PRS Season Champions total for the Open Division, and you’ll see there have now been 3 golden bullets received by the USAMU workforce:
2024: Ben Gossett (US Military Marksmanship Unit)
2023: Kahl Harmon (US Military Marksmanship Unit)
2022: Austin Buschman
2021: Austin Orgain
2020: Austin Orgain
2019: Clay Blackketter
2018: Matthew Brousseau
2017: Matthew Brousseau
2016: Tyler Payne (US Military Marksmanship Unit)
2015: Dave Preston
2014: Bryan Morgan
2013: Dustin Morris
2012: Wade Stuteville
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