RANGE DAY
The next morning would start just before 0700 HRS to board
the complementary bus to take writers, photographers and
videographers a half hour away to the range in Boulder City for
the day. As the PMCI team off loaded and split into “fire teams” to
cover the 1.2-mile-wide events on the range, we had a brief team
huddle to remind everyone to be safe and focus on our mission at
hand. Spirits were high and the fun was ready to begin!
Over the next eight hours, the team got hands on experience
with several new models of handguns, suppressors, full-auto
machine guns and even went long with sniper rifles out to 800
meters. Take it from a one very proud Deputy Editor, the PMCI
team really impressed the vendors with their depth of knowledge
and skill sets when handling firearms. Aside from shooting the
latest guns coming to market, the team even enjoyed a light-
hearted knife and axe throwing competition at the Buck Knives
booth where several walked away winning a new Buck knife.
When everyone needed to recharge their energy, most opted
for a wide array of some of the area’s best food trucks that were
inside the gated event, while some decided to tempt fate by
sneaking past the Jack Links Sasquatch to obtain all the free beef
jerky one could snack upon. As our videographer, Doc discovered
after being throttled by the furry sentry, sometimes you must fight
to eat!
Some of the highlights of this day came in the form of getting
to shoot the new Springfield 1911 TRP pistols chambered in
10mm, running an AK 47 quietly getting hits on reduced torso
sized steel thanks to OSS Suppressors and of course, watching the
range burn down at the mercy of a 7.62 calibre electric M134
machine gun by Profense, LLC. Several items of interest the
PMCI team came away with notes to watch in the future were
Mossberg’s new MC1sc compact pistol and the two new dual tone
ten shot capacity offerings from Glock with the models 43X and
48, all chambered in 9mm. Stay tuned for full in-depth reports on
those coming this spring.
PRODUCT EDUCATION
The next four days would be spent spanning four different floors
of the Sands Convention Centre in a variety of rooms spanning
from the size of a large retail store to Super Walmart. As our
“fire teams” consisting of one writer and one cameraman or
videographer flanked the rooms to not only capture the sights and
sounds of the show for our readers and social media followers,
each team met with product marketing executives and discussed
loan agreements to get firsthand experience throughout the year
OT
Making the trip were a couple of new faces to our team as well
as our regular roster. PMCI writer, “Call Sign Lunch Box” fresh from
an overseas assignment was in attendance as usual alongside
long-time photographer and “King of Kydex”, John Phillips and
outdoor writer, Jared Peltz. SHOT SHOW rookies this year were new
team members, Doc Burger and Jerry Moody, both excited and
eager to capture the sights and sounds of the event via video and
photos. Once the show doors officially opened on Tuesday, we
caught up with UK PMCI contributor (and our “tactical padawan”),
Kelly Hardwick. This year would start off with an “ace in the
hole” having PMCI writer, Clint Steele monitoring comms from
Florida providing information, schedules, locations and updating
social media. While Clint couldn’t make the trip this year, he still
managed to be a valuable member of the Vegas team. Look for
his boots, along with those of our Editor Bill, to be on Vegas soil
beside us in 2020!
pmcimagazine.com