With inventions that range from handguns to shotguns to rifles to cannons for fighter aircraft, it’s little wonder why our company founder, John M. Browning, is considered to be the greatest firearms inventor that has ever lived. A considerable number of Browning’s inventions were pistols, most famously the Model 1911 chambered in 45 ACP that was the stalwart sidearm of US Military forces for most of the 20^th century.

Another John M. Browning sidearm was the Woodsman 22 LR model that was produced by Colt^® for more than 60 years. 35 years after the death of John M. Browning, his grandson Bruce made improvements to the Woodsman design and gave rise to rimfire pistols such as the Browning Nomad and Challenger. Although different from those early designs that sprung from the genius of our founder, the Buck Mark — first introduced in 1985 —can trace its heritage all the way back to the creative genius of The Man himself.

Of course, to call the Woodsman “different” from the modern Buck Mark is an understatement. Especially when compared to the striking appearance of the new Browning Buck Mark Plus Vision models. In the January 2021 issue of Shooting Sports USA, Field Editor Chris Christian ran the Buck Mark Plus Vision through its paces to test its potential as a competition firearm.

“…The newest Buck Mark model, the limited edition Plus Vision, is not only the most stylish in the line — but also offers enhanced competition features.”

Before touching upon what makes the Plus Vision stand out from the rest, Christian delves into the features found across the Buck Mark line, “Like the rest of the Buck Mark series, the Plus Vision is a blowback-operated, 22 LR pistol built on a CNC machined 7075-T6 aluminum alloy receiver. It features a left-side manual thumb safety and slide release, with a magazine safety that prevents the gun from firing if a magazine is not inserted. The Buck Mark models use 10-round, single-stack magazines.”

“On my range, I zeroed the gun from a sandbag rest at 25 yards...”

After cleaning the barrel and gathering together ammunition that “…was complicated by the current ammunition crunch.” Christian zeroed the Plus Vision from a rest and set to work. He appreciated the ease of loading magazines to their 10-round capacity and noted the comfort of the UFX grips. “Although the grips had initially looked a bit skimpy, I found that once I got both hands wrapped around them, they provided a very solid and positive grip. I have average-sized hands, and they placed the pad of my trigger finger right on the center of the trigger.” Christian also found the sights on the Plus Vision to be more than capable. “The sights were impressive. The big front fiber-optic dot and the wide white-outline rear resulted in a quick and positive sight picture.”

Moving on to accuracy testing, the author installed an electronic sight to the included Picatinny rail for added precision. “I wanted more precision than the iron sights offered, so I installed a SIG Romeo3 Max with a 3-MOA dot. The accompanying accuracy chart shows the gun has more than enough accuracy with quality ammunition.”