Whoever makes the decisions for Winchesters product line up is an idiot. Browning made their X-Bolt a top priority introducing more than a dozen new models every year ranging from lightweight mountain rifles to heavy target guns and from traditional wood stocked hunting rifles to carbon fiber and short barreled rifles purpose built for hunting suppressed.
Meanwhile Winchester offers the exact same handful of “SHOT Show Specials” which are just the same rifle with different wood. The fact that they never reintroduced a version of the FN SPR under the Winchester banner considering it was built on a Model 70 action is just absurd considering how popular long range shooting has become. And it wouldn’t be hard, both McMillan and MDT make stocks/chassis for them so buy those, put a heavy barrel with muzzle threads on it and BAM you’ve saved some guys a few thousand dollars in gunsmithing costs.
If Browning can sell a $4,500 X-Bolt with a McMillan stock and Carbon Fiber barrel then Winchester can get off their ass and offer some better options. Considering their only real competition in the CRF with 3 position safety market is Kimber or Defiance which is $3,000 for just the action they are positioned to do quite well. Hell, if Winchester offered long range target rifles I probably would have just went that route instead of spending way more money building my own.
