Wes Crisp is a Daystate Wolf Pack shooter who has burst onto the competitive airgun shooting scene recently.
Although shooting all disciplines, Wes really loves Speed Silhouette. In 2025 he won the Gunslynger speed silhouette competition at the Pyramyd Cup. There he was shooting under the magazine-fed PCP rules and nailed all 25 targets in just 41 seconds, handily beating veteran campaigner Thayne Simmons in the finals.
Our heading photograph above shows Wes at the 2025 Pyramyd Cup. Photograph courtesy of Pyramyd AIR. The other photographs illustrating this article were either taken by Stephen Archer or supplied by Wes.
He also placed second – just behind team-mate Lauren Parsons – in the Speed Silhouette Open Class competition at Extreme Benchrest, 2025. There, Wes cleared the 25 targets in 20.39 seconds. That’s just over 1 second per target, fast even with what he admits were a couple of misses in the final round!
So at Extreme Benchrest 2025, I sat down with Wes to ask him about his meteoric rise in airgun competition together with the equipment he uses. Here’s what I found out…
Remarkably, Wes has been shooting airguns for just 4 years. He started during the COVID lockdown period.
Like many firearms shooters, he suffered from the widespread ammo shortage of that time. So he started making online searches about airguns.
Living in the Phoenix, AZ area, it didn’t take him long to discover that Airguns of Arizona was located just 15 minutes from his house. (Lucky guy!). The rest – as they say – is history…
The learning process was helped by a visit to Extreme Benchrest 2021. Wes liked what he saw about airgun competition!
“I just love shooting”, Wes told me. “And I have found that all the air gunners I’ve ever met are very supportive. They also encourage newcomers, as I was not so long ago.”
“For me airguns have been a steep learning curve in a short time. But I love to compete and I have definitely benefitted from the support that comes from being part of the Daystate Wolf Pack,” he explained.
“Speed Silhouette and WFTF Field Target are my favorite disciplines.”
Above A successful Wolf Pack Team at the Pyramyd Cup 2025. Left to right: Wes Crisp, Tony Pellegrino, Barbara Pellegrino, Lauren Parsons.
For his first experience with airguns, Wes bought a Benjamin Akela PCP, plus a hand pump. Field Target was his entry point to airgun competition. But he soon graduated to a Daystate Red Wolf in .177 caliber.
Shooting in the WFTF Field Target class, with its 12 Ft/Lbs maximum power level, Wes has upgraded the Red Wolf with a PRS stock and continues to use that gun in Field Target shoots.
As he became more and more interested, Wes invested in a couple of Feinwerkbau 10 Meter target rifles. His plan was that practice with these guns would help him to conquer the dreaded “forced standing” stages of Field Target matches.
Then came a second Red Wolf, this time in .22 caliber. This was initially used by Wes for benchrest shooting until being replaced by a new Daystate Blackwolf. This gun is in .30 caliber and equipped with a Sub-MOA barrel.
Finally a .22 caliber Delta Wolf for Speed Silhouette competition was acquired. That is the competition-winning gun that Wes has been shooting this year.
So I asked Wes Crisp about his evident love for Daystate air rifles.
He told me that he loves the programming capabilities of the electronic guns. That makes them so versatile – he says – and able to be used for many shooting disciplines. He also said he loves the new Blackwolf, a mechanical gun.
Oh, he loves the looks of them too.
Wes also praised the complete lack of recoil and the fact that his guns have all been “insanely accurate”. You can’t argue with that when you look at his outstanding success in 2025 competitions!
Then I asked Wes about his choice of pellets. He shoots JSBs. “I’ve tested the others,” he says, but come back to JSB pellets.”
As for riflescopes, Wes started with Athlon Aires models. Since then he’s moved-on to Kahles scopes but uses a Vortex Razor on his Blackwolf.
“The biggest issue for me in shooting is that I have a busy, full-time career,” Wes explained. “That means I don’t have as much time for practice as I would like.”
Well, in spite of limited practice, he has definitely become a force to be reckoned-with in the competitive airgun world – and in a very short time, too. We will definitely be seeing the name Wes Crisp up there in lights among the winners in airgun competition for a long time to come.
Oh, and I need to mention one other thing. Wes is just an all-round great guy too!
The post Airgun Speed Winner Wes Crisp Talks to Hard Air Magazine appeared first on Hard Air Magazine.
