While I was looking for a 22 cal target pistol I came across the SW22 Victory Target model and I bought one. The purpose of this post is to provide some information about the pistol from the shopping and new owner perspective; I found that information about this configuration of the SW22 on forums and YouTube was fairly sparse, so here are my thoughts and experience so far, and hopefully they can help someone considering a similar choice.
First of all, to be clear, this is not a Performance Center model. It is a Standard model with a black bolt, plain sights (no FO) that have a slightly tighter sight picture, a thumb rest on the side you choose (L or R, you get both sets of grips), and possibly a different “match” trigger, although I’ve just seen this mentioned a couple of places. In my experience it seems to be a good trigger, but I don’t have a comparison to tell for sure that it differs from the one on Standard model.
For me, I already have FO sights on my carry pistol and they serve a purpose there, but I find them distracting at the range, so I would have swapped them out anyway from the Standard model. I think these sights are terrific and, overall, the extra $20 for the Target model seemed like a good value. The Target model also comes with the blue plastic S&W case, whereas the Standard model comes in a cardboard box. The case is OK and I would not use it for back-country or air travel, but it does get you to the range and back just fine.
I have medium sized hands and the grips with the thumb rest fit me really well. My carry gun has replaceable side panels and backstrap for the grip. The Victory grip with the thumb rest is very comfortable in comparison. However, with the thumb rest on the Left side the reach to the mag release is awkward, and I don’t think an after-market enlarged mag release button would fit with these grips. I can also see where these grips may not be workable for someone using the gun in competition where mag swapping speed is an issue. You can fix that by putting the standard left side grip on that comes with it, or get a set from the many after-market options. I am amazed at how affordable this gun is to upgrade.
When you go through the configuration tool on the S&W web site it shows that the Target model is not available with the threaded barrel, so if you want threaded you’ll have to go with a different model or Performance Center. There are many cool options for after-market barrels on this gun, or you can get a standard S&W threaded barrel if you look around. I’m going to leave mine as-is for now because the barrel is not the limiting factor on my accuracy, I am.
This gun is heavy. I sold a Glock 44 to buy this, and the weight difference is tremendous. I also shoot a Ruger MkIV Target that belongs to my son, and this is noticeably heavier. That said, I like it because the felt recoil is very manageable. This is a very comfortable gun to hold and shoot.
The magazines were very tight and the sides of the magazine were concave on the trailing side under the push button causing a lot of drag, but that is not an issue specific to the Target model. It just took a little work to loosen them up.
I’ll have to let you know later on how well it does actually shooting. After my first trip to the range mine is going back to S&W for the usual reasons. I expect it will run like a top when I get it back and do a little tweaking.
Thanks for reading, I hope someone can find this useful.
TrainorSW
First of all, to be clear, this is not a Performance Center model. It is a Standard model with a black bolt, plain sights (no FO) that have a slightly tighter sight picture, a thumb rest on the side you choose (L or R, you get both sets of grips), and possibly a different “match” trigger, although I’ve just seen this mentioned a couple of places. In my experience it seems to be a good trigger, but I don’t have a comparison to tell for sure that it differs from the one on Standard model.
For me, I already have FO sights on my carry pistol and they serve a purpose there, but I find them distracting at the range, so I would have swapped them out anyway from the Standard model. I think these sights are terrific and, overall, the extra $20 for the Target model seemed like a good value. The Target model also comes with the blue plastic S&W case, whereas the Standard model comes in a cardboard box. The case is OK and I would not use it for back-country or air travel, but it does get you to the range and back just fine.
I have medium sized hands and the grips with the thumb rest fit me really well. My carry gun has replaceable side panels and backstrap for the grip. The Victory grip with the thumb rest is very comfortable in comparison. However, with the thumb rest on the Left side the reach to the mag release is awkward, and I don’t think an after-market enlarged mag release button would fit with these grips. I can also see where these grips may not be workable for someone using the gun in competition where mag swapping speed is an issue. You can fix that by putting the standard left side grip on that comes with it, or get a set from the many after-market options. I am amazed at how affordable this gun is to upgrade.
When you go through the configuration tool on the S&W web site it shows that the Target model is not available with the threaded barrel, so if you want threaded you’ll have to go with a different model or Performance Center. There are many cool options for after-market barrels on this gun, or you can get a standard S&W threaded barrel if you look around. I’m going to leave mine as-is for now because the barrel is not the limiting factor on my accuracy, I am.
This gun is heavy. I sold a Glock 44 to buy this, and the weight difference is tremendous. I also shoot a Ruger MkIV Target that belongs to my son, and this is noticeably heavier. That said, I like it because the felt recoil is very manageable. This is a very comfortable gun to hold and shoot.
The magazines were very tight and the sides of the magazine were concave on the trailing side under the push button causing a lot of drag, but that is not an issue specific to the Target model. It just took a little work to loosen them up.
I’ll have to let you know later on how well it does actually shooting. After my first trip to the range mine is going back to S&W for the usual reasons. I expect it will run like a top when I get it back and do a little tweaking.
Thanks for reading, I hope someone can find this useful.
TrainorSW
