Tonight Ruger officially announced the pistol I used to shoot
Dave Spaulding's Handgun Combatives "Essential Pistol" class out at FTW Ranch the other weekend: The
Compact American 9mm.
Several of us ran the pistols through the class, as well as in informal range sessions and competitions before and after and, despite a rough round count between 400-700 rounds per gun (thank you, Hornady!) I only recollect two malfunctions.
You'll note the dual captive recoil spring. The gun ships with small, medium, and large backstraps, as well as both flush and pinkie-rest floorplates for the 12-rd mag and a grip adapter for the 17-rd mag. States behind enemy lines get two 10-rounders.
The guns are available both with ambi thumb safeties and in a "Pro" variant with only the trigger safety. The thumb safety locks the slide when on, like on a 1911. Kinda wish it didn't.
As you can see, the American Compact splits the difference, size-wise, between the G19 and G26, much like the Smith & Wesson M&P9C does.
The one I used at FTW Ranch was a non-thumb-safety gun, so I'm looking forward to getting more trigger time in on this thumb safety model.
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