Dimension Africa

John Zent and tracker Willy Matyobeni struck paydirt quickly during the new hunt, finding an old, heavy-horned bushbuck ram, a fabulous trophy. 

Though T/C Communications Manager Craig Cushman has been spreading word about the Dimension’s ingenious modularity and value, he knew that actual performance on game would be the ultimate test.

A huge variety of plans game populates the Eastern Cape’s rugged hills, but in that wide-open, brushy country, the climbing and glassing can seem more like the American west than wild Africa. NRA’s John Zent (right) and PH Ryan Pienaar of Crusader Safaris pushed on to dusk in search of game.

In the 24 hours following his climb in the alpine snow, John Zent traveled a few hundred miles north to the Natal province where Crusader Safaris has another camp in semi-tropical forest.

Are you sure this is Africa? Indeed, on the heels of a freakish snowfall in the province’s Stormberg Mountains, John Zent found himself in the perfect position for a chance at one of Africa’s most unusual, localized trophies, a vaal rhebuck. One steep, uphill shot from the Dimension did the job.

Striking first blood was Todd Pearson from Carl Zeiss Optics. With a shot that dropped the bull in its tracks, Todd took a black wildebeest, the so-called “animal designed by a committee.” Pearson’s T/C rifle was chambered for 7mm Rem. Mag. and carried his company’s Conquest HD scope.

On the back of a safari truck in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province, the distinctive, arched buttstock of a Thompson/Center Dimension rifle peeks out of a hunter’s pack. This new design with all-American roots was on its way to an exclusive test in one of the world’s best hunting grounds.