Really Right Stuff is known for its high-end tripods, which are the best that money can buy. Their most recent product, the Benchmark series of tripods, keeps that same quality while hitting a price point that more shooters can afford. I had the chance to run one of these tripods in an NRL Hunter match to see how it stacks up.Tripods @ TFB:TFB Review: Colorado Tripod – Series 2 Centennial Carbon Fiber TripodTFB Review: Athlon Optics MIDAS CF40 TripodTFB Review: Innorel RT90C Carbon Fiber Tripod with Really Right Stuff BH-55 Ball HeadDisclosures: I have a very close relationship with RRS. They provided the tripod and slot to shoot the NRL Hunter match.BackgroundRRS has invested heavily in manufacturing capabilities and has brought its carbon fiber tube manufacturing in-house. The Benchmark tripods are the first product to use these new tubes. They are made through a process called “pultrusion.” Wikipedia informs me that “Pultrusion is a continuous process for manufacture of fibre-reinforced plastics with constant cross-section. The term is a portmanteau word, combining 'pull' and 'extrusion.’ As opposed to extrusion, which pushes the material, pultrusion pulls the material.” Ok, I will take your word for it.The benefit to the end user is that RRS can bring down the price point of the Benchmark series by making their own tubes. There is no impact on the quality; it is just more economical to manufacture their own parts. About the only visible difference is the weave pattern. Some people may like the older pattern more, but I do not care at all. This tripod could be spray-painted tan for all I care, as the aesthetics are not really a concern. What I care about is how it works. This specific review model is a pre-production version of the Benchmark Inverted with Anvil 30. It has a three-segment leg design with a folded length of 28 inches. On The RangeLast year, I borrowed another RRS tripod for an NRL Hunter match. That was a Versa 22i, which is about as “gamer” of a shooting tripod as there is. It has only two leg sections, speeding up the setup process for shooting stages on the clock. The trade-off is a much larger tripod (38 inches collapsed) when the legs are stowed. This is no big deal in a competition context, but a smaller tripod would be easier to live with while in the backcountry.The Benchmark Inverted has three leg segments, so setup and takedown take a little more time than the single adjustment point of the Versa 22i. But the Benchmark also collapses down to a much smaller item in the retracted position. The Versa 22i would be a little harder to take into a hunting situation due to the length in the stowed position.With this being a pre-production model, a few things differ from the production models. One is the thread pitch on the leg adjustments. Production models will require only about a quarter turn to loosen or lock the legs in place, as is true with other RRS tripods. This unit needed closer to a full turn. It still worked fine. Thankfully, commercial production models will correct this.NRL matches require the shooter to be within reach of a specific marker, and the mountainous terrain and juniper trees limited target visibility. Many of the stages involved shooting positions where kneeling or standing from a tripod were the only good ways to get stable. Several of those stages had the shooter move between positions where a tripod was needed, so we did a decent amount of running between positions with the tripod clamped to the gun.Throughout all of that, and with plenty of dust and dirt building up in the working parts, the Benchmark just kept working. The Anvil system was consistently easy to loosen to find targets or switch between them, and tightening just took a slight movement on the lever to lock the gun down. I also used the Benchmark for practising with my Winchester 70 in .375 H&H. Shooting that gun prone or seated at a bench is not fun. It's not painful like a .458 Win Mag, but the punishment builds up while shooting groups. I put a Gamechanger bag on top of the anvil and used that to rest the rifle for supported offhand shots. This is not as stable as using the anvil clamped on a rail but it works just fine for this application. That is probably not the use case the Benchmark was made for, but it was no problem even with the stout recoil of that rifle. Another gun that has spent time on the Benchmark is the Geissele GFR. This rifle is an absolute monster in 6mm ARC. A full review is coming for that gun, but suffice it to say it is truly exceptional. The lock-up on the handguard is nice and snug, and the gun balances well. The GFR is a gun where everything just goes right, and the Benchmark is much the same. Behind The LineThe RRS Benchmark does not just shine with a rifle attached or rested on it. I have also used it a lot with the optics while watching other people shoot. During the NRL match I did a lot of spotting for my teammate with Vectronix binoculars. And when we had some gun issues and needed to check zeroes, it was also a great support for a spotting scope.The Benchmark also went with me to a SPARC precision gas gun match, and I spent the better part of the day spotting hits and misses for my squad. That is not passively watching a single target; it is constantly moving from target to target. Once again, the anvil system works so dang well that it is frustrating to try and use anything else once you are used to it. The Benchmark was a joy to use as a spotter. ConclusionAt the end of a very rough two days of NRL competition, the RRS Benchmark was one of the few things that performed as advertised. But how good it was didn't really sink in until it was gone. I set up my old aluminum tripod with a Chinese ball head and tried to zero a rifle. It went very badly. It was hard to adjust the tensioner, and even when it seemed tight, it would slowly drift off under the weight of the gun. The entire time, I was wishing that I still had that Benchmark. It always just worked without conscious thought, which freed up my attention for jobs like watching the wind and identifying targets.The elephant in the room is price. You can get two or three lesser tripods for the same money. But, to quote Ferris Bueller (speaking about a Ferrari), “If you have the means, I highly recommend it.” Most guys are not taking two or three lesser tripods into the woods; they are taking one. And if you want that one to be the best option on the market, the RRS Benchmark is the one to beat.