My wife and I shot competitive for over 20 years. She has a Tri-Star o/u she won. Shoots as good as my Browning but not nearly as smooth which one would expect. If we had to start again then as mentioned by several Beretta 300 would hands down be my choice under 1000. We shot with and against shooters using them many, many times. Dead reliable and patterned well. Shot lighter loads reliably which is critical when a woman is using the gun.
Good luck and just have fun.

I really hate all these posts about Women Shooters Can't ....

In 2021 our Skeet Squad was 1 short so were were assigned a "Floater". That floater was a 9 year old girl all of aobut 4'6 inches tall and weighing in at roughly 85-90 lbs. She shot all 4 guns, which is 12, 20, 28, and 410 and scored rather well for a shooter with only 1 year of shooting Skeet. She did well enough in the 12 gauge to hit 84 out of 100 targets. The point is that smaller shooters who are well trained have no issues with shooting Target shells of any caliber.

If your wife is having issues with 1 ounce 12 gauge at 1200 fps then there is a primary cause and a secondary cause. The primary cause is shooting too many years with a "loose" mount. Smaller shooters MUST keep the gun FIRMLY on the shoulder because if you give the gun a running start it will damage the shoulder. A firm mount couples the mass of the gun to the mass of the body and that can cut the perceived recoil in half or more.

The secondary cause is damage to the shoulder. In this case I suggest that you get your wife a Beretta A400 Ecel Sporting with the Kickoff energy absorbing stock. When you add a softer shooting gas operated Semi to that Excellent Kickoff stock the end result is a very very soft shooting gun. In fact the first time she shoots it she may step forward during the recoil that she braced for that didn't happen. If it sets her to giggling That's just another indicator how soft shooting this model can be.

Below is a link to this model and that black area behind the grip is where the stock collapses. By doing this the stock to face relation ship is maintained during recoil and the gun shortens in that area behind the grip. BTW Joel Etchen Guns is a shop that specializes in Sporting Shotguns and I have always received excellent service from them.

https://www.joeletchenguns.com...xcel-/view/7759-xcel.

Christmas came a few days early. Cabelas really pissed my wife off by talking down to her then trying to talk her into other guns when she went in looking for a select few. She went into a different local store quite pissed off but they were very nice and Santa upgraded more than he should have.

Will this bust some clays?

That's a handsome shotgun

Beautiful wood. Enjoy the new shotgun.