So when you lung shoot a deer and it runs off, do you assume you hit it solidly, and just watch it run? I don't have the confidence to do this - usually I'm shooting at running deer (in front of dogs) and almost always through brush. Too many things can go wrong for me to be confident on my first shot. Only once have I held off and that was on a buck that I could see was leaking like a garden hose at 50+ yards. I watched him go another 100 yards and collapse.

I am a shoulder shooter and it's not that I'm a poor hunter - it's just that I tend to shoot at deer until they are down (maybe that's weird, but that's how I was taught). If I'm going to do that, the way to waste least meat is to put it down on the first shot.

Most of my deer hunting is done with a .444. Normally I use the 265 grain loads, but for quite a few years they were unavailable (factory), so I used .240 grains... The 265 grains are not that bad, but the 240 grains make a mess of the shoulder - but less of a mess that if I shoot through the lungs and then a couple shots in the rump as it runs away.