For the guys that distrust using anything under 30 cal, you have to realize that isnt 20 years ago when all people had to choose from were the standard soft points, todays premium and hand loaded ammunitions bare little resemblence to what you and your dad were using back in the day. I really did my home work before deciding to carry my 7mm08 as my main gun. After hours of home work and several trips to the range it became quite apparent that the barnes XLC bullet was just the ticket for elk. I could safly up the velocity a couple of hundred FPS over a standard bullet and they shot great. I used them to shot a whitetail buck with and the results where spectacular, the bullet broke the near side shoulder traveled the complete length of the body and exited the offside ham. After that performance I didnt have any reservations at shooting an elk upto and including 300 yards.