At the shot, the buck ran about 10 yards. Then he turned and ran back toward the hunter. Marty fired a second slug for insurance, and the buck went down. As the huge animal came to rest, his antlers were tangled in some brush, and Marty could not see the entire rack. Remaining relatively calm in his stand, Marty waited 10 minutes with the gun lined up on the great buck -- just in case.

NO SHRINKAGE HERE!
He finally climbed down the 15-foot ladder and approached his trophy. As soon as he got his first good look at the massive rack, he was in awe.

"I was in shock," Marty said. "All I could do was just stand there and stare at the buck. I tried to count the points, and I kept coming up with different numbers between 19 and 21."

After some of the shock started to wear off, Marty called his nephew Nathan. He told Nathan he had just shot a 20-point buck. Nathan said, "No way! You're lying!" Later Marty called his dad and told him the same thing. You guessed it! Bill said, "No way! You're lying!"

THE MARTY SHARP BUCK
Scorable Points:	21 (9R, 12 L)	TOTAL LENGTH OF ABNORMAL POINTS: 49 1/8
Tip-To-Tip Spread:	16 0/8
Greatest Spread:	26 4/8
Inside Spread:	24 0/8
AREAS MEASURED	RIGHT	LEFT	DIFFERENCE
Main Beam	29 6/8	28 1/8	1 5/8
1st Point (G-1)	9 4/8	9 1/8	3/8
2nd Point (G-2)	13 5/8	15 1/8	1 4/8
3rd Point (G-3)	13 0/8	12 2/8	6/8
4th Point (G-4)	--	1 1/8	1 1/8
1st circ. (H-1)	6 2/8	5 7/8	3/8
2nd circ. (H-2)	5 0/8	4 7/8	1/8
3rd circ. (H-3)	5 2/8	5 2/8	--
4th circ. (H-4)	4 3/8	3 6/8	5/8
TOTALS:	86 6/8	85 4/8	6 4/8
Gross Typical Score:		196 2/8
Subtract side-to-side differences:		-6 4/8
Add abnormal points		+49 1/8
FINAL NET NON-TYPICAL SCORE:		238 7/8
Taken by: Marty Sharp, DATE: November 16, 2007, LOCATION: West-Central Illinois

Perhaps there was a bit of a credibility gap among close family members brought about by past experiences. On other hunts, whenever Marty had excitedly called his dad or nephew to tell them he had just shot a "big" buck, a considerable amount of ground shrinkage always seemed to take place. But not this time! In fact, the longer everyone looked at the unbelievable buck Marty had just downed, the bigger it seemed to grow!

Later on, the deer definitely grew in size as Marty and his two nephews Nathan and Zach dragged it out of the woods. Marty did not want to put the deer on a 4-wheeler and risk breaking any part of the rack, so he and his nephews ended up dragging the carcass a fairly long distance to the truck.

A WORLD-CLASS FRAME
Marty's buck did, in fact, have 21 measurable points. Amazingly, the typical 4x4 portion of the buck's massive frame grossed 196 2/8 inches! With nearly 50 additional inches in non-typical points, including a classic 8-inch drop tine, it's easy to see how the huge rack tallied up a net non-typical score of 238 7/8 inches!

"It's the largest typical 4x4 frame I've ever measured," said Tim Walmsley, one of Illinois' best-known B&C measurers. Tim has scored dozens of record-book trophies. He was particularly impressed by the length of the main beams -- (the right beam was just under 30 inches), as well as the extraordinary tine length (the left G-2 was 15 1/8 inches).

Marty took the great buck to Emkin Taxidermy, where the deer was mounted in time to be put on display at the Illinois Deer Classic held in Bloomington, Illinois, last February. The buck was hailed as the largest firearms non-typical at the show. As mentioned, it was also the largest non-typical whitetail taken by a firearm in Illinois during the 2007 season. By coincidence, Illinois' largest bow-killed buck, taken in 2007, scored 238 2/8 inches, only 5/8 of an inch less than Marty's great buck. That deer, taken by Kevin Radke, will be featured in an upcoming issue of North American Whitetail.

Marty summed up his exceptionally good luck by saying, "I think it was a combination of experience, patience (staying in my stand all day), hunting the stand for the first time, staying alert, and being lucky enough to see the buck before the buck saw me."

Any experienced deer hunter will tell you that no matter how hard you work at it, you always need a little luck. Nov. 16, 2007, was definitely Marty Sharp's lucky day!

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