WB1GQR Single Op, High Power, Vermont
Score: 250,224
QSOs: 1604
Sections: 78
BAND QSOs TIME
160 66 1:22 >
80 400 6:18 > Dipole @ 50 ft
40 579 8:00 >
20 534 2:40 > A4 @ 50 ft
15 25 0:40 >
----------------
1604 24:00
Oh boy, were conditions weird, and really not very good in
propagationally-challenged New England.
(Pop Quiz: When was the last time a SOHP New England station made
it to Top Ten?) Ans: a loooooong time ago....
Twenty meters started out normal enough, but I struggled very
early on. Conditions reminded me of Field Day - lots of people
calling, no one copying anything!
I made the quick jump to 80 meter at 2300. 80m is my point man
up here. That's where the big hours occur, picking up scores of
1,2,3 stations on short skip. Not this year. I put up several
mediocre hours - and that's being generous. The rates were
dropping abruptly and I was quickly running out of options.
Forget 40m - with a dipole from the East Coast, nighttime is
useless. I made my desperation move to 160m at 0300 - no
great rates, but it helped stop the bleeding for a while.
160m doesn't have enough SS activity to stay there long, so it
was back to 80. Things were pretty grim. Apparantly, stations
in the midwest had some great hours on 80 which didn't bring much
solace.
I made a real desperate move to 40m at 0520. Fortunately, this
worked out real well, much to my surprise. At this hour, 40m
sounded a lot like 20m during the day.
After a few hours of down time, I spent 3 1/2 hours on 40 meters
and had the best rates I've seen on 40 meters in 20 years. The
jubilation was short lived. 20m was anemic all day and 15 was
hopeless. The good news was I finished the sweep at 15:45,
allowing me to concentrate totally on putting contacts in the
log.
In comparing this years log with last year's, I found that the
total number of close-in stations (1,2,3 land) was down by 200.
This is also the number of contacts I was down this year compared
to last year.
Pet peeve: Too many people calling CQ and not working very much.
All three active bands (80,40,20) were hopelessly jammed. Finding
a spot to call CQ was about as easy as finding parking in Midtown
Manhattan. Maybe the scoring should be changed to discourage
CQing and to encourage more S&P. (And I hate operating the
Sprints!).
Oh well, maybe the 160 meter test will have better conditions!
73, Mitch WB1GQR Vermont Contest Radio
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