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Re: [VHFcontesting] Date of the January Contest

Subject: Re: [VHFcontesting] Date of the January Contest
From: Marshall-K5QE <k5qe@k5qe.com>
Date: Sun, 27 Jan 2013 20:05:18 -0600
List-post: <vhfcontesting@contesting.com">mailto:vhfcontesting@contesting.com>
Hello Jeff and all the other VHF operators....

Do people actually stop contesting so they can watch a stupid football game????? SLAP!! OK, reality has returned..... I am FOR anything that will make our contests better. Careful scheduling is certainly something that we need to do.

This year, we had NAQP and the Jan VHF contest on the same weekend. Does the right hand of the ARRL not know what the left hand is doing?? I know several good VHF ops that decided to do NAQP rather than the Jan VHF contest. This was a big loss to our contest....if they had decided to run the VHF contest instead of NAQP, I doubt that anyone would have noticed. My point is that even a "small" distraction disproportionately hurts us and our contest.

Super Bowl Sunday now seems to be the first Sunday in February. Is that correct?? Is it now fixed so that we can plan in the future?? As I recall, the Super Bowl used to be in January, but the NFL kept moving it backwards until it now has landed in February.

Concerning Jeff's idea of moving the Jan contest to the weekend before the Super Bowl: That is certainly a workable idea. As he mentioned, it would put the contest further away from the Winter Es season.

Your mention of the Winter Es season has gotten me to think in a different direction. We had a really nice Es opening on 6M in 2012 and a fair one in 2013. It would really be wonderful if the contest were close to the peak of the Winter Es season. Lots of Es on 6M would be a GREAT contest enhancer. Suppose the Jan contest were held on the first weekend of January. Someone is going to jump up and say that there are playoff games then, too. Probably, that is true, but they would be of a lot less significance.

OK, suppose we could avoid the football games altogether?? I would suggest that we consider having the January contest start at 0000Z on FRIDAY night and continue to 1600Z on Sunday morning. This scheme would give us two nights and two mornings to take advantage of any extended propagation that might occur. That is a total time of 40 hours as opposed to the 33 hours straight that we have now. For me, the 33 hours straight is one really hard slog in the mud. Suppose we included two "breaks" or "quiet periods" of 5 hours each. Then the total time on the air would be 30 hours. The "breaks" could be scheduled late at night where there is practically no activity anyway. I believe that the single op stations sleep during these hours now. Getting some sleep would really help AND more time in the contest would be during productive hours.

The time from the start of the contest to the end of the contest would be longer, but the total time on the air would be shorter. More importantly, the non-break times would be much more in the realm of "prime time". There are several HF contests that start at 0000Z on Friday and have breaks in them, so this does not seem to be a huge departure from other contests. I do know this....getting some sleep on Friday night and Saturday night would really be welcome.

I can see only one possible "snag" with the above idea. It would probably hurt the rovers. They would be on the road for 2 days and nights as opposed to the 1 night that they have now. However, this would allow the rovers to stop and get a decent night's sleep rather than driving all night and all day so that they can locate a bridge abutment somewhere. Of course, the rovers could also take advantage of the two nights and two mornings which should give them more time with good propagation characteristics.

The argument that "we have never done it this way, so we can't change" OR the NIH argument(Not Invented Here) are not worth consideration. There may be some serious objection to a plan such as this(other than "its different"). Of course, we don't have to change the June or Sept contest at all as there are no football games scheduled in those months.

I believe that this scheme has the same chance of being adopted as the proverbial "snowball in hell", but it is something worth thinking about. It would get us away from the football games completely.....no matter which weekend in Jan was chosen for the contest. NOW, if we can just get the Jan VHF contest off the same weekend as NAQP......

73 Marshall K5QE


On 1/27/2013 3:24 PM, wa2teo@aol.com wrote:
After many years of watching the bands die off once the NFL Playoff games 
start, I am thinking I'd like to write the VUAC to see if somehow we can't get 
the contest date moved to the week before the Super Bowl when there are no NFL 
playoff games. I know this has been discussed before and there are some 
barriers. It's one week later so there is less likelihood of Es on 6, The CQ 
160 contest etc. But we also have the NAQP on the current weekend as well as 
the NFL games.

It seems to me that this problem has gotten so bad the last few years it's 
worthwhile to take another look. Every year my rate plummets as soon as the 
games come on. It doesn't help that the Patriots, Giants, Redskins, Ravens and 
Eagles have been regulars the last several years, all in major parts of my 
contesting zone. But wherever you are in the country my sense is that activity 
drops when the games start.

Thoughts?

Tnx,

Jeff K1TEO


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