CQWW CQ Worldwide DX Contest - CW
Call: OZ1AA (@ OZ7HVI) Country: Denmark
Mode: CW Category: SOAB LP <- 21 years
BAND QSO QSO-PTS PTS/Q ZONES DX
160 221 225 1.0 6 38
80 257 321 1.2 9 47
40 195 430 2.2 17 59
20 377 800 2.1 25 65
15 323 731 2.3 25 77
10 373 882 2.4 26 88
---------------------------------------------
Totals 1746 3389 1.9 108 374 = 1.633.498
Operation time: 37,5 hours.
Equipment description:
Yeasu FT-1000MP, 100 W
10,15,20: Fritzel FB-33 tribander @ 23 m.
40: 2 elm. yagi @ 22 m. (SWR 3:1!! - that's why the low number)
80/160: Sloopers @ 21 m.
Club Affiliation: WWYC (World Wide Young Contesters)
Comments:
What a contest!! My best ever as SOAB, and just my second in CQWW DX CW.
Last year I made 585 QSO's, so no problem to beat that one, but another of
my goals were to get my error rate down because last year it was far too
high. I have worked a lot with my CW since, and during the contest I
really felt it had helped. One day before the contest I looked at the
records for OZ, and I saw that the SOAB LP category was only about 1 mio,
and then I
decided that now it was going to be mine :-)
Friday in the School I became very nervous because I thought that we were
going to write an assignment for Monday, but luckily I got it changed to
Friday this week - lucky me! In the afternoon I went to the club and made
sure that everything was working OK, and then I went home again and tried to
sleep. I say tried because it was totally impossible to me since I was so
exited for the great weekend to come. Anyway, I was horizontal for about 2,5
hours. Then up one hour before the start of the contest, and on the bike
again - you have to be 18 to get a driver licence, and I am 16 now :(
The contest.
I started the contest S&P-ing on 40. The rate wasn't good, but lots of nice
DX's. Then I went to 80 and later 160 and had some quite nice rates there -
I even had some US's calling in on 80, and my antenna is only a very simple
slooper @ 21 meters! The rest of the night I frequently changed between
40,80
and 160 mostly S&P-ing, but from time to time I could make some runs with
maybe 15 callers and then my frequency became so full of QRM that no one was
able to hear me, but I guess you just have to live with that when you are
running low power - I am looking very much forward to the day where I will
step into SOAB HP category together with the big guys!
In the morning 10 meter opened into JA, but it was not as great as in the
SSB
part, where I operated from OZ9KY (maybe it was just because my antenna
was smaller?) Then NA started to appear on 14, 21 and 28 at the same time,
but I just couldn't get a run going. I don't think it heard me that much
because I S&P'ed with quite good rates, and when I was done on one band, I
just continued on another. It was very depressing that I had to leave
several pile ups with out being able to brake them, but just too many
stations calling... I thought that on Sunday the pile up's would not be that
deep, and that did also became truth for many of the stations. In the
evening
I tried to call CQ on 20, and suddenly I got a very nice run going; I think
the rate meter was up to 180 for a few minutes, but then, as soon is it
started, it was over again, and I just sat down there and thought "this is
how it is to run 1,5 KW and big antennas".
After the first 22 hours I had 1100 QSO's, but the at that time the rate
went down, and so did I!! I had operated 22 hours and had only moved from
the chair a few time to go to the kitchen or the WC, but now I certainly
felt
tired. I started to type very slowly, and the rate went longer and longer
down - my brain stopped to think logic (but it thought lots of strange
thoughts :) I remember I started to wonder what a contest was!! I
decided to get some sleep, and that was probably very wise. I went home and
in bed, and at 0000Z I was sleeping. I sat the alarm to 0300Z, but when
I woke up, the clock radio said 0800Z!!! I didn't believed my eyes, but when
I looked out the window and saw the sun rising, I knew that I had made the
biggest mistake in my contest carrier - in other words I had slept for 8
hours!! Big lesson learned here: don't sleep in your own bed, keep the
light turned on and so on... I considered to skip the whole thing, but lucky
my logic sense had returned to my brain, and I could see that I would still
be able to get the OZ SOAB LP record. Now I am just so glad that I returned
since I really enjoyed the last hours when I came back in the club and
started to operate again. The rates during the second day were not as high
as the previous, but I new that I had to work many mults since I had "saved"
some of them from Sunday, and also because of my huge sleep disaster!
Some of the very great moments of the contest was right before the end,
2354Z, where I found VU2PAI for a double mult followed by VE2IM for zone two
at 2358Z both on 40 meters.
And then suddenly the show was over. I looked at my score and thought that
it was not too bad, 10 minutes after I thought it was OK, and today I am
actually very satisfied with it!
If somebody is interested, I have a Log Search page at my homepage for all
the QSO's in this contest: www.qsl.net/oz1aa/search.html
Again in this contest I was so happy to work some other young contesters
including 4N7RGH, YU7AL, SM3WMV (@SK3LH), LU9AY (@LT1F) + other M/S and M/M
station where I know there were young operators. I can also say that some of
us are working on a group for young contesters all over the world, and I
will be back later with news about this project.
If some of you are still there, I hope you enjoyed this text just a little
bit. I will also say thank you so much for all the QSO's, and I am sure that
we will meet again in another one.
Vy 73 de Thomas, OZ1AA
--
Thomas Andersen - OZ1AA (ex. OZ5DK)
Copenhagen, Denmark
www.qsl.net/oz1aa
oz1aa@qsl.net
--
..._._
dit dit
(CW rules)
--
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