I hesitate to go public with this information, but after 8 years of inaction,
it's past overdue ....
There has been a problem with the ARRL scoring of the IARU HF contest logs for
USA participants since (at least) 1997. I have personal knowledge it was still
a problem in 2002, and no confirmation that it has been corrected since the
2002
results. The software uses the call area in the participants callsign to
calculate what zone the participant is operating from, even if all other
information in the Cabrillo file would indicate that the participant is
operating from a different zone. For example, N2IC, who has been operating
from
Zone 7 for the past 24 years, has being scored as a Zone 8 participant by
virtue
of the "2" in the callsign, even though he gets listed in the results as a Zone
7 participant. As a software developer, it's hard for me to understand why
this
has been so difficult for the ARRL (and its outsourced IARU log-checker) to
fix.
And yes, there has been plenty of communication over the years with N1ND, N7NG,
and his predecessor K5FUV.
What difference does this make, you ask ?
Just as a refresher, the IARU rules award you 1 point for stations worked in
the
same zone, 3 points for stations worked in a different zone, but same
continent,
and 5 points for stations worked in a different continent.
Due to demographics, there are many more active stations in Zone 8 than Zone 7.
So, if N2IC, operating from Zone 7, makes 250 Zone 8 QSO's and 150 Zone 7
QSO's, he would get 700 points if scored (incorrectly) as a Zone 8 participant,
or 900 points if scored (correctly) as a Zone 7 participant - a siginficant
difference. A difference that has cost me several slots in the top-10 each
year.
So ... this is a warning to Zone 6 and Zone 7 participants - use a callsign
that
is "home" to your zone. And here's a little hint to you east coast guys - for
a
leg up on your Zone 8 competition, use a callsign other than call areas 1-4.
See you this weekend ... with a K5 call !
Steve, N2IC/5
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