This is an informative article written by John, K3TN on ARRL Sweepstakes
Contesting. A good read for all experience levels and some excellent tips to
help get you started!!
73, Ralph K1ZZI
History
The ARRL Sweepstakes has its roots in "The January Contest" announced in
December 1929 QST. It was originally structured as a message handling contest
for hams in Canada and the US (which at the time included Cuba, the Philippines
and "Porto Rico") and ran for two solid weeks in January. A successful two way
exchange of a minimum ten word message would result in two points for each
station. The number of message points would be multiplied by the number of ARRL
sections at the time (68) for the final score. A key rule was "Participating
stations will be limited for the purposes of the contest to sending but one
test message to each station worked; that is, further messages can be
transmitted but will not add to the contest score of either station." Thus was
born the dreaded "work stations once per band" rule.
While a lot about the contest has stayed the same over the years, much has also
changed. Sweepstakes was moved to November in 1932; a separate phone contest
was added in 1941; and operating time was limited to 24 hours along the way.
However, for the past half-century not much has changed, other than the ARRL
section list gradually expanding to its current level of 80.
Description and Rules Summary
The ARRL Sweepstakes consists of two contests, one for phone and one for CW,
that are open to US and Canadian hams only. A summary of the important rules:
Contest Period:
CW: First full weekend in November
Phone: Third full weekend in November
Operating Period - 24 of the 30 hours from 2100Z Saturday to 0300Z Sunday
Exchange - Serial Number; Precedence; Your Call; Check; Section
Where: Precedence = Q (5 watts output or less), A (under 150w), B (above 150w),
U (Single Op Unlimited), M (Multiop), or S (school station)
Check = last two digits of the first year of license of the operator or station
Section - ARRL/RAC section location of the station. List of standard section
abbreviations is here
Duplicate Contacts - stations can only be worked once per band.
The full rules can be found here. For any given year substitute the current
year for "2009" in that URL.
Strategies
Like any contest, selecting the best strategy for Sweepstakes depends on your
goals. You can play to win in one of many categories or in your section, just
help out your local club's score, try to fill in the states you need for 5BWAS
or just try to see how quickly you can make a Clean Sweep. As long as your
strategy matches your goal, you are bound to have fun.
Whatever your goal is, scoring more points is always more fun. Maximizing score
per hour means the most fun per unit time invested. Look here for some great
operating tips on maximizing your SS score.
Equipment
Station design is always an important starting point. Sweepstakes is a very
"little gun" friendly contest and doesn't require huge antenna farms Since SS
is a domestic contest, low antennas in many cases are preferable. N6BV has some
excellent pointers on optimizing your antenna choices for SS - click here. In
low sunspot years, forty and eighty meters are the "money bands" in
Sweepstakes, with 20 meters being the usual workhorse. Near sunspot peaks, 15
and 10 meters provide wide open spaces for more QSOs.
Sweepstakes doesn't have any unique demands on other aspects of station design,
though the "work once per band" rule does give a lot of benefit to having a
second radio. Run rates on Sunday often slow down to glacial speed (especially
CW SS), and having a second radio to search and pounce between automated CQs
brings in a lot of extra QSOs.
If you aren't planning an extensive effort, you can still get paper forms here
and log by hand. However, logging contests real time on a computer is just so
much more efficient - and green. Just about every popular contest logging
program supports SS - check Contest logging software. If you aren't going to
use a computer to send CW, the long exchange in SS means at least using a
memory keyer with an incrementing serial number capability, to maintain your
sanity.
Operating Time
There are all kinds of theories on strategies for selecting the optimal
operating time periods for SS, but like all contests more hours in the chair
will always translate to more points. In general, if you are going to put more
than 12 hours or so into SS being on from the start for the first 8-10 hours is
key to getting that QSO total up. If you can only put in a few hours, calling
CQ on Sunday afternoon will bring some nice high run rates since you will be
fresh meat to all the stations putting in full time efforts. If your goal is to
maximize points for your club, a common strategy is to operate from one station
on Saturday and then from another station (with that station's call) on Sunday
- basically combining both of the above strategies.
Common wisdom in Sweepstakes is to let the multipliers come to you - unless
your goal is to just get a Clean Sweep, the best strategy is to maximize QSOs.
For a 100,000 point SS effort, a multiplier is worth about 8 QSOs - spending
more than 10 or 15 minutes to get that elusive section will basically lower
your score. But if you just want that Clean Sweep mug, knowing propagation
paths from your location is the secret sauce: what times/bands will give you
the short hops to nearby sections and which will provide openings to the
Pacific or quasi-polar distant sections. Barring entering the unlimited
category and using packet spotting, working the rare sections that don't have a
lot of operators is pretty much just luck of the draw.
As in any contest, maximizing score means running (calling CQ) as much as
possible, and SS is one of the easier contests for the average station to find
and hold a CQ frequency. However, if you did a lot of running on Saturday,
searching and pouncing on Sunday to find those "Sunday drivers" will be
important.
Sweepstakes Etiquette
Sweepstakes is a contest that attracts the full spectrum of hams: top operators
at big stations looking to win, serious contesters looking to beat last year's
score or come in ahead of their buddies, club members just looking to help the
club score, and first time contesters just trying this thing out. Just like in
a marathon running race, that means there are competitors at a wide level of
capabilities. To deal with that there are some norms of "etiquette" that have
evolved to let everyone have the most possible amount of fun. These are not
hard and fast rules, just common norms that have evolved over the years. You
won't be disqualified by going against any of these norms, but by following
them you will definitely save a lot of whining on CQ-CONTEST after SS is over.
There many areas where standard contest etiquette applies, but there are also
some specific norms for SS:
a.. The exchange in Sweepstakes is complicated on purpose - Sweepstakes
tradition comes from traffic handling - this is what makes SS fun and
different. Learn the exchange before the contest and get comfortable sending
and receiving it in the expected order. There are basically three scenarios to
be comfortable with:
1.. The CQ Scenario: You will either be calling CQ or answering CQs and
following a standard protocol will make everything go faster and more smoothly:
K3TN: CQ SS K3TN K3TN SS
W8ABC: W8ABC
K3TN: W8ABC 123 B K3TN 69 MDC
W8ABC: 55 A W8ABC 74 OH
K3TN: TU K3TN SS
Remember, SS is one of those contests where you do not have to send RS(T).
When you send the exchange the first time, no need to send anything twice -
send it once and let the other station ask for a fill if needed. Also, there is
no need to send "NR" at the start of your exchange when replying to a CQ,
though some feel it helps the receiving station get ready to copy the exchange.
Note: Sweepstakes does not require that the station answering the CQ send
back the CQers call. It is not a bad idea to do so if you think there is any
doubt who you (W8ABC above) are responding to, such as on a crowded band where
multiple CQers are "sharing" a frequency. In that case, W8ABC would reply "K3TN
55 A W8ABC 74 OH"
2.. The Fill scenario: Contests are about speed and accuracy, so before you
hit enter in the log you want to make sure you have the info right. Good
operators will always ask for a repeat or "fill" if they missed part of the
exchange or aren't 100% certain they copied it right. The generally accepted
ways to ask for fills are:
CK? - Please send the Check (last two digits of the first year you were
licensed) again
NR? - Please send the serial number again.
PREC? - Please send the Precedence (A, B, M, U, S, Q) again.
SEC? - Please send your Section again.
CL? - Please repeat your call?
AGN or ? - Please resend the entire exchange again.
It is only really necessary to send the entire exchange if the station
sends AGN or ? but many operators aren't familiar with the abbreviations for
Check and Precedence and so on.
K3TN: CQ SS K3TN K3TN SS
W8ABC: W8ABC
K3TN: W8ABC 1%& B K3TN 69 MDC
W8ABC: NR?
K3TN: 123
W8ABC: 55 A W8ABC 74 OH
K3TN: TU K3TN SS
If there appears to be any confusion, just resend the entire exchange.
3.. The Dupe Scenario: This is a tricky one. When you are calling CQ and a
station calls you that you have already worked, in most contests it is just
faster to work them a second time. However, the long exchange in SS changes
that equation a bit - many stations choose to not work dupes and will send
"K3TN B4" or "K3TN QSO B4" or "K3TN DUPE." This may or may not be the right
thing to do, depending on circumstances. N6TR (who manages the log-checking for
SS) has made it clear that a repeat QSO in one log that is a first QSO in
another will not result in a penalty to either op. On the other hand, a NIL
(not-in-log) QSO, where a QSO shown in one log is not even loosely matched in
another log, will result in a fairly significant penalty. On Saturday evening,
when rates are high, it may make sense to say "QSO B4" and go on to the next
station, because if you are not in his log, chances are good that the station
will call you again on Sunday. On Sunday, when rates are low and "fresh meat"
is scarce, it makes sense to insist that the previous QSO is "not in my log"
and say "pse work again". You're really doing the other station a favor, and
not costing either of you much precious time.
a.. Send the entire exchange! - don't forget, you must send your callsign
as part of the exchange.
b.. Cut numbers and leading zeroes: In contests where RST is required,
sending 5NN is universally recognized to mean 599 - just as CW is universally
recognized as an abbreviation for Continuous Wave. However, in SS using cut
numbers in the CK field (6N instead of 69) or even in the serial number field
leads to confusion because of the mix of numbers and letters in the exchange.
Just avoid cut numbers. Similarly, there is no reason to send leading zeroes -
they just increase the chance for confusion.
c.. Use the standard abbreviations for sections on CW and standard
phonetics on SSB. In Sweepstakes, you are not in "Maryland" or "Massachusetts,"
you are in "Maryland DC (MDC on CW)" or "Eastern Mass (EMA on CW)" or wherever.
You can find the list of standard ARRL sections here. Similarly, leave the fun
phonetics on the shelf for contests - stick with the ICAO standard phonetics
found here.
d.. Send (or say) the exchange in the standard order: number, precedence,
your call, your check and your section. There's no need to say "precedence",
"check" or "section" if they are in sequence, making it faster and clearer both
for you and for the other station. In general, the fewer words the better.
e.. Don't repeat what you copied back to the CQer. Especially on SSB, it is
tempting to say "Thanks for number 123 B in MDC, you are number ." Just stick
to sending your information and everything will move along more quickly.
f.. Send "QRL?" or "?" twice to check if a frequency is in use. The long SS
exchange also means that there will be longer than usual gaps while a CQer is
listening to someone reply. Just sending "dit dit" and then hitting that CQ key
is just rude - do the right thing and check twice. If you are running stations
and don't respond to QRL? checks, the frequency is assumed to be up for grabs.
A corollary to this principle is.
g.. Just because you own two radios doesn't mean you own two frequencies.
If you are operating SO2R and don't respond to a legitimate "double QRL?"
because you were off on the other radio trying to break the VE8 pileup, that
frequency is up for grabs.
h.. Send CW at the code speed of the other operator, or the fastest you are
comfortable copying - whichever is lower. If you answer someone CQing at 35
wpm, but are only able to copy 20 wpm, reply at 20 wpm. If you are sending CQ
at 35 wpm and someone responds at 20 wpm, slooow down to something near the
other station's code speed. Hitting Page Down or twisting the K1EL knob a bit
isn't that hard. Exceptions: on Sunday, everyone slows down their CQ code speed
to attract casual operators. Also, if you hear a buddy calling CQ at 20 wpm and
you know they can copy 35 wpm, call them at the higher speed. Even more fun:
call him or her at 45 wpm and throw in some cut numbers: "ATN B K3TN 6N MDC"
Remember: only do this out of love.
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