[3830] SS CW K1KD Single Op HP

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                    ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, CW

Call: K1KD
Operator(s): K1KD
Station: K1KD

Class: Single Op HP
QTH: VT
Operating Time (hrs): 24

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
  160:    0
   80:  151
   40:  254
   20:  350
   15:  245
   10:    0
------------
Total: 1000  Sections = 80  Total Score = 160,000

Club: Yankee Clipper Contest Club

Comments:

My first ever sweep in a CW contest!  During the first few minutes of the
contest I realized that I have forgotten to plug in the narrow cw filter that
goes in my Kenwood 850.  Unfortunately, to swap out the filter takes several
minutes and includes unscrewing a hatch on the underneath side of the case. 
Once I got the filter in, things went pretty smoothly.  By the end of the first
night,  I was running about 100 q's ahead of last year's numbers.  When I went
to bed, I lacked only 3 sections - MB, SK, and UT.  I was lucky to work some of
the historically difficult ones very early on.  VY1JA called me on 15m only 2.5
hours into the contest.  I also got calls from Alaska and Hawaii in the first
evening.  By 17:00 on Sunday I had the sweep, working W7CT in UT at 1700z.

Without worrying about chasing multipliers, I concentrated on rate and on
breaking my goal of 1000 q's.  My rate was still in the 50's by Sunday
afternoon, and I had over 900 q's with six hours to go!  I remember thinking
that it would take something major to keep me from breaking a thousand, and
that's when conditions went horribly wrong.  What I later learned was the Aurora
had me thinking, "Did the tower just fall down?".  At 2300z the rate came to a
screeching halt, and I couldn't buy a contact.  I could only copy local stations
since all other signals were so watery sounding I could hardly make out what
they were sending.  All signals were weak, and nothing was coming through at all
on 80m.  Completing the last four hours was more difficult than the previous 20
hours had been.  As time expired I completed my 1000th contact!  Despite the
strange conditions at the end, I had a fun time.  I'm hoping for better
conditions for SSB though.


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