[3830] SS CW VE7FO SO Unlimited LP

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                    ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, CW

Call: VE7FO
Operator(s): VE7FO
Station: VE7FO

Class: SO Unlimited LP
QTH: Vancouver
Operating Time (hrs): 22

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
  160:     
   80:   56
   40:   93
   20:  138
   15:   70
   10:   98
------------
Total:  455  Sections = 79  Total Score = 71,732

Club: British Columbia DX Club

Comments:

Another emotional roller coaster.

I'm starting to think that I'm spending too much time reading about contesting,
promoting contesting, training contest ops, thinking about contesting, writing
about contesting, etc. and not enough time actually prepping for the contests I
enter.

My ideal contest prep would consist of: making sure I have TRLog configured the
way I want for the particular contest; doing at least 2 hours' CW practice with
the TR simulator using calls from previous SS contests; running propagation
predictions; reading all my previous years' stories about the contest, as well
as those from others which I have saved from 3830 posts; making sure I know the
rules; identifying the important mults (in SS, the Sections with very few
stations) and, particularly in SS, identifying likely call signs for these mults
(WB0O comes to mind); creating an operating plan which represents my best guess
as to which band to be on at any particular time to optimize the mult/rate
trade-off; making sure the gear is all configured and working the way I want;
getting enough rest ahead of time; and buying a bottle of wine to drink while
I'm winding down and composing the after-the-contest story.

You've probably figured out that the only prep that actually got done ahead of
time was buying the wine.

Friday night would have been a good time to do this stuff but, instead, I went
to hear about the VE7SV/FP expedition at the DX Club meeting.  Many things about
it impressed me but the biggest one was that, just 15 minutes before the truck
arrived to haul everything away, one station was still operating with just a
dipole, working Eu, and the pileup sounded the same as it did after the first CQ
when they arrived.  Another thing that got me a little excited was the statement
from the keeper of the log that, while he hadn't checked thoroughly, he hadn't
noticed my call in there.  I felt better when ops I had worked assured me that I
must be in there.  Left fairly early as had a 30 mile drive home and wanted to
make sure I got enough sleep and some time for prep for the big weekend.

Didn't sleep well, didn't wake up well, got up about three hours before the
start and dragged my butt the whole time.  Actually, including about half an
hour after the start because that's how long it took me to get everything
functioning (well, not everything - just the gear, not me).  This isn't a
propitious beginning for an activity that, while somewhat gruelling, is supposed
to be fun.  If I'm feeling rested and have had some recent practice, I have no
trouble with 30 wpm CW in contests.  Admittedly, 123A W2BCD 45ENy is a much
bigger bite to chew and less predictable than 59K, but still, given appropriate
practice, I can do it.  Sadly, none of those conditions applied, and I was
having a tough time, as were those I contacted.  

My mood wasn't helped when I noticed that I hadn't told the logging program that
we're now on Standard time and that 70 Qs have the wrong time and some have the
wrong date.  Oh well, I have a little program I wrote which will add or subtract
any desired amount of time from any arbitrary sequence of Qs in TRLog and fix
the time and date.  

Now, as all those who have exhorted their flagging spirit to stay in the chair
can attest, you feel a much greater sense of accomplishment if you do.  In my
case, 2 hours in, I said, "Screw it," headed upstairs and laid down.  Not a good
sign.  After about an hour's sleep, I got up and went back at it for another 8
hours.  

It wasn't a good 8 hours - lots of stumbling over the exchange.  Not only that,
the data base I've built up over the last few years isn't telling me anything
about the check or Section of folks I know I've worked many times in the past. 
Altogether, not a happy camper.  I really try hard to be as competitive as I can
with my modest station but I know that I've already blown this one, so I decide,
instead, to bend my efforts towards a clean sweep of all 80 ARRL/RAC Sections. 
Only managed that once since my contesting reincarnation in 2000.  O, had I but
realized the slippery slope to which I was setting my foot I would have QRT
right then, rather than confess the degradation to which I eventually succumbed.
 

So, lots of S&P, lots of hours with rates less than 20.  "Lots" is code for,
"All but one".  Still, I'm hunting mults so rate is going to be poor.  

I have this belief which, although totally blown away by the wild propagation
conditions we experienced (my only VE6 was on 10m - usually they're on 40 or
80), says that one should expect the close in stuff to be worked on 40 and 80. 
Well, 20 died around 6 pm so down to 40 with my miserable dipole which is up
about 40 ft in the middle and 20 ft at the ends.  Then again, if I'm looking for
close in stuff, that high angle radiation should be just what I need.  So, what
close in stuff did I work?  These are all new mults.  WY-yes!!  RI-huh!! (but
very welcome)  NE-this is close?  EMa-this isn't but, why would I care?  It's a
mult.  Between 40 and 80 I got 25 mults, although none in the last 90 minutes. 
Gotta remember to be hard-nosed about this and go to bed whan production falls
off.  Still, you gotta love 3 consecutive Qs with UT, SD and ID in the space of
7 minutes - all new mults, followed by another 3 consecutive Qs with new mults
in 10 minutes - SB, EW and IA ..... I'm a sucker for late night radio.

Some time ago I went to quite a bit of trouble to put up an inverted L for 160
in the hopes of getting a few mults.  It's only 30 ft high and 120 ft long and
has as many buried radials as you can get into a rectangular quadrant of about
15 x 25 ft.  Say, there must be some Qs to be made on 160!!  Wrong.

Finally go to bed at 1:30 am with a pathetic 234 Qs and a not so bad 66 mults
with about 13 hours to go.  

But, dear friends, what hasn't been revealed here is the decision made in the
depths of darkness to sell my honour for a clean sweep.  Until now, in my entire
recent contesting career of four years, I swear by all that is holy that there
have been no spots to blot my escutcheon.  O, how could I have been deluded into
believing that a spotted sweep could be deemed "Clean"?  Yet, in my mind's eye I
saw that unholy grail dancing before me, beckoning me, nay, propelling me
forward to conjoin with those unclean, by very definition, "spotters".  The
local manifestation of these hideous beings is presided over by an outwardly
jocular but inwardly sinister VE7CC with his "cluster".  The Serpent of Eden
offered but one apple - here I was tempted with a "cluster" and, to my eternal
shame, I confess that I accepted.  O, Adam, never again shall I revile you.  I
shall not dwell on the perverse pleasures which accrued to me as I watched the
vari-coloured spots cascading down the screen of my secondary viewing device nor
the growing sense of alarm as I attempted to manipulate the various philtres
offered to control them and thereby keep them from overwhelming me.  

I haven't got around to feeding cluster spots straight into TR yet so I
displayed them on a 2nd monitor mounted above the main one, using AR-User to do
the filtering, etc.  I was amazed at the rate at which spots were coming in.  It
reminded me of the opening minutes of "The Matrix".  I'd be scrolling up the
screen looking for mults to punch into the bandmap and a bunch more spots would
come in, dumping the cursor back to the bottom of the screen.  It was a real
pain, particularly in the neck as I had my head tilted up to better see the 2nd
monitor.  This seemed like even less fun than I was having before.  However,
once I didn't need to check the old ones any more, it was easy to keep an eye
open for new mults.  The little flurries of new mults mentioned earlier were due
to seeing them spotted and going there.

Back at it at 7:30 am, not feeling a great deal better.  20 is alive and so, to
a lesser extent, is 15.  Damn.  should have gone to bed and got up an hour
earlier.  No plan - that's my problem.  I'm still needing SFl, SC, SD, NT, Me,
Nl, VI, SNJ, Mb, Ab, NLI, Pac, Ms and Qc.

Well, with the help of the spots I managed to get all but Qc.  I know I would
have missed most of them without the spots.  The only sign of Qc was a spot for
someone on SSTV.  Never heard one.  Never heard anyone calling one.  VY1JA was
very patient and finally pulled me through under difficult conditions.  Thanks
J.

I did manage to get the database working.  I had loaded the DX one.  Not too
many checks or sections in there.  Loaded the domestic one and everything now
working FB.

It was pretty obvious that there was weird stuff happening with propagation. 
Signals would just die away for a few minutes and then come back.  Around 2115
W3s and 4s had a very strong auroral buzz on them.  One W4 I worked had no tone
at all - sounded just how I imagine spark used to sound.  Not used to working W4
through the auroral oval.

It's 2210, I haven't heard or seen a spot for a single KH6 and I'm getting
nervous.  Oops, there's a spot for KH6NF so I go there immediately.  So did
everyone else - what a hoot.  He's obviously trying to make up for lost time as
he's zipping along at about 35 wpm.  So, I finally figure out what he's sending,
set TR to 35 wpm so I can sound like a S... Hot Op and dump my call a number of
times.  He finally comes back to me.  I'm so excited I hit the exchange button
when he's only half finished sending my exchange, so, of course, I have to send
it again.  So much for the SHO image.

Had a sudden flurry of calls once, indicating that I had been spotted.  Just at
this moment, for reasons I can't explain, the spot display jumped from the 2nd
monitor to the first one, covered up TR and took the focus away from it.  By the
time I had banished the spots back to the 2nd monitor, everybody had left.  I
was spotted a few more times but no flurry of calls.  Another blow to the SHO
image.  I saw myself being spotted on the wrong frequency once.  Naturally, I
immediately moved there.  Didn't help.

The last 2 hours on 40 and 80 were pretty tough.  It was quite interesting,
though, seeing all the spots on 20 where people were working each other off the
aurora.  I didn't bother as I didn't see any I hadn't already worked.

I don't know what to think about spots.  Had I started off using them I probably
would have got a sweep.  I'd rather get a high score.  I didn't bother chasing
every spot I saw, just the mults, but still, it was distracting.  I think that
generating my own with a 2nd radio might help get the rate up.

Hmmm..... just realized..... I sent A for my precedence the whole time while I
guess I should have changed to U.  I suppose this is somewhat compensated for by
my not realizing that I could up my power from 150W.  Of course the max from the
MkV is 200W so it wouldn't have made a lot of difference.  Oh well.

See you in the SS SSB.  Looks like I've got 7 newbie, no-ticket ops signed up
for it.  Six of these are different newbies from the 10 I had over for CQ WW
SSB.  Should be fun.

Thanks for the Qs (and the patience).

73 de Jim Smith	VE7FO


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