[3830] WPX CW VA7ST SO(A)AB HP

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                    CQWW WPX Contest, CW

Call: VA7ST
Operator(s): VA7ST
Station: VA7ST

Class: SO(A)AB HP
QTH: BC
Operating Time (hrs): 31

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
  160:    5
   80:   48
   40:  316
   20:  523
   15:   56
   10:     
------------
Total:  948  Prefixes = 409  Total Score = 1,135,384

Club: 

Comments:

N1MM Logger
FT920 + SB220 (SO1R)
160M Inverted L
80M vertical
40M half-squares (two -- E-W and N-S)
3 ele. tribander at 45'

        Band    QSOs    Pts  WPX
         1.8       5      19    1
         3.5      48     177    5
           7     316    1302  107
          14     523    1155  282
          21      56     123   14
       Total     948    2776  409

Year  QSO   WPX        Score (claimed)
=========================================
2007  948   409        1,135,384
2006  941   515        1,445,605
2005  694   378          712,908 
2004   --    --               --
2003  412   233          269,348 (VE7ASK)
2002   63    45            9,000 

Sigh. What rotten conditions. SSN=zero, SFI=68, A=20>16, K=4. Predicted tough
going to some parts of the world. Didn't quite know how these numbers would
translate to a high-participation WW contest, so I had lofty goals of 1,500 Qs
and 2M points. (Rationale: running high power with better 40M antennas ought to
have built on last year's 100W 941 Qs and 1.44M points). I was dreaming. With
just a few hours to go, I figured even the 1M-point mark was out of reach, till
Europe opened up a bit.

This one seemed more of a domestic contest than a DX event from here. Not
having one of two expected decent EU openings hurt the WPX count -- 106 fewer
than last year. Heard plenty of over-the-pole superstations, but it must have
been one-way propagation as they weren't hearing much going the other way.

Started Friday evening with an 86 hour and a run of 101 Qs, mostly U.S. with a
few SA. Rate in the first few hours: 83, 62, 45, 51, 43, 46, 35, 25, 10... 

Wasn't spotted often, but sure noticed a five-minute rate boost when they
happened. Thanks fellas.

EU really only opened up here on 20M late Sunday afternoon. Worked far more ZLs
than JAs on 40M. Didn't hear much EU on 40M at all. 

15M was very poor and 10M was just a sea of noise with nary a signal all
weekend.

80M was soft on Friday night, but quite strong and quiet on Saturday night --
did better this year than last year (48 vs. 14 Qs). Was very pleased to work
CX6VM on 80M and KH6ND on 160M. Laid out some 65' radials for the 160M and 80M
antennas, and they worked better than I expected.

Ran http://www.w1ve.com/livescores all weekend. It was a lot of fun. Watched
VE1RGB in SO/LP matching me almost Q for Q all the way, despite my high power
advantage. He came on in the final two hours to really blast up the score. Sure
were a lot more stations posting to Live Scores this time. Great to see, and
much more exciting to watch.

Had a super time at last finding many 20M EU mults with two hours to go, but
when EU fell away there wasn't much DX left on the band. (Afternoon power line
noise prevented me from running much U.S. on 20M as too many station were
buried in the S9 noise). Went to 40M and tried calling, but there were only a
few stations heard around 2300z, so I called it a day with 45 minutes
remaining. 

Highlights: 5H3EE new one (lots of dits!). Didn't think he'd hear me, but he
did.

Lowlights: Power line noise, hopefully soon to be fixed. Oh, and insipid
jammers. 'Nuff said. OK... one rant -- what a waste of RF on both counts.

Note for next year: even basic SO2R for 20M and 40M would really add points in
the early evening.

Stats:

Most-worked countries    Qs        %
=====================   ---     ----
1 	United States 	692 	73.0 	
2 	Canada 	         46 	 4.8 	
3 	Brazil 	         14 	 1.5 	
4 	Argentina 	 13 	 1.4 
5 	Slovenia 	 12 	 1.3 	
6 	Germany          11 	 1.2
7 	New Zealand 	  9 	 0.9 	
8 	Spain (EA7) 	  8 	 0.8 	
9 	Italy 	          8 	 0.8
        ...and 56 others

Thanks everyone for the contacts. See you next year -- hopefully, we'll be in a
whole new state of flux.


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