[3830] ARRL 10 W4PM M/S HP

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                    ARRL 10-Meter Contest

Call: W4PM
Operator(s): W4PM
Station: W4PM

Class: M/S HP
QTH: VA
Operating Time (hrs): 12

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
   CW:  190    44
  SSB:           
-------------------
Total:  190    44  Total Score = 33,440

Club: Central Virginia Contest Club

Comments:

Rig: Omni VII, ALS-600 400W
Ant: 176' CF at 60 ft.

When is ARRL going to join the rest of us in the 21st century and have single
operator assisted categories? Putting a single operator, single mode station
using DX cluster assistance into the multi-op category is ridiculous.  Oh well,
my station wouldn't be competitive in a single op category anyway but having no
single op assisted categories is still nuts! Actually using the DX cluster
information was of little use.  At least 90 percent of the spots were not
readable here!

We're still at the bottom on the solar cycle and this weekend really brought
that fact home.  Compared with 1999-2002 when I could work 70 or 80 countries
and all of the states with low power and an even smaller wire antenna this
weekend was a real bust.  

I didn't have a lot of time this year, was suffering from a bad head cold, and
the long periods of searching the band for new stations to work provided little
incentive to stay in the chair.  Calling CQ didn't yield very good results.  A
number of stations replied that I could almost hear but not copy.  In S&P mode
I could work most that I could hear but many appeared for a few seconds and
then faded away and I missed them.  The most consistent path from here was from
VA to FL.  Almost as many FL stations were worked as locals. There were also
some very big signals coming in from NS, NB, PEI and QC.  Too bad there aren't
as many stations up there as there are down in FL! The band did open to W6 on
Sunday for a while but I never heard even one W7 area station. 

No DX other than some SA countries and the Carribean area were heard or worked.
 Of my 44 multipliers 30 were states, 5 were Canadian Provinces and the other 9
were DXCC entities.    

CU next year in this one.  Let's hope for some sun spots!

73,
Puck, W4PM


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