[3830] WPX CW 6Y1V M/2 HP

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                    CQWW WPX Contest, CW

Call: 6Y1V
Operator(s): K4BAI N7ZG XE1AY KY1V
Station: 6Y1V

Class: M/2 HP
QTH: Hopewell
Operating Time (hrs): 48

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
  160:    0
   80:  392
   40: 1987
   20: 2043
   15:  830
   10:   78
------------
Total: 5330  Prefixes = 1140  Total Score = 22,207,200

Club: 

Comments:

First and foremost, I'd like to thank John K4BAI, Guy N7ZG and Ismael XE1AY for
joining me in Jamaica for this contest. They arrived with the enthusiasm and
drive of a winning team and the results speak for themselves.

While in Dayton the weekend prior to the contest, several people approached me,
wished me good luck and informed me we were in good shape to break the North
American record having John, K4BAI on our team.

I've worked John hundreds of times over my 30 years in ham radio, but I have
never seen him operate in person. One of the contesters in Dayton told me,
"John's a machine...and the SCP is in his head!". The description was
accurate.

Guy and I quickly discovered that although we were about equally matched in CW
contesting skill, neither of us were capable of competing with John. After a
brief discussion between Guy, Ismael and myself, we quickly abandoned our
operators schedule in lieu of simply putting John on the air on the most
productive band at all times, unless he was tired. Did he get tired? Oh yeah,
once he asked for a short break to take a nap.

The strategy paid off, and everyone still had plenty of time in the chair. John
spent the majority of his on air time accumulating those ever so important 6
point Q's from Europe on 40 meters. When 40 meters wasn't producing, we simply
moved John to 20. The stacks remained on Europe most of the contest and the
Steppir's, when not being used on 40 meters, were pointed at the US.

The 80 meter band was a big disappointment. The band was relatively quiet with
no storms in the vicinity, but we just weren't able to work that many stations,
particularly in Europe where we usually do well.

Having checked ZF2AM's score, it is apparent that the Caribbean suffered
greatly on 80 meters. With 20 meters open round the clock, we never ventured to
160 which typically doesn't produce significant rate in this contest.

40 meters was once again our bread and butter band. With almost 2000 Q's at an
average of 5.19 points per Q, we scored over 10,000 points on this band. There
is no question, having a stack of full sized monobanders on 40 meters is a
contesters dream. Putting the stack in the Caribbean at 850' ASL with a clear
shot to every major DX location is the icing on the cake. If we win this
contest, it is clearly due to our 40 meter advantage.

We didn't produce as many Q's on 20 meters as expected, but the band was open
well into the night giving us some Q's when 80 was dead.

The 15 meter band exhibited the same symptoms as in the WPX SSB contest. It
opened late and didn't produce the Q's that Europeans were experiencing.
Fortunately, the stacks enabled us to focus what little openings we had on
European Q's for an average of 2.61 points per Q, slightly higher than the 2.47
achieved on 20 meters.

The 10 meter band was a real disappointment. Similar to ZF2AM and other
Caribbean station, 10 meters never really opened anywhere. Interestingly
enough, just a few hours ago (Monday evening) 10 meters opened to Europe and I
was able to run SSB stations at over 300/hour for over an hour. While fun, the
opening was a day late. Oh well, at least I know what to expect when 10 meters
opens.

Time will tell if we won the M2 category. I don't anticipate we will, but I am
confident that we set yet another WPX record for North America. 


Notes: The Internet was down except for a short period Friday evening. It was
interesting operating almost the entire contest the old fashioned way, S&P
without packet. Perhaps we should all try this every now and again. It felt
good!

I believe North American DX stations suffered in this contest due to an
unusually low participation of casual contesters whom were most likely enjoying
the U.S. holiday (Labor Day) weekend. This, combined with the European E-SKIP
openings, may be why European Q counts are significantly higher than ours. We
worked everyone that called us.

David ~ KY1V


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