[3830] ARRL 160 N2GC Single Op HP

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                    ARRL 160-Meter Contest

Call: N2GC
Operator(s): N2GC
Station: N2GC

Class: Single Op HP
QTH: NLI
Operating Time (hrs): 24.5

Summary:
Total:  QSOs = 852  Sections = 68  Countries = 25  Total Score = 170,469

Club: Yankee Clipper Contest Club

Comments:

IC756PROIII, AL-1200, bent dipole at 35-40'

Living in a typical suburban Long Island QTH makes it challenging putting up a
full size 160 antenna within your property lines.  Last year I put this antenna
up for the 160 meter season and had great success with it.  This year I was able
to get the bent ends up higher so it looks more like a horizontal double L. 

Going into the contest my goal was to beat my score from last year which is the
NLI section record.  I thought that it would be pretty easy to do as last year I
missed some prime hours due to family events and this year my schedule was clear
to operate as much as I could.

I knew in the first hour that it was going to be a long night.  I had so many
un-answered cq's that I started to S&P using the second VFO in between cq's.  I
got lots of practice doing SO2V the whole weekend.  I ended up packing it in
around 0900Z as I was tired and the W6's were not hearing me.  The conditions
on Saturday were much better and I was able to hold a good frequency 1828 for
hours though it was harder doing SO2V with the fear of loosing my run freq.  
As a result I missed some easy DX mults though many called me like UA3, EW, UR,
MD, SV, YL, VE4-5-6 to name a few.  

Around 0830Z I could not keep my eyes open but I still needed a lot of CA
mults.  I heard a few but they were still not hearing me and some had big
pileups.  I decided to take a nap and wake up before sunrise thinking
conditions would be better towards the west.  I got back on at 1030Z and I
think I heard only 2 CA stations on the whole band.  Both were already worked
earlier.  I guess the others packed it in while I was napping.  I did work EWA,
OR, LA and 2 KH6's that I needed but no CA.  Lesson learned, work them when you
hear them as they may not be around later!

Compared to last year, this year I had 121 more QSO's but 14 less mults and 21
less 5 pointers.  If I had done a better job with the mults I would have easily
topped last years score.

Even with all the ups and downs of propagation over the weekend it was a lot of
fun and looking forward to the SP and CQ160.

73 & Happy Holidays
Mike, N2GC


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