[3830] NA Sprint SSB KE3X(@N4RV) QRP

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                    NA Sprint SSB Contest - February

Call: KE3X
Operator(s): KE3X
Station: N4RV

Class: Single Op QRP
QTH: Oakton, VA
Operating Time (hrs): 4
Radios: SO2R

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Op Time
---------------------
   80:   56     1.0
   40:   43     1.0
   20:  102     2.0
---------------------
Total:  201    Mults = 56  Total Score = 11,256

Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club

Team: PVRC Team DC

Comments:

Many thanks to Jack and Gwyn for hosting me again.   At midweek I noticed the
Planned Activity page showed only 2 VA stations on Part Time, and I knew of 5
DC stations planning to be on.   So I called an audible and called Jack to ask
if I could come over and activate VA.   In past Sprints I have missed VA since
I was the only one operating there!

Then just before the starting gun went off, I heard someone on 20-meters saying
the Planned Activity page had almost 300 entries!  So then I thought maybe the
'get out the vote campaign' worked?   The first 5-minutes was complete bedlam.

After a quick QSO with K6MR in the first minute, I got beat out 10 straight
times on 20-meters, before settling in at about 1 QSO/minute for the first
hour.   I had couplets about half the time - if I didn't get called, I would
send one CQ then keep tuning.   I tried to stay on 20 as long as possible to
get the Western multipliers, but after UT failed to materialize, I figured
'there goes the T-Shirt' ... no way I'm getting UT on 40 or 80!   Turns out WV
and MS were nowhere to be found later anyway.

I kept telling myself ... no matter how frustrating it was on 20, 40 would be
worse, and so it was, even though Jack's antenna farm is strongest on 40.   I
switched to 40 briefly at 0120Z and spent 5 minutes calling stations before I
finally got a QSO there.  Oops. Thankfully the band opened up better about an
hour later.   Back to 20 again, where the rate was lower but a few CQ's lower
in the band yielded some W6's.   The 20-M activity was fantastic, with QSO's
logged as low as 14.170 and up to 14.307.

In Sprints I usually find 80-meters to be a big money band from VA, due to the
high number of East Coast stations and Jack's high dipoles.   This event was no
exception, and the multipliers just kept on coming.   I was using N1MM Classic
(which did not log the new multipliers correctly) and when a manually
calculated the real multiplier at 56 I thought I must have made an error.   

Thanks to the organizers for bring back this event - I am looking forward to
the October one already.  Amazing to see KW8N with 65 mults, K0EU break 400
QSO's in HP and WD0T break 330 in LP.  The NA Sprint SSB is dead!  Long Live
the new SSB Sprint!

73,

Ken KE3X


N4RV Configuration
------------------
Two FT-1000's at 5W
DX Doubler, N1MM Classic
20M: Bencher Skyhawk @75' 
40M: 4-El Wire Beam NE @80', Full Wave Loop West @90', Stackmatch
80M: Dipoles NE/SW and SE/NW @90'
Rcv: Beverages NE, NW, SE, SW


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