[3830] ARRLDX SSB WX3B M/M HP

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                    ARRL DX Contest, SSB - 2023

Call: WX3B
Operator(s): WX3B N3FZ
Station: WX3B

Class: M/M HP
QTH: MD
Operating Time (hrs): 10.15

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
  160:    0     0
   80:   15    11
   40:   71    28
   20:  285    72
   15:  397    79
   10:  893   108
-------------------
Total: 1661   298  Total Score = 1,477,782

Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club

Comments:

After the stellar ARRL DX CW conditions, I was wondering, could SSB POSSIBLY be
as good???  

The week leading up to SSB was filled with solar flares and other interesting
activity by the sun, and listening to 10 meters Friday morning before the
contest was absolutely depressing.  Even my reverse beacon network skims were
not covering much of Europe during my tests.  I was prepared for a dud on that
band, as I sat down at 7:30am on Saturday morning to start the event.

The 10 meter band scope looked promising, and I was greeting with an immediate
modest run, of mostly southern latitude Europeans, mostly running high power,
with good signals, and what I would call a comfortable but certainly not high
rate of speed.

Like a light switch, somewhere before 8:00am, I was starting to get louder
signals, from far more varied locations AND stations with 100 watts...or
less...right before the band ERUPTED into a full-on wide-open sprint of delight,
which lasted for several hours!!

Bryan, N3FZ arrived to assist my operating so I went on 15 and left him on 10. 
After about 30 minutes, our newest guest, Dale, KC3TAU came in for some serious
pileup training and he took my place on 15 meters...before Bryan retired and
Dale took over on 10 meters, leaving Bryan and I to a good (non-radio) rag chew
while Dale had the time of his life.

Dale operated just over an hour, Bryan somewhere closer to two hours.  

I was floored to listen to how few signals were on 20 meters, the band sounded
broken before noon.  K3LR was CQing into thin air and not getting many answers,
and 9A1A was the only semi-loud European calling CQ.  Fortunately, 20 meters
perked up in the afternoon - though you can see my interest was clearly tilted
toward 10 meters.

10 meters was a non-stop ball of fun - and the Europeans kept answering my call
late in the afternoon.  I finally gave up after the rate slowed down and turned
my antenna at 155 degrees and started a completely new run of South Americans. 
I was surprised that Europeans starting calling me again at that beam heading...
as well - and I was able to maintain a respectable late afternoon rate on 10.  

It was a great having Champ at E2A spot me on 10 meters (so I could call him
through the EU wall) and he was quite loud once alone. 

I had another fun QSO with Alex, RA3GAS - who I recognized by voice from decades
of contest QSOs.  He gave me the RA3, and I correctly guessed his call,
something we both enjoyed.  

AD - G6AD called me with old vintage equipment and 30 watts, and proceeded to
put the YouTube recording of our QSO on my Facebook group.  

I ran into many "rag chew" contesting friends and got to say hello for
a bit longer than just a signal report.  Braco, E7DX is always great fun to work
in a contest (he is one of my favorite hams I have yet to meet) and he put up a
huge score with over 6,000 QSOs this time (nice job!).  I also heard the
familiar voice of Charlie NF4A at his operating position from Croatia, and that
QSO also made me somewhat nostalgic for the QSOs I used to make with Paul N4PN
(SK) from Croatia as well.  Charlie has one of those great voices you would
recognize no matter where he is operating from (and Paul had a similar
distinction!).

In our 10+ hour effort, I had hoped to break 1,000 QSOs on 10 meters but decided
to fatten up my score to be a little more respectable.  My hours of operation
were Saturday only from 7:30am until 7:00pm and when I subtracted all the rag
chewing with Brian and Dale (it was significant!) we only had about 10 hours on
the clock - mostly single-op.  I made a valiant effort to make some QSOs on 20
meters, and hunted for mostly multipliers on 40 & 80.  I could not hear one
country on 160 before 7:00pm - and only had one spot to listen for - so no 160
QSOs this time.

I had my wish of having all 3 high bands in good condition, though it took 20
awhile to wake up.  Was 20 open all night and morning??  I don't know, but
looking at K3LR and W3LPL's numbers, it obviously suffered from a lack of
activity and/or less than ideal conditions.

This short effort left me wanting more - and I am looking forward to WPX SSB in
just over 3 weeks HOPING we have similar band conditions.  It sure is fun to
have good runs on the 3 high bands at once.  

CQ WPX SSB is up next - and I will have an excellent team for the entire weekend
in the hopes that we might have a chance to break NQ4I's 2014 record.  Several
other teams have set their site on the same goal, and there's going to be a
great shoot-out for first place in the Multi/Multi category this year. 

In closing, I have a very special congratulations to my good friend Dennis,
N8IVN - who entered this contest - for the first time - with high power and a
good Yagi at 40+ feet on an AB/577 and realized, that it's true, he's now loud
on those bands - and it looks like he had the time of his life, particularly on
10 meters.  Way to go Dennis, it's nice to see you enjoying your new station!

Many thanks to all my friends around the world that continue to make this the
world's greatest game!

Sincerely,
Jim Nitzberg   WX3B


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