[CQ-Contest] East coast vs. West coast

[John Brosnahan]

>
>What was the problem again?  Did someone say it's impossible to win a
>contest from the mid-west?  Someone must have forgotten to tell these
>guys.
>
>--Trey, N5KO

Echoing Trey's comments I would suggest the secret to winning is
to pick the contest/band/mode, maximize your station, and sharpen 
up your skills.  Colorado may not be the blackest of black holes--
but it is no glory location like W1.  But by understanding propagation, 
knowing what is possible from here, and having guest operators with 
great skills (W0UA, N2IC, etc) W0UN has won 6 plaques in 6 years 
(3 ARRL and 3 CQWW ---- 3 on 10M, 1 on 15M, and 2 on 40).  
Add in a lot of very competitive 2nd and 3rd place finishes and 
you have a very competitive station (at least on one band at a time)
from a pretty difficult area.  Some of the plaques also represent 
all-time USA records, something that I am very proud of.
Based on number of plaques versus contests entered the
victories represent somewhere between 1/3 and 1/4 of the
total entries.  Much better would mean it was too easy!  Much
less and I would start to suspect my skills as a station and antenna
designer!

If you can't do the big stuff on all bands then become a band
specialist and choose your favorite band to concentrate on.
The W0UN efforts on single bands have been part of a strategy to
work on one band at a time until the station was competive on
all bands.  Each band that has been attempted has resulted in
at least one plaque.  Twenty meters was skipped as we followed
the sunspot cycle down--but this is the year of 20M and W0UA's
results from W0UN in the CQWW CW test (20M single band)
(2nd place high claimed so far) are a strong indication that I am 
on the right track in tackling this band--just need to get some 
more aluminum up in the air.

And I will let you all in on a little secret--there is an even greater
satisfaction from winning out here--knocking off all of the
east coast stations--than there ever would be from back there.

You need hardware of course, but skill is the most important
factor.  Give me a great op from a mediocre station anytime over 
a mediocre op from a great station.  From out west (a mediocre to 
poor location) all it takes is the combination of a great op AND 
a great station.  But you have to pay your dues.  There are some 
very competitive guys out there and it isn't easy to knock them off--
but then, if it were easy, it wouldn't be any fun.

But I also understand the need to benchmark one's progress
as one is honing his/her skill level.  Being 27th is no fun unless one
knows that the 26 higher finishers had much bigger stations.  I
can certainly see the usefulness in having contest reports that
indicated station capabilities.  But it is also clear that this
can't be done in the major magazines under the current economic
conditons of publishing.  So this may best be handled by NCJ or
CQ Contest or by the internet.  I for one would love to know what the
competition is running as a way to calibrate station performance.

73  John  W0UN




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