re: [CQ-Contest] 2003 CQ 160 Change Coming

[i4jmy@iol.it]

> 
> The proposal laid out by W4ZV means that the contest doesn't start for
 us
> on the east coast until 2 hours after sunset (8 hours for Europeans)


A 48 hour format is surely more fair for a WW contest, and what's going 
to be on 160m already did happen with the ARRL 10m contest more than 20 
years ago. 
For an international contest, any time restriction out from a full 
24/48 hours format is actually and advantage for someone and a 
disadvantage for others, a situation that's more evident in bands where 
useful hours are only a portion of the day.
Since the total time will be the same 48 hours, everyone has the chance 
to decide how to use it including two full sunsets and 
sunrises, what is definitely better than it was until now 
when some part of the world has all good times and others lose 
good hours because the contest is over or still has to start. 
Under a central european perspective, starting at 00z instead of 22z 
changes a little since sunset is gone in either cases but the sunday 
hours from 16z to 24z are really good ones and include a second sunset 
that's lost with present time table.
True that a real plain field doesn't exist in any contest, otherwise 
people with winning aims wouldn't move to well known countries to take 
unbeatable advantages, it's 
evident that no other format than full day/s worsen things, expecially 
with single band contests.
What I think could be advisable in a contest like the CQ160 is instead 
a rule stating that any entrant can't submit a log with more than a 
certain number of hours.

Something like to select the best 24 hours within the two days of 
operation would be probably better than a fixed hours amount. I mean 
that one could be free to work even the full 48 hours and anyway will 
submit his full log, but he will be requested to indicate only 24 hours 
of operations for scoring purposes, of course establishing a 
reasonable minimal period lenght, let's say for example one hour. 
This would surely cut away daytime operations, keep alive the band in 
good hours until the end and award people able to develop a certain 
strategy.


 and
> it means that we now have to operate single band contest 3 nights inst
ead
> of just two.  The Europeans would operate 1/2 night on Saturday mornin
g,
> Full night Saturday night, and 1/2 night on Sunday.  

Talking about cental/western europe, two half nights and a full one, 
two sunrises and two sunsets are surely much better than one and a half 
night and with deprivation of sunday sunset. 
 
> Am I the only one that thinks this is a really stupid idea?
> 
> This is smarter: 
> ---------------- 
> The contest starts 1 hour before local sunset on Friday and ends 1 hou
r
> after local sunrise on Sunday.  The contest starts for everyone when t
he
> band is open and ends when the band is closed.

I don't think this is the way to follow.

Unfortunately darkness time, sunrise and sunset aren't the same for 
everyone and depend by latitude and season. Following your advice a 
160m Contest will be transformed into a sort of continental event but 
with a bonus for people able to manage QSOs with another continent.

Probably, a scoring that's the sum of the obtained QRB multiplied with 
the sum of CQ zones and countries would be the most interesting change 
after the time table. Unluckily it won't be homogeneous with past 
editions setting the birth of a new event rather than an optimization 
of the present contest.

73,
Mauri I4JMY


> 73
> 
> Bill, W4AN


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