[CQ-Contest] Contest Recruiting 101

[David A. Pruett]

Bill,

I gotta commend you on your efforts to raise teams for the NAQPs.  It 
sounds like you're having a lot of success and it should be a lot of fun.

You mention W8LNO's 'Midwest Popguns'.  Joe was a long-time member of MRRC 
and about the same time that he was organizing the Popguns, I was 
organizing the 'Motley Crew' Sprint teams.  This was the timeframe (early 
80s) immediately after I returned to MI from college in AR.  K5GO and I 
were on 7200 KHz every Tuesday evening talking contesting and we'd attract 
other contesters.  We started with one Motley Crew team (the name sprung 
from the wide assortment of operators we attracted), had two teams quite 
often, and occasionally three if I remember correctly.

Of course, IMHO the crowning achievement of the Motley Crew and Midwest 
Popgun teams was the 45 minute "New Wave" Sprint we held immediately before 
a regular Sprint in 1984 to protest W6OAT's refusal to move the starting 
time from 01Z to 00Z to provide a modicum of stateside propagation for us 
Midwesterners.  We made our point and Rusty made the change.  The panic 
caused across the USA as contesters double-checked their clocks was a bonus...

Of course this was before you and I knew each other :-)

We need more stuff like this to make history.

I wonder what Joe Warden is up to now?

Unfortunately, we have an MRRC meeting at W8AV's the day of the CW 
NAQP.  This date was not chosen carelessly, but was the result of 'AV 
family schedules.  Our plan is to have K8MAD on the air multi-op from 'AV 
for NAQP CW QSOs.  Also, the following weekend is the OH QSO Party so a 
number of the mobiles plan to drive their mobile contest setups to the 
meeting so there are some other potential sources for QSOs.

GL OM.

73,

Dave