[CQ-Contest] 24 vs 48 - NO NEW CAREGORIES!

[Ron Notarius WN3VAW]

Pete,

What you have put your finger on is why so many discussions on the
contesting reflector often degrade into silly arguments.

In other words, when we are discussing the potential "24 hour" category in a
24 hour contest, are we talking about operating solely within a single
contiguous 24 hour window within the contest -- which is what I and others
have thought -- or about a total operating time of 24 hours or less,
non-contiguous, within the 48 hours -- which is what you and others have
thought about?

It makes a big difference.  With a contiguous 24 hour period, the operator
has to watch the clock carefully to map out his optimal times, but s/he's
going to have the overnight lulls (or whatever) just like everyone running
the full blown contest does.  In other words, it's a condensed contest for
these ops.  But with the non-contiguous 24 hours, a great deal more strategy
comes into play as these ops try to pick their operating times to maximize
propagation.  Which implies (all else being equal) a great deal more
activity on the high bands than the low bands, which I believe was one of
K4OJ's disagreements with that concept.

I'm not saying that either of these two concepts is wrong; each has their
strong and short points.  But I wonder if there is truly a need for the
non-contiguous 24 hour category, especially in contests that limit SO
stations to 36 hours maximum of the 48.  To my thinking, the contiguous 24
idea has a little more merit because it requires the operator, while
carefully planning his start/stop times, to deal with one full
round-the-clock cycle of operating -- which also gives the single band or
limited band (be it high or low) ops an opportunity to work them, too.

But I will agree with you on this:  anything that will help boost activity
is worth examining.

Let's just make sure we're all discussing the same things at the same time.

73, ron wn3vaw

'Never attribute to malice that which is adequately
  explained by stupidity.' --Hanlon's Razor

----- Original Message -----
From: "Pete Smith" <n4zr at contesting.com>
To: "Ron Notarius WN3VAW" <wn3vaw at fyi.net>; <cq-contest at contesting.com>
Sent: Friday, February 07, 2003 9:06 PM
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] 24 vs 48 - NO NEW CAREGORIES!


At 10:40 AM 2/7/03 -0500, Ron Notarius WN3VAW wrote:
>Jim has a point.
>
>For a 24 hour category to work w/in a 48 hour contest, it would have to be
a
>contiguous 24 hour period.  Exactly which one may be up to the contest
>sponsors (ie UTC Saturday only, UTC Sunday Only, or any given 24 hour
>period) but it needs to be one 24 hour block.  Otherwise the "24 hour" gang
>can cherry pick the bands they want to maximize Q's.


That's exactly why this category is potentially interesting.  The strategic
decisions to be made are part of the fun.


>Or to put it another way, there should be a way of distinguishing, IMHO,
>YMMV, between someone who runs in the 24 Hour category and someone who
>operates 24 Hours in the 48 Hour category.  After all, isn't one of the
>reasons for proposing this category is to accommodate those who only have
>one 24 hour window available to operate on the contest weekend?


No.  It is to encourage people who would only operate 8 or 10 or 12 hours
to make a 24-hour effort, composed of whatever time they can spare or their
bodies will let them do.



73, Pete N4ZR
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