[CQ-Contest] re: TO ID OR NOT ID - WHY YOU NEED TO GET THAT CALL NOW!

[Robert Shohet]

Hi Kelly,

I have to strongly disagree with most of what you said.  I will elaborate.

FIRST, when you are operating in a contest you have to figure out whether
you are:

1) A Casual participant
2) A Competitor, or,
3) A SERIOUS competitor.

#2 and #3 are terms relative to your category, geographic area, station
quality and level of experience
and commitment (and EGO).  :-)

Your suggestions are great for the operator in category #1 and some who are
in category #2.

However for a serious competitors (Category #3) and most of the competitors
in Category #2,
what you suggest does not work and would lead to LOWER scores..

In order to REALLY compete, you must work EVERYTHING, and I mean EVERYTHING!

If I mult shows up for 10 minutes before being overwhelmed by packet
callers, YOU MUST FIND HIM!
When he is gone, he is GONE!  That roaring pileup where the DX station is
not iding may be that rare
double mult that you need.  Or it could be a weird path open at a weird time
and you are at a propagation
disadvantage but this is the only time you may hear that mult or station on
that band.  YOU MUST WORK HIM!

You can't just tune by later.  He will be gone 9 times out of 10 and your
competition will have worked him.

SCORE ADVANTAGES ARE BUILT ONE MULT AT A TIME!
SCORE ADVANTAGES ARE BUILT ONE QSO AT A TIME!

As you are piling up 1000 q's and 130 countries on the same band, the effort
required to find that new Q or
mult is increasing geometrically.  Of course, so is the impact of that
additional Q or Mult on your score.

YOU MUST CONSTANTLY TUNE AND FIND NEW PEOPLE TO WORK.

When you have already worked out the band for the 20th time, you are mostly
left with the Dx stations
that come and go quickly.  10 minutes later and they will likely be gone
because you don't know how long they
have already been there, how frustrated they already are and whether or not
their antenna fell down, they are
off to church, feel like turning on the "FUTBOL" game, have a beer, take a
dump, whatever.  You must work
them when you hear them!  And when you hear them you MUST get their call!

I am sure that DX contests are not like this in VE4, but in New England this
is how you must operate because
their are 5 or 6 other highly talented, highly skilled and highly motivated
ops at BIG STATIONS who have
put their life and career and family on hold for the purpose of working
everything they hear on 2 radios
for an entire weekend.  THIS IS COMMITMENT!  In fact, many of them "commute"
from out of state
just to operate!

I do not mean to imply that only in New England do the top ops make this
level of commitment.  Top ops
(a.k.a.  SERIOUS competitors) make this level of commitment wherever and
whenever they operate from.
However in New England, the density of SERIOUS competitors in a DX contest
is much higher than anywhere else in
the country.  You can be 4th in Connecticut and 5th in the US!

Let me give you an analogy to the Indy 500....

You seem to be saying:  It is ok if you don't have quite enough room to pass
on Turn 3 of lap 198.  You have plenty of laps left to find
other opportunities to pass.

The SERIOUS competitor (Category 3 guy) is thinking, there isn't quite
enough room to comfortably pass and my car feels a little slow, but I can't
just sit here and hope that things get more favorable,  I better MAKE them
more favorable and get in there and try to create some daylight NOW because
this may be my BEST opportunity to pass!

A category 2 guy may be thinking about a lot of those things, but he DOESN'T
have to act (attempt the pass).
A category 1 guy is there to have fun.

I won't get into all the other things that the Serious competitor is
thinking, except that he has already considered the style of the other
driver, the conditions of the track and the conditions in particular exactly
where he will attempt the pass, the condition of the car, his reflexes,
weather, and 100 other things.  In these split-seconds he is ALSO thinking
about when he passes, how he can multiply his advantage to get ahead and put
pressure on the guys ahead of him and set up his next pass. He is ALWAYS
WORKING AND THINKING AHEAD.  HE NEVER STOPS!  NOT EVEN FOR 10 SECONDS!

This is why serious competition is so exhausting.  The effort required EVERY
SECOND AND EVERY MINUTE is geometrically greater than making that same
effort for 30 seconds out of every minute.

A category 2 guy may be thinking about a lot of those things, but he DOESN'T
have to act (attempt the pass).
A category 1 guy is there to have fun.

Getting back to radio contests....

If you run across 500 frequencies in the course of 48 hours (not much per
hour) where you have to "fight" to get that call, and you get   450 of those
calls, you will probably make 200 additional q's with another 50 mults.
That alone can be the difference between being 1st and 4th place in a
contest category.  If you can successfully pass some of those mults to
another band, you have increased you advantage even further (kind of like a
"bonus round" on a game show".

All things being equal (they never are) the op that works the hardest and
the smartest, WINS!  That's why things that less serious ops think are
marginal for score, are seized on by the SERIOUS op because he knows that he
can capitalize in areas where others are less willing to work as hard for
meager gains (like getting that station to ID).

I hope that this makes more sense to you know.

73
Bob KQ2M