[CQ-Contest] Operating as DX in ARRL DX-Contest

[Alan Braun]

I was one of the 2 operators at V31TP during the recent ARRL DX CW 
contest. It was fun, as usual, but I noticed that an old familiar 
problem was worse than ever this time. I'm sure most people know that 
this contest is DX to W/VE only, NOT DX to DX. However, throughout the 
contest, I found myself being called, repeatedly, by various European 
and Japanese stations.  This always goes on in this contest, but it was 
FAR worse this time than ever before. More stations doing it, more 
persistence, and at times deliberate QRM'ing of my attempted QSO's with 
W/VE stations. I've always had special keys programmed in TR-log saying 
"no EU" or "no JA", but this year for the first time the offenders 
continually ignored them.

If you are in Europe or Japan, PLEASE UNDERSTAND: When I'm in V3, I 
cannot work you for credit in the contest! If one of you is calling, 
there have to be at least 20 more listening, and if I work one of you, 
I'll immediately have a pile-up of DX stations, and lose my (sometimes 
hard-won) run frequency and my rate. I understand that V3 is relatively 
hard to work on CW from your part of the world, and I try to work as 
many of you outside the contest as I can, but I'm mainly there to do the 
contest and if you interfere with that you will only make me mad. By 
calling on top of my QSO's with W/VE stations and lowering my rate in 
the contest, you're only familiarizing me with your call in an 
unfavorable way, so that you'll be "blacklisted" during my general 
operating time outside the contest. 

I generally try to work 300-500 QSO's with non-NA stations before the 
contest. Unfortunately I wasn't able to do so this time as I injured one 
of my eyes on a wooden post while setting up antennas, and spent most of 
the 2 days before the contest chasing eye doctors rather than DX, or in 
bed due to pain. We did enjoy the contest however, and my personal log 
(V31EV) is already uploaded to LOTW. The contest log will be as well, 
but the other operator (John, WC0W/V31TP) will  be doing that.

Thanks for all the QSO's, both in and out of the contest! And, EU/JA 
stations, PLEASE be patient with the guys doing contest DX operations.

73


Alan NS0B/V31EV
one of the ops for the V31TP operation in 2006 ARRL DX-CW