[CQ-Contest] Trending contest activity

[kr2q at optonline.net]

Interesting thread and numbers.  I like the suggestion of tracking scores.  Looking at mults wouldn't hurt either.  One caution.  Be sure to compare apples to apples in terms of SFI.That is, look at activity which is in 11 year  blocks (~2006 to ~1995 or so).  The CQWWDX "handbook" had a plot like that (as I recall) and there is a pretty correlation between sfi and activity (number of logs).As for VHF/UHF, as an HF contester, I tried it maybe 20 years ago...rather slow, kinda boring unless you get really psyched by tiny openings which are "cool" by some measure.  On a band like 2m, you have to be a CQ machine and hope to snag the casual Sunday morning types who make "one pass across the band" and turn the rig off.  Compared to HF, you sure do a lot of CQing with relatively very little return.  I just felt like I was rev'ing at 8,000 rpms but only moving at 5kph.  Im sure things may have changed dramatically in the last quarter century.  LOL.de Doug KR2Q