[CQ-Contest] TQP vs CQ RTTY

[Charles Morrison]

> Date: Tue, 2 Oct 2007 21:29:23 -0400
> From: "ku8e" <ku8e at bellsouth.net>
> Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] TQP vs CQ RTTY
> To: <cq-contest at contesting.com>
> Message-ID: <000601c8055c$d4eab1e0$6101a8c0 at jeffclarke>
> Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="iso-8859-1"
> 
> W4TV wrote :
> 
> These are major international RTTY contests and activity will spread
> as needed to find room and avoid other contest QRM.  RTTY contest
> activity has probably increased by at least ten fold in the last
> ten years.  What new blood there is in contesting is much more
> familiar with computers than CW and the trend will only continue
> to accelerate.
> 
> 
>    I sure hope this trend reverses. It just shows how getting rid of
> the CW requirement and making it easier to get an amateur license has
> ruined our hobby. It's not surprising that modes like RTTY, that
> require minimal operating skills are growing.
> 

With a wink to K1AR, I'll tell you what I think:

Like Joe says Jeff, different strokes for different folks.  I'll give you my
perspective.  My reason?  I'm competitive.  My choice of mode?  RTTY, and
like you said, it was easy!  Because I work in the computer industry as a
network consultant, I walked into the RTTY forum in Dayton a few years back
after an absence in Ham Radio altogether.  I watched George W1ZT and Don
AA5AU give a great forum on RTTY and RTTY contesting.  They explained in
great detail how to get started, what was required and the fun that you
could have.  So I walked out of the forum, bought a copy of Writelog and
began experimenting.  I improved my technique, I improved my station, I
built the interfaces, I assembled the software and customized its settings.
I set out to improve my score.  I gathered a group of friends, none of whom
EVER contested, and we ran a M/2 in Roundup.  Didn't do all that well, but
that left room for improvement.  

2 things came out of that M/2.  One was that I'd gotten 3 new people into
contesting, and second was that the next few contests, I steadily improved,
until I won one of each of them.  Roundup, Sprints, NAQP, and CQWW.  I made
new friends at Dayton, people who recognized my call (your friends from Ga
in the SECC), and have had a great time.  But what should be important about
all of this to you is that, you know what it did?  It fueled my desire to
move over to CW and SSB contesting!  That's right, more stations for YOU
Jeff, to work in CW and/or SSB contests.  W5WMU invited me to work the NAQP
SSB contest, and we're getting better.  Tough competition in the M/2
category, but we're working on it.  I've also delved into the CW contests,
but at 20 WPM, its hard to work some of the elitist stations that insist on
Sunday when they need Q's that they still need to send exchanges at 35 WPM.

So if you need a valid reason for RTTY being an easy entry into contesting,
you should be happy in that some of the people who enter the easy way may
move up to help you out in your CW contests.  None the less, with the ease
of operating it, the proliferation of computers, and the current trend to
more and more RTTY logs being turned in, the amount of RTTY stations will
only increase.  Some people may call it progress, others may call it a
hindrance, but the fact remains that these issues are going to continue
regardless of how much either party complains one way or the other.

As for the emergency operating technique theory, never once crossed my mind.
That's not my bag, may be for some, but not for me.  I do it for the
competition and my main goal each and every contest is to win, period.

Charlie
KI5XP