[CQ-Contest] Be careful what you wish for

[Matt NQ6N]

I've been sympathetic to many of the ideas shared in this thread, but upon
reading Kelly's defense of the Sweepstakes rules I find myself fully
persuaded.  He's absolutely right.   The playing field is leveled very
effectively by reducing the ability of super-stations to use their all-band
superiority to rack up more QSOs with the same stations.

>From my station, it was easy to make 358 QSOs on 80m, but nearly impossible
to develop a run on 40m.  This is because on 40m my quarter wave vertical
is competing with stacks, whereas on 80m my inverted U is competing mostly
with shunt-fed towers and the occasional four-square. Being in 9-land
doesn't hurt either.

I view Sweepstakes as a challenge of working all the bands dry as much as
possible.  By the end of the contest, the station who has worked the most
bands dry the most effectively is the winner.  This creates a clear
strategic advantage to the SO2R op who is able to tune through the bands
while running on the other radio.

The other benefit of the Sweepstakes status quo is that it lets a station
leverage its biggest strengths.  One does not need to move to 40 at the
same time as everyone else if the rates are good on 40 or 80.  One can move
earlier if 40 is his strongest band, and one can move later if it is his
weakest -- allowing multiple QSOs creates a big incentive for everyone to
move at once to simply re-work each other before the next group band
change, and diminishes the ability of an op to truly maximize his station
to work the most uniques.

The two rule changes I think could have very good consequences are:

- Limit high power to 500W.  40m crowding is the biggest frustration in the
contest, and I think reducing the amount of RF energy on the band as a
whole would help a lot, especially on SSB.

- Create a "Sunday Only" category to attract part-time ops and encourage
Sunday activity.  Many casual ops informally do a "Sunday Only" session,
but are less likely to take it seriously because there is not specific
recognition for this.

In athletics there are marathons and there are sprints.  Slogging through
Sweepstakes Sunday rates is very much analogous to running the last miles
of a marathon.  It takes a great deal of endurance and dedication to do it
and to avoid distraction and boredom and the temptation to quit.

Great discussion, there are many ways that SS is fun and I'm sure the
contest will be fun whether or not any rules change.

73,
Matt NQ6N


On Wed, Nov 8, 2017 at 7:57 AM, Art Peters <k0acp at k0acp.com> wrote:

> Ed,
>
> I have to take exception to your comment, I may be able to see old-Timer
> from where I am, but have only been contesting with any sort of intensity
> for the last 7-years.  SS is
> one of, if not my favorite contest, partly due to my station
> configuration, and partially it is the intricacy of attaining all 83
> sections, which while a lot of work, it is doable.  So I’d have to
> respectfully submit that the great thing about (Ham Radio / America) is
> that everyone is entitled to their opinion...
>
> 73 es God Bless,
>
> Art / K0ACP
>
> Sent from my iPad
>
> > On Nov 7, 2017, at 11:39 AM, Ed Sawyer <sawyered at earthlink.net> wrote:
> >
> > SS has been an old timers contest for as long as I have been contesting -
> > 20+ years.  Virtually no one coming into contesting in the last 2
> decades is
> > a gung ho SS competitor.  The SS group is growing old or dieing off.
> >
> >
> >
> > But don't compare that to most other contests.  CQ WW SSB was amazing.
> Rate
> > meter spending LONG times above 200 and 300 peaks observed numerous times
> > during the weekend.  3000 - 4600 Qs logged by the top 10 US HP and 9000
> Qs
> > logged by 8P5A SOAB HP leader.  CQ WW CW has been no exception in the
> past
> > to be as much if not more volume of Qs than the SSB contest.
> >
> >
> >
> > SS has a problem - that is not debatable.  But SSB contesting and CW
> > contesting don't show signs of problems in most other contests.  In fact
> -
> > until this last year of greatly diminishing sunspots - have been on a
> decade
> > long growth trend globally.
> >
> >
> >
> > Its easy to fix the boredom of SS.  But its not easy to do it and keep it
> > the same old SS.  Choices need to be made.
> >
> >
> >
> > 73
> >
> >
> >
> > Ed  N1UR
> >
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