[CQ-Contest] NCJ Article RE: Sweepstakes Change Suggestions

[Jeff Clarke]

George.
You make some great points but I have a different perspective as someone who has always had a small station. I have no expectations of winning  anything nationally and it's an added bonus if I can just win my section.  The better the rate is the more fun it is.
There seem to be lots of traditionalists out there that don't want change. But they are willing to accept SO2R and using spotting assistance. Why don't they complain about that ruining Sweepstakes?
BTW maybe you can refresh my memory of when someone other than a 5,6,7,VI or PR has won either mode?
Jeff




Jeff ClarkeInformation Technology Professional Ellerslie, Georgia
http://www.ku8e.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffrey-clarke-ga

-------- Original message --------From: George Fremin III <geoiii at kkn.net> Date: 3/17/18  12:57 PM  (GMT-05:00) To: Jeff Clarke <ku8e at ku8e.com> Cc: cq-contest at contesting.com Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] NCJ Article RE: Sweepstakes Change Suggestions 
On Fri, Mar 16, 2018 at 08:32:49PM -0400, Jeff Clarke wrote:

> sums up what I think about the current Sweepstakes rules.  I'm not
> sure why anyone would have a contest that allows you to work
> multiple bands that the rules allow only one contact. Maybe way back
> in the  the early 1900's when SS started there was some advantage to
> this but it's antiquated in today's contesting world.

Restricting stations to working only once in the contest does some
great things.

 - It makes it possible for an entrant to be competitive from year to
   year regardless of the band conditions.

 - It makes it possible for an entrant to pick the best band for his
   station/antennas/location for those conditions and for the
   strengths and weakness of his station and location.

- It makes it possible for small stations to compete with stations
  with much larger antennas or in different parts of the country.  You
  can make the top ten from almost anywhere and you do not need to have
  a huge station with receiving antennas or tall towers to make the top ten.

- It makes it possible to make a top score from WPA with a simple dipole.

If you look at the band breakdowns of the stations from different
parts of the country but with similar scores you will see huge
differences in band counts.  Sometimes you will see a wide variation
even between stations that are near each other - often due to
differences in their stations strengths.

Yes - rates can get slow on Sunday but this is also how those in less
advantaged places can make up some ground - they might not have the
huge rates but they can grind away and pull back up to the the guys
out west that had the huge hours on the high bands at the start.

If your only goal is to make the rates higher for some stations I will
concede that you will likely do that - I am not sure it will make
Sunday a whole lot faster - we will just have huge rates for the first
12 hours and then it will be slow again.  The really good ops can work
each other from their big stations very fast and will just move down
through the bands doing that for the first part of the contest.  The
folks distant from the population centers will rack up huger scores
but those in the middle of the country will never be able to catch up
to them. No longer will the top ten have as much diversity as it does
now.

A word about rates in the SS.

In my experience all contests have slow rates.  I do DX contests from
Texas - the rates get very slow.  Should we allow everyone to work 6
times on each band to get the rates up in DX contests?

So Sunday is slow.  I have always maintained that it is the slow hours
that win contests - it tests the operators skill in knowing what band
he should be on or what things he can do to make that 30 hour into a
45 hour.  That is likely much harder than making 15 more contacts in
your 100 hour.  It makes you dig for the weak ones.  It tests your
will to go on sometimes - it makes it hard. It makes it a challenge to
do well.  I have found that if I do the Sweepstakes to my limit I am
worn out. If contests are in some part designed to test our operating
skills then I submit the Sweepstakes is working very well.  It is a
hard contest. And for me that makes it fun.  If you want to just have
high rates - I suggest you fire up a simulator or go be DX in a DX
contest (at least for some hours until it gets slow).

One of the things that I have come to appreciate about the various
contests is that they are not all the same. If they were I think it
would be sad. I like that the rules have variation.  I do not want to
do the same contest each weekend with the same winners.  In my mind
the SS gets a lot right in being a fun contest from all locations.

So far I have made serious entries in the SS from
NTX
STX
MT
SCV
OH

I hope to do it from some other places in the coming years. 

One additional aside about SS rates - with the long exchange I am not
sure what the CQ WW DX contest equivalent rate is.  I think the top
rate on SS SSB is somewhere just slightly above 200/hr.  So what does
that make 25 or 30 hours equal to?  I am not sure.  maybe we could
make some guess just based on exchange length differences.

-- 
George Fremin III - K5TR
geoiii at kkn.net
http://www.kkn.net/~k5tr