[CQ-Contest] A public thanks to CQP (and others who've tossed the MAR mult away)

[Yuri]

Barry, the term is known, but that's not the reason to discriminate HAMs 
who happen to live there (myself included).
Having Ontario North, South and East - why not add Ontario West or 
Ontario Centre? It would look pretty logical to a lot of people (again, 
myself included).
There was no any valid explanation for calling it GH, except that "RAC 
Emergency communication people needed it".
Our own Radio Amateurs of Canada seems to have its decision written in 
stone.
We had this discussion on out CCO reflector where RAC officials were 
offered to operate in a couple of Contests (especially Field Day!) and 
use GH as an exchange, but it seems that contest community does not 
exist for RAC.

Sorry for raising this issue, but Mike's message brought it to my mind.
We just had our section called "GTA" for a few years before renaming it 
to "GH", so there's hope we'll have it finally changed, as it happened 
with MAR.

73, Yuri VE3DZ

On 9/28/2023 7:06 PM, Barry Jacobson wrote:
> Yes, I asked a non-ham cousin from Toronto if they knew what the term meant
> and they never heard of it.
>
> Barry WA2VIU
>
> --
> Barry Jacobson
> WA2VIU
> bdj at alum.mit.edu
> @bdj_phd
>
> On Thu, Sep 28, 2023, 6:30 PM Yuri <ve3dz at rigexpert.net> wrote:
>
>>   >>>Ontario Golden Horseshoe GH
>>
>> Hopefully this one will follow MAR's path soon.
>>
>> 73, Yuri VE3DZ
>>
>> On 9/28/2023 3:06 PM, Gerry Hull wrote:
>>> Canada's sections for SS 2023:
>>>
>>> Alberta AB
>>> British Columbia BC
>>> Manitoba MB
>>> New Brunswick NB
>>> Newfoundland and Labrador NL
>>> Nova Scotia NS
>>> Ontario Golden Horseshoe GH
>>> Ontario East ONE
>>> Ontario North ONN
>>> Ontario South ONS
>>> Prince Edward Island PE
>>> Quebec QC
>>> Saskatchewan SK
>>> Territories TER
>>>
>>> I suspect NS will be the rare one and hard to get, especially in SS CW.
>>> Not a lot of active contesters in NS anymore,
>>> and none that I know of that will do Sweepstakes.
>>>
>>> I'll be operating from NB (via remote); N3JT as VY1JT from VY1JA's QTH
>> (via
>>> remote)
>>> 73,
>>>
>>> Gerry W1VE aka VE1RM /VE9 for SS CW
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Sep 27, 2023 at 7:15 PM Paul Bourque <pbourque at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> The MAR section is no longer, effective 1-1-2023. NS and NB have been
>>>> added, as well as PE. The ARRL/RAC section list has been updated to
>> reflect
>>>> that. There’s s link to the contest sections list on the ARRL
>> Sweepstakes
>>>> web page.
>>>>
>>>> Paul Bourque, N1SFE
>>>> ARRL Contest Program Manager
>>>>
>>>> On Wed, Sep 27, 2023 at 4:44 PM JOHN GEIGER via CQ-Contest <
>>>> cq-contest at contesting.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Isn't the MAR "section" still in play for the SS, with only PE split
>> off
>>>>> from it?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> 73 John AF5CC
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Sent using {0}
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> ---- On Wed, 27 Sep 2023 13:07:10 -0500 Mike VE9AA ve9aa at nbnet.nb.ca <
>>>>> ve9aa at nbnet.nb.ca> wrote ---
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Some of this is a little tongue-in-cheek or my weak attempt at humour
>>>>> (it'll hopefully be obvious which parts) so try not to take everything
>>>>> I've written below as too serious.
>>>>> For those of you that are humour impaired, please look away....look
>> away
>>>>> now !
>>>>>
>>>>> A little unrelated to contesting, but did any of you ever watch the
>>>>> Canadian Comedy TV show "Corner Gas" whereby when a neighbouring town
>>>>> name was mentioned(normally Wullerton), all the residents of Dog River
>>>>> present would spit (or fake spit) on the ground?
>>>>> When I hear the acronym "MAR", that's me.  SOME of us guys out East (at
>>>>> least me in particular) almost "hates" MAR (but hate is way too
>>>>> strong......) Very much dislikes the "MAR" designation only as it
>>>>> relates to contesting because I don't live in MAR<spit>, I live in New
>>>>> Brunswick. (or Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island) etc. and MOST
>> contests
>>>>> have always permitted us to send the correct Provincial designation. In
>>>>> the past I didn't always get to play for the home team! (Only SS, ARRL
>>>>> 160, some Sprints and CQP are the ones that come to mind)
>>>>> A few years ago the (various) Sprint folks were very kind to us VE9,
>> VE1
>>>>> and VY2 types and may have been among the first (of the last!) of
>>>>> contests to let us send NB, NS and PE---so another thank you to those
>>>>> movers and shakers !
>>>>> Not long after (actually, Jan 1, 2023), RAC (It's kinda/sorta like the
>>>>> VE version of the ARRL for those readers abroad) finally got rid of the
>>>>> MAR designation (which has absolutely NOTHING to do with contests, I
>>>>> should be careful to mention) and so the last few contests that I am
>>>>> aware of have all adopted the NB, NS and PE designations for mults
>>>>> (partially?) based on the RAC and ARRL finally no longer using
>>>>> it....again MAR as it relates to RAC and ARRL has zero to do with
>>>>> contesting !
>>>>> (there is still some housekeeping work to be done @ ARRL fixing up
>>>>> scores and records, but that's minor)
>>>>> I believe (but stand to be corrected) that the CQP
>>>>> <https://www.cqp.org/Rules.html> CQP Rules
>>>>> which most of us love, was the very last holdout on the World stage to
>>>>> get rid of it. (they called it MR) <spits on ground> :-)
>>>>> Thank you to Chris/N6WM and all those folks in California who have
>>>>> finally permitted us to send NB, NS and PE in your truly great QSO
>>>>> party.
>>>>> So anyways......I am rambling a little bit. I guess I don't have
>>>>> anything left to complain about contesting wise--Geez-what
>>>>> now?......maybe cut #'s in serial # contests? High K indices?
>>>>> Perpetually losing the Poison d'Avril test?  or maybe everyone being
>>>>> zero beat in a big EU pileup on 80m? (1rst World problems from here in
>>>>> the Northeast?)
>>>>> I wish to extend my thanks to all of you to have put up with my minor
>>>>> moaning and groaning over the decades while I worked  (in tandem with
>>>>> others to be sure) to help supply information and reasoning  to those
>>>>> last small handful of contests to move us away from using "MAR" <spit>
>>>>> as a mult.  In the end the situation mostly remedied itself and
>> sponsors
>>>>> like Sprint and CQP agreed to modify their rules on mults. based on
>> what
>>>>> RAC and the ARRL and a few others have done.
>>>>> Now I really AM rambling.
>>>>> Appreciation all around ! ! !
>>>>> Mike VE9AA, current president Maritime Contest Club (MCC) (Is it Ironic
>>>>> our contest club name has that word in it?) haha
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>