[SECC] Club Competition

[Kevan Nason]

Not sure where you think what you wrote is criticism, Bill. Although your
message is more elegant and positive, it is basically what I said too. A
few years back I often posted. Looked for and encouraged the very
discussions you say we should be having. I didn't feel there was enough
chatter and exchange of ideas. So, after being frustrated with the lack of
activity for a couple years I reluctantly sought greener pastures and
shifted my energy to a club which provided what I was looking for. The very
thing you say we need. I know for a fact from discussions with others who
no longer participate with the SECC that I am not the Lone Ranger who led
the exodus.

You are right about momentum and Bill Fisher's death. I'm a newcomer
compared to you and others, but I watched it happen too. I think Jeff is
trying to shake things up a bit and try to turn things around. I think that
is wonderful. Past experience has made me doubt enough people will listen
to your message and care enough to change things.

Let me throw out something to consider in regards to Bill's point about
discussion. Hopefully it won't upset people. I'll apologize up front in
case it does.

I give a lot of presentations to groups here in South Carolina. I usually
get two types of responses. People are either enthusiastic or critical. The
critical ones find fault that they didn't learn anything. They're the folk
who have been in the hobby for 40 years, have SO2R stations, two or three
towers, $4,000 radios, etc. An interesting observation about those people
is because they are so knowledgeable and have the best money can buy they
are the leaders of most groups. The ones who are enthusiastic are the
little pistols and newer hams. They often sit quiet and let the critical
people voice their opinions and guide the training topics. In many cases
the quieter people know very little about take off angles and wonder why DX
is so hard to work with a G5RV at 30 ft. They might never have used a VOM,
do not know what common mode current is let alone know how to reduce it,
and think RG8X is a perfectly fine feed line for most anything. It's those
latter people that have the energy and excitement though. They are often
afraid to ask questions and show their ignorance. Those are the people we
need to encourage. That won't happen if us more experienced hams don't open
up and talk about things that are second nature to us. Explain the things
we learned 30 or 40 years back.

Case in point. This is meant to be illustrative and not a " Aren't I great?
" type of thing. I recently gave a Zoom talk to the DDCC about how I ended
up with the vertical antennas I use. They aren't fancy. Just a plain old
160 inverted-L and a 40/80 elevated vertical. I started it out by saying if
your station includes four squares and multiple towers you won't get much
out of this talk. Nothing extraordinary was presented. I am not an expert
on them so couldn't answer some questions. I just regurgitated what other
smart people figured out. Discussion was active during and after the talk.
A couple days afterwards I read a comment involving two experienced
contesters. They thought it to be pretty simplistic. Fine. It was simple. I
wanted it to be for two reasons. First is because I don't know enough for
it to be new and exciting information for Hams with 40 years experience and
Electrical Engineering degrees. More importantly, I wanted to share what I
had learned with those new and excitable Hams who had no idea
about that information. I received several emails from newer hams saying
they loved it. One guy wanted to use some slides in a presentation he is
giving to his local Illinois club -- which is not a contest club. Others
asked my opinions of how to make their stations better thinking I know much
more than I do. The DDCC posted it on YouTube. Word got around because it
now has over 500 views. Someone in the Norfolk Amateur Radio Club (NARC) in
the UK saw it and contacted the DDCC asking for it to be given to them.
They  reciprocated and are giving talks to the DDCC.

My point is people are hungry for the basics and us experienced folk ain't
givin' em what they want. Too many of us are focused on squeezing out 1
more dB and forget many out there still have plenty of low hanging fruit
within easy reach. You don't need to know a lot to pass on information to
those who know very little. We need to open up and share what we know
with newer Hams and Contesters. To not be afraid of criticism from
stating the obvious. Besides camaraderie, that is why most people join a
contest club -- to hear about the things you mention Bill -- and it is why
they leave when they don't get it. I'm doing my best to give it to them
by sharing my mistakes and triumphs. I just do it somewhere else now
because when I tried to get it from the SECC it seemed they weren't
interested.

Kevan N4XL

On Tue, Nov 10, 2020 at 7:51 PM Bill Coleman <aa4lr at arrl.net> wrote:

> I don’t mean to be critical of either Kevan or Jeff here, but I just want
> to point something out.
>
> Part of the problem with having activity in the SECC is that people are
> posting their activity to other groups.
>
> You’d have more activity in the SECC if these other groups weren’t such a
> distraction.
>
> I’ve been a member of the SECC since it’s inception. I think the club lost
> some of its momentum when Bill Fisher W4AN passed.
>
> One thing Bill did was encourage people to operate. Didn’t have to be big
> scores, just makes some Qs. I think that’s what we need. A tail twister.
>
> Another thing which might be helpful is to have more useful discussion on
> the reflector — which is, honestly, our clubhouse.
>
> Any one doing anything interesting? Any station improvements?
> Contemplating any persona goals for upcoming contests?
>
> Perhaps have some discussion about operating techniques, challenges, etc.
>
> If we are having discussions, perhaps we’d be more accountable to each
> other.
>
>
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