Topband: The "Contest" this past weekend

[Jon Zaimes AA1K]

I worked 72 DX stations in the contest, including 44 Europeans (mostly G, DL, F, I, PA, OZ, OK, OE, SP -- no Russians), .3 Africans (CN, EA8, EA9), one KH7 and one LU.

This was an all-band single-op entry, so with one exception it was mostly a multiplier band. I worked 31 stations the first night -- fairly evenly spread over the course of the evening, with 7 in the 05z hour and 9 in the 09z hour. Conditions were good to Europe the first night and the band was quiet.

The second night was quite different -- QRN sounded like mid-summer and didn't work anyone on the band till 03z hour. At 04z I had pretty much pulled what I could from the noise on the low bands so decided to take my first nap of the contest. Woke up 45 minutes later to find the QRN gone and European signals quite good on 160. Ended up making this the "run" band and spending the whole 05z hour there and working 22 stations, mostly Europeans. 9 more stations in the 06z hour.

73/Jon AA1K
www.aa1k.us