Topband: November 30-December 2 -- ARRL 160 Meter Contest

[Shoppa, Tim]

After the Thurs night NCCC NS sprint I called CQ on 160 and worked two guys who were on 160 for their first time ever. One was there to see what it's like before the ARRL 160 and the other was there because he noticed the swarm of NS'ers just a few minutes before. Both were loading up into whatever wire they had for other bands.

I myself am a 160 newbie. Ham for 36 years but my first 160 QSO was just over a year ago. The contests, even little events like NS, be they fair or not, help draw folks in.

I think perhaps more promotion of TBDC would be appropriate. QST will always pay more attention to the ARRL 160 but we have many other channels to push TBDC, I found out about it through WA7BNM's contest calendar.

Tim N3QE.

----- Original Message -----
From: Tree [mailto:tree at kkn.net]
Sent: Friday, November 30, 2012 09:32 AM
To: Eddy Swynar <deswynar at xplornet.ca>
Cc: TopBand List <topband at contesting.com>; herbs at vitelcom.net <herbs at vitelcom.net>
Subject: Re: Topband: November 30-December 2 -- ARRL 160 Meter Contest

On Fri, Nov 30, 2012 at 6:07 AM, Eddy Swynar <deswynar at xplornet.ca> wrote:

At that time, I established a dialogue with one of the committee members
> who was situated in western Canada: as I recall, Frank had success in
> expressing his concerns to him, but I don't recall the outcome of your
> efforts. Did you, in fact, make a connection to the CAC through that
> particular window of opportunity...?


CAC members have a fairly limited role in situations like this.  They are
only called in to "advise" on specific questions that are handed down from
HQ.  They then go off and collect data on those questions.  Think of them
as survey coordinators who collect data from members of their division and
roll that up into a report that goes back to HQ.

The ARRL160 isn't everyone's cup of tea.  It does however have a fairly
long history as being an event that gets people in the USA and Canada fired
up and on topband..  It is sort of like the ARRL Sweepstakes - but only on
160 meters.  DX QSOs are allowed - but it isn't an international contest
really.  It is a very boring contest from Zone 21 for example.

If we engineered all contests to be "perfect" from one perspective - all
contest would end up being the same.  I don't think it is that bad of a
deal that we have three different 160 meter contests that are all different
- and you can decide which ones are the ones you want to participate in.
If you feel there is something missing from this equation - I invite you to
sponsor a 4th one and then see if people "vote with their feet" and
participate in the event.

73 Tree N6TR
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