[UK-CONTEST] EU Sprint CW - G0MTN

[Lee Volante]

Hi all,

This week I did end up away from the radio for a little time.  It was a
little bit blustery in the Midlands, and I didn't fancy winding the mast up
for the little yagi.   The windom centre was still propped up however, but I
was quite alarmed to see the support bending and swaying about.   At one
point the inverted vee was about thirty degrees off the horizontal which was
putting me off the exchanges as I looked out of the window to see what would
happen next !  After a little mucking around in the garden, throwing more
bricks onto the base of the support, I took the prop down and carried on,
hopefully avoiding breaking any antennas.

I guess I suffered a bit with more restricted antennas, but there's no
denying the main problem was me !   Like Ed SQX, Sprint paranoia seemed to
set in.  I could be tuning up and down, finding dupe after dupe, or waiting
for a QSO to end, and then getting pipped to the post after their CQ, and
easily 5 minutes (an eternity!) might go by without a QSO.   I was getting
wound up a bit and then started to fluff some of the exchanges.  I guess
with SO2R all the while whilst I've was busy going no-where on one band, a
steady stream of CQs could have been sent on another band.  I must get out
of the habit of 'needing' to reply to a CQ after I've just QSY'd - if after
a couple of minutes I've not found anyone suitable, I should try calling CQ.

There were almost too many G stations (!) - I know of at least three I heard
going by, but never managed to get them into the log on 40m or 80m.  Very
good fun - four hours of intense concentration.

20m: 56 Q
40m: 67 Q
80m: 31 Q

Total: 154 Q

TS850 + A1000 + lower than normal windom @ 18 feet waving in the breeze

Lee G0MTN