[UK-CONTEST] Best Radio & 2m Trophy activity.

[Ray James]

> Jiri Culak wrote:
> > I was running G0KPW station this year and was
> dreadfully disappointed
> > with UK activity. I am not big fan of banning skeds
> over WWConv or KST
> > as it helps small stations to work further distance
> and from my point of
> > view it destroys even now poor UK VHF/UHF activity.

Jiri, from what I am led to believe, the VHF Contest Committee made this decision because there were reports of an isolated number of operators who slipped up and utilised WWConv, KST or DXC to transfer information that would aid completion of a contact. The "numbers" were never disclosed but in their wisdom they decided to crack a nut with a sledgehammer.
Rather than confront, warn or penalise an offender, the VHFCC opted to ban use of such facilities by EVERY UK entrant!
Disqualify the cheats, don't hinder the experimenters.
This not only put UK operators out of kilter with every other country in Europe but at a stroke alienated VHF/UHF operators in the furthest points of the UK. It was hard enough in the past to get folk to beam north or north west for any length of time but their decision was the final straw for me and others who now don't bother or rarely appear. I opted to press my 2m 9 over 9 into service during the weekend just to work some GM portables before giving some points away on 80/40/20m.
   
73 Ray GM4CXM
IO75TW (distance from GB3VHF.....599Km)

PS. VHFCC conducted a fairly in depth consultation earlier this year and it will be interesting to see if they see sense on the issue of sked making on VHF/UHF again.