[VHFcontesting] Limited Multi Class

[Bill Olson]

Hi Terry, Long time, how are tyou doing?? I agree with you that the whole 
contest scoring thing needs to be reviewed. As you say, VHF contesting does 
not seem to be an ARRL priority! Not much (contest rules I mean) has changed 
in the last 30 years and it probably should. I guess grid squares for 
multipliers leveled the playing field a little and Rovers did as well. W2SZ 
discoverd that a long time before there was a ROVER category as did the guys 
in Kansas when WB0DRL was scoring so well with Dean, WA0TKJ out in the 
"rover". But the rover class got a whole bunch of people "interested".. and 
that helped everyone.

There still is the geographical location/population density factor, though. 
We have to be careful trying to level the playing field too much. People in 
Wyoming are gonna start whining about not being able to "compete"..! That is 
why the scores are listed by division, so you are really only competing with 
stations within your division and awards are given out accordingly. Well 
they do put that "xxth overall" on the certificate too and list the "top 
ten" or whatever in QST so i guess everyone wants to be in the top ten 
overall.... But that's not the point. Stations in the less favorable 
geographic locations are not going to score as well. That's just the way it 
is. In the end we are all just competing with ourselves, trying to do better 
than last year, or heck, just trying to have fun making the station work, 
work new grids when a bunch of stations are on, etc. It is very frustrating 
at K1WHS Unlimited Multiop in Maine to try to compete with W2SZ and K8GP. We 
really have a killer station, but everything being the same, there's NO WAY 
we can compete. There's a whole lot of OCEAN out there to the east, (and not 
much more to the North!)!!! We do not want a rules change that will make our 
score closer to SZ or GP. How could that be?? Then what about a rules change 
for stations with really small antennas?? How about a rules change for 
stations that cannot operate the whole contest period? How about a category 
for FM only, or, I don't know, a class for really old gear that doesn't work 
very well... hah!

There comes a point where you have a separate category for every station and 
level the playing field so every one gets the same score and a first place 
award. It IS a competition and someone HAS TO to win. It's probably going to 
be the station in the east (that has dumped a lot of time and effort into 
his station), but the fact that it is POSSIBLE for a station in the midwest 
or west to win in June (6M factor) or a station in Calif to win (with the 
population density factor), makes it exciting. Plus as far as i remember, 
WA8WZG still has some overall records from Northern Ohio... (of course that 
ain't Wyoming!!) At K1WHS we know we have little chance of beating you guys 
on the "Knob", but it's fun to try and there are small victories like more 
grids on 1296 or something... But I'll repeat, we really don't expect the 
rules to be changed so we can win.. I guess I just plain have a problem with 
TOO many entry categories. I can see it getting to a point where every 
station has it's own category (Limited Multiop, portable, Medium Power, East 
coast, etc etc..)

As far as increased QSO points for the higher bands. I agree this needs to 
be looked at as well. There's a lot of new gear out there that makes it easy 
to get on. But I think the argument that the increased points adds incentive 
for stations to get on a new band (and we DO want to increase activity on 
the higher bands) is still valid. Yes, you can buy a ready made rig for 1296 
or heck even for 47GHz but it is still tricky (relatively speaking) to get 
it going and actually work someone with it. Just look at the qso totals and 
grid totals on the higher bands  and you will see. These totals would 
probably be less if there wasn't the pooint incentive. Now having double 
point value for 220 and 432, I don't know.. so I agree the whole thing needs 
to be looked at. And I wonder if it changes the ultimate result anyway, You 
don't see anyone entering the limited multi category with JUST 
903,1296,2304,3456, right? So it must be harder to score there EVEN with the 
increased Q points.

So I'm rambling. Just wanted to voice some of the stuff *I* have been 
thinking about!! So now I guess we've opened up a can of worms, but as long 
as Dan at ARRL reads this, it is probably useful.

Bill, K1DY (exW3HQT)





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