[VHFcontesting] Contesting ethics for rovers

[aduhawk at comcast.net]

Here's my two cents worth.  Pat, K9ILT and I resurrected family roving in the upper midwest in 1999.  We worked many contests as family rovers until, late on the Thursday night before the  2005 September Contest it was announced that the practice would no longer be allowed.

The concern expressed directly to me was that family roving, when added to pack roving could effect the outcome of a contest.  The new rule changes allow the practice.  We will rove again as a family in the future.  

We run six and sometimes seven bands from the car and have one several certificates for section and division finishes.  There have been a couple of top ten finishes.  When roving as a family while running and gunning through nine or so grids your scores will be lower because it takes more time for two people to make contacts -- especially on the higher bands.  Our scores have never been identical.  Conditions can change rapidly and over the course of a weekend and you can count on missing a few QSOs that the other one gets.

One could bring along a few HTs and have a much higher score by picking up multipliers by having the family members work each other.  Pat and I NEVER worked each other not one time not ever.  For us, it didn't pass the smell test.  We didn't think that it was fair to the other participants.

There aren't any guys out there in striped shirts, so we have to police ourselves, and for the most part -- especially on VHF+ I think that we're pretty darn good about it.

73, Tim, K0PG
-------------- Original message -------------- 
From: jcplatt1 at mmm.com 

> Hi Tom. What you say was true in 2005, but the Rover rules have been 
> changed and one of the changes was to enable the Family Rule. I am looking 
> forward to working both you and Penny from the rover .... maybe Rovermania 
> in August ? Wisconsin, northern Illinois, Iowa & Minnesota have become a 
> hotbed for rovers! 
> 
> 73, Jon 
> W0ZQ/R 
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