[WWYC] sprint notes

[zoltan.pitman at vodafone.com]

Hi guys & gals,

Last weekend I did my first sprint and in summary it was fun. Actually it
was painful, especially the first hour but it was still fun. 

I considered it a learning experience and used alt-n frequently. I started
the contest with some ideas learned from the writeups and how-to's like that
of N6TR and W4AN. Too bad I couldn't find back Bill's old Sprint recordings
- they would have been great for warm-up. I ended up realizing that most of
the ideas did not work and I have more questions than before. ok, enough of
the intro, here's the story:

I learned that this weekend I would get stuck in PA and thought would ask
around if I could take a local station to guest-op. Luc ON4IA whom I did
some contests like IOTA in 2002 together was kind enough to accept me.
Arriving to his station 2 pm we found out that the rotator of the 20/40m was
broken (shorted cable) and the yagis were fixed to NE. Quick solution was to
have a dipole at 12m with a fat lobe around 25 degs and above. No SO2R, just
a single radio (MP) and a PA. 

The original idea was to use Luc's club's contest call OT4L but found out
that it was not permitted for this contest, so I went for ON/HA1AG. Actually
I thought that the long call would help me to when tailending QSOs and at
least 1AG or AG gets through. I was completely wrong! Most stations asked me
for repeat even at the second QSO...  

I programmed F2 as <call> # zoli on/ha1ag and F3 as <call> on/ha1ag # zoli.
Used F2 when answered cq's and F3 when got called on CQ. The idea was from
Bill Fisher suggesting that the guy coming to the freq will hear my call and
will know that I will be the one to be called.  It did not work here either!
Most stations simply got confused when got the nr where they expected to
hear my call. I heard only G4BUE to do the same. Noticeably top sprinters
like DL6RAI used even the DE between the calls. I never heard anyone asking
Ben for a fill. hmmm.

I thought that sprint will be a contest with speedy CW and set my speeds
accordingly. On 20m where everyone closer than UR, ES, LY, SV, UA was esp or
some strange scatter QRS it was obvious but even on 40 and 80m I often had
to go below 30 wpm. That was a lowlight. 

I don't know (but would like to) know how others play this game. I noticed a
few guys even with big numbers just jumping between two freqs and work the
guys by one on cq. I always tried to work two guys on a freq and keep the
vfo on the freq after the 2nd qso to see if the guy who called the guy whom
I left the freq would be a new one. and got back the same freq. I changed
bands down early and then it seemed to pay off.

IMO, this contest requires as much antenna planning as any dx contest. I
knew the 3 el 40m yagi at 26m fixed to NE would not be ideal but where most
guys are +20, S9 was not enough despite the HP. Next time I would be better
off with an other low dipole. The Yagi worked vy fb though, E21EIC called me
on 40 (with 002!) but I4's were tough to get. Doing this contest from HA 20m
would be even more tough.

Digging out LP stations from the noise especially the QRS-types was made
difficult by stations landing on the freq starting CQ. (I did it at least
twice accidentally , sry Ulf!). Sending by paddle was helpful then but still
those QSOs took looong time. Sometimes I wished they did not even called
me... :(

This time I did 1 radio but I see room for SO2R. I think the Sprint is not
really for the ptt-controlled audio switch but more for the constant audio
splitup. I'm very curious to know how SO2Rers do their magic in Sprint. 

some statistics: 97 calls altogether and I heard about 5-6 more I did not
contact. I think the contest could use some popularity...

Thanks for reading it so far, and hpe2cu in autumn,

zoli ha1ag (of)







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