Add to Your DXCC

What would a weekend be without a contest? Boring? Eh, depends on the individual and their interests when it comes to amateur radio. This weekend brings the ARRL International DX Contest (Phone) beginning 0000 UTC Saturday and ending 2400 UTC Sunday. I don’t plan on putting much of an effort into this contest on Saturday since I will be at work at the start of the contest until about 0700 UTC. I am not sure what sort of luck I will have on 40/80M with the SteppIR BigIR and the Alpha in line on phone. I will have to look back on previous phone contests and see where most of my activity came from. I highly doubt 40/80M will yield much, but I will probably put in a few hours to close out Saturday night.

Sunday bring much more of the same for me, as the over 30 soccer league begins again. This will leave me less than 4 hours on Sunday in which to participate. I know N6RO was looking for interest to man his super station, but it seems many are putting off commitments until WPX (phone) at the end of the month. I was going to offer my overnight services, but I think I am going to pass on this contest.

Phone for me in general is not my strong mode. Funny, but I remember starting out on HF only wanting to work SSB. This was prior to learning Morse code or using an interface for digital modes like RTTY or PSK31. I enjoy talking on HF and have made quite a few contacts both during contests and just chasing DX I just don’t have the best setup for phone. I figure I will put in a few hours in and hopefully log some new DXCC entities on a few different bands.

It is still my hope to achieve my initial DXCC (mixed) this year. I am will on the way to that award with 75 confirmed to date. Not surprisingly phone is behind RTTY and CW with only 26 confirmed since 2007. With any luck I will be able to get into EU on 15/20/40M and add to my total for phone and mixed.

Regardless of what happens I will look at putting up a realistic goal this weekend since I will not have much time to participate in the contest.