Originally printed in the NCJ, September/October 2003
Midwest “Antz” Invade Contests!
by Paula Uscian, K9IR
K9ir@arrl.net
Air travelers refer to the part of their
journey over the midwestern US as “The Big Flyover.” Radio
waves, especially the DX variety, also have treated the
heartland this way since Marconi’s first transmission.
Within this bleak RF environment, however, several
outstanding radio contest operators have been nurtured. NT1N
(ex-NU9R), K4JA (ex-KS9K) and W4AN (ex-KM9P) each developed
successful contest skills operating from the Midwest before
moving to the relatively easier pickings available from
being closer to either coast.
Many hardy souls, however, continue to
contest from the central states. In early 1985, a group of
them formed the Society of Midwest Contesters (SMC) “with
the goal of uniting Midwest contesters into a competitive
group, and to further the idea of radiosporting in the
Midwest.... The intent is to make the society competitive
with the best big clubs in America,” wrote Steve Dubberstein,
K9WO (then NA9D), the club’s first president, in the June
1985 newsletter. Steve named the newsletter The Black Hole
and explained “those who have contested from the Midwest
realize that we have not been blessed with the same
propagation as our fellow citizens in other parts of the
country. At times, it is actually like being in a ‘black
hole’ of propagation. Being at somewhat of a disadvantage is
no excuse; however, and we must try that much harder in
order to do better than those elsewhere. Hopefully, the name
of the newsletter will be a constant reminder of this.”
By September 1985, the club had 51
members from Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin, and gained
ARRL affiliation. K9WO set as one of the first goals “to
submit more than 50 entries in the SS for the Society. By
doing this we will appear ‘out of the blue’ in the UNLIMITED
category— an impressive move, to say the least.” Impressive
and ambitious, as it would require nearly every club member
at the time to participate. The membership responded by
winning the ARRL Sweepstakes Unlimited class in both 1985
and 1986.
A Star is Born Paul Gentry, K9PG,
recognized it later as one of those life-defining moments,
the spring day in 1981 when his father brought home a CB
radio. Five years later, after running down the car’s
battery talking for nearly six hours to every “good buddy”
from Channels 1 to 23, Paul became licensed as KA9VAK. By
1987, he had upgraded to Technician, and met Scott Pederson,
N9FZO (now KI5DR), and his roommate Dave Patton, then NU9R,
while at college. K9PG acknowledging the SMC Recognition
Award.
In October 1988, Dave invited Paul and
Scot t on a contester’s road tr ip to Hannibal, Missouri, to
operate CQ WW SSB from the home of CQ Contest Hall of Fame
member Lew Gordon, K4VX.
Paul didn’t make any contacts on that
visit, but returned twice more to operate before running the
1989 ARRL 10 Meter contest from K4VX as Single-Operator SSB.
Motivated by the contesting bug, Paul had upgraded by then
to Amateur Extra and joined SMC.
The St Charles Epiphany
Over the years, SMC members had
continued to promote contesting, often assembling teams to
win NAQP or Sprints. By 2000, membership had grown to 120.
The club’s early Sweepstakes successes, however, had not
been duplicated. It was against this backdrop that Paul
became SMC president in 2000. For a time, K9PG’s e-mails had
ended with the line “People said I couldn’t do it...so I did
it.” Never was this attitude more evident than in August
2000 at an SMC dinner in St Charles, Illinois, when the
subject of Sweepstakes came up. As Paul describes the
moment, “I got this crazy idea in my head for the SMC to go
for the Unlimited title. I remember K9NW looking at me l ike
I was crazy…then someone else said that it’s
impossible…can’t be done. That was all the motivation that I
needed.”
Paul proceeded to spend at least four
hours a day, seven days a week, for the next two months
spreading the word about SMC, signing up new members,
sending out and answering literally thousands of e-mails,
and generally getting everyone pumped up to win Sweepstakes.
Membership tripled to over 300 members.
The result was what Paul described as
his “most memorable moment in contesting” when he received
on behalf of SMC the 2000 Sweepstakes championship gavel at
the following year’s Dayton Contest forum.The club not only
won Sweepstakes Unlimited that year; it broke the 1997
Unlimited Club score record held by the Potomac Valley Radio
Club (PVRC).
Repeat
SMC’s 2000 Sweepstakes win surprised
the contest world and the club’s score nudged out the
nearest contender, the Nor thern California Contest Club (NCCC),
by less than 500,000 points. Both NCCC and PVRC pledged to
topple SMC in 2001. K9PG and the gang were just as
determined to show their previous win was no fluke. A
galvanized SMC membership joined Paul to further augment
their ranks and participation level. The result was a repeat
Sweepstakes win, this time by a convincing margin of over 4
million points.
The ARRLWeb summary of the 2001
competition, however, rained a bit on the SMC parade when i
t stated “Club competitions in contests are a bit like
political leadership conventions: the competitor who sells
the most party memberships wins. So it should surprise
nobody that the Society of Midwest Contesters (SMC), emerged
victorious” with 342 entries, versus 159 from NCCC, the
nearest competitor. The article characterized the 2001
results as “quantity vs. quality,” and noted the call signs
of several prominent NCCC contest operators while ment
ioning not one f rom SMC (see www.arrl.org/members-only/contests/
results/2001/SS-PH/clubs.html).
This commentary prompted SMC member
Mike Kasrich, AJ9C, to compare the club’s outstanding member
participation to an army of ants—or “antz” as he phrased it.
“Antz!” became the rallying cry for the next year’s effort,
and graced e-mails and a limited-edition pin in a show of
club solidarity. Given concerns over the future of Amateur
Radio, SMC should have been applauded, if not rewarded, for
successfully encouraging greater contest participation and
overall interest in the hobby.
Three-Peat
The momentum from the previous years’
wins, plus some lingering irritation over the League’s
comments, propelled SMC’s planning effor ts for the 2002
Sweepstakes such that K9PG no longer had to spearhead the
effort. To encourage increased participation and QSOs per
log, many SMC members recruited new members, encouraged
their colleagues to pledge contest QSO goals on the club Web
site, and offered prizes for the highest mode scores and
largest percentage increases over last year’s score. The
heat was on, as PVRC and NCCC vowed that this was the year
theywould take back the gavel. The result was a third
consecutive SMC victory by an even greater margin. Again,
the ARRLWeb commented, “That SMC has such a large lead (22.4
million points to 15.6 million) is in no small way related
to the lead it has in contesters (387 vs 183). But on an
average basis, Mad River [Radio Club] comes out on top, with
103.5k points per team club member vs. 57.8k for SMC....
Just like party leadership conventions, it’s the club with
the most points, SMC, that wins, regardless of membership.”
(see www.arrl.org/members-only/contests/ resul ts/2002/Nov-Phone-SS/
index. html).
K9PG addressed this debate by first
recalculating SMC’s score using only the top SMC CW and SSB
logs up to the same number of logs submitted by NCCC and
PVRC for each mode. The results didn’t change—SMC remained
the winner. Paul then recalculated scores based on the
required number of logs to enter the Sweepstakes club
Unlimited category. Using the top 50 logs from each mode
(100 total), SMC scores again topped both NCCC and PVRC.
Only calculations using 25 logs per mode (50 total) put NCCC
on top, but as Paul noted “in my mind that doesn’t mean much
since 50 logs puts you in the medium category, and that’s
not what we’re competing in.” Case closed.
How’d They Do It?
For K9PG, it’s all about having fun. He
takes his inspiration from a comment by Bill Fisher, W4AN:
“Imagine how many more people we would have to work if each
one of us got just one other person involved in contesting!”
That statement is at the core of Paul’s success in
resuscitating SMC.
Numerous club members mention his
tireless efforts at recruiting new participants to the
contest ranks. Paul has convinced people from all walks of
amateur life—DXers, VHFers, rag chewers—to give contesting a
try.
For example, Clay Melhorn, N9IO, is a
self-described “dyed in the wool rag chewer and occasional
DXer.” In 1999, he and his daughter Crystal, W9IOU, worked
multi-op as their first effort in Sweepstakes Phone. Paul
saw the published results, contacted N9IO and invited his
family to submit the next logs as SMC members. Clay, his
wife and kids have competed in Sweepstakes since then,
encouraged by SMC camaraderie in which “The big guns are
more than willing to share their tips and secrets, to the
benefit of the group.” Even more important, K9PG brings a
personal touch. Sam Effinger, K9SD, observes that “Paul
talks to almost everyone. That makes it personal, not just a
generic e-mail, and encouraged us to help each other. We
enjoy a feeling of being a par t of something, with no
‘cliques’ but everyone working as part of a team. If you
have wires and 100 watts, you are just as important as any
Big Gun. Paul made it fun.”
This reaching out to each individual
doesn’t stop once the contest starts. Chuck, KI9A, notes
that “During a contest, [Paul] will stop me several times
during the weekend,...ask how I am doing, [and] suggest I
need more mults, QSOs, different band, etc. He has no doubt
made me a better contester.” “[Paul] always has time to say
‘Hi Gary’ when I work him in a contest” recalls Gary Hext,
K4UU.
Brian Maves, K9QQ/KH6, emphasizes a key
characteristic of SMC that Paul’s leadership has reinforced.
“From the first year, we always stressed that we were a club
for all contesters, not a ‘big gun’ or ‘prestige’ oriented
club. Everyone has always felt comfortable as part of the
group and we’ve successfully avoided developing rifts and
some of the other self-destructive behavior that tends to
ruin clubs.” K9QQ/KH6 also points out how the Internet and
e-mail have helped. “Even though we’re geographically spread
out, it allows us to come together as a group and keep
everybody involved and informed.” Hardly a day goes by
without an e-mail posting on the SMC reflector, regardless
of any scheduled contest.
Added to that is Paul’s motto that
“Every QSO counts,” which motivates members like Mike Brown,
K9MI, to “fire up the rig and get as many Qs in as I can.”
Relentless recruiting, infectious enthusiasm, the personal
touch, an inclusive membership that recognizes each member’s
contribution is vital to the team, sharing ideas, taking
advantage of enabling technologies and most of all keeping
it fun—these are the elements that K9PG has brought,
encouraged or leveraged to rebuild a successful contest
club. Regular in-person gatherings at hamfests and an
outstanding hospitality suite at Dayton also have helped
sustain the buzz. And don’t forget those antz! It also is
worth observing what Paul and SMC haven’t done to rejuvenate
the club. No newsletters have been issued for the last few
years, and the “President’s Corner” on the Web site is
blank. Dues requirements resemble Montana speed laws—
whatever one feels is appropriate. Paul is as modest as his
colleagues are effusive, however, regarding what he has done
for SMC and how much they appreciate it. He views his
efforts as nothing anyone else couldn’t have done.
What’s Next?
For SMC, a Sweepstakes four-peat is the
obvious goal. Ratcheting their game a notch would be to
capture Sweepstakes and the ARRL 160- and 10-Meter
competitions in the same season. Propagation on the
“Gentleman’s Band” actually favors the heartland, and SMC
has won this contest in the past. Ten meters is another
story, however, and would require the score doubling that
results from mixed mode participation to nail the hat trick.
Unfortunately, the physics of the Black Hole won’t allow for
a serious club run at a CQ WW title.
SMC membership is over 500, and K9PG
sees no reason why it can’t double in the next year. With
many members sharing the tasks of keeping the club strong
and competitive, Paul has no concerns SMC has grown too
reliant on his contributions.
In the midst of his intense activity on
behalf of SMC, Paul won both the 2003 ARRL DX Phone and CW
contests operating as WP3R in the Single Operator-All
Band-High Power category. He also appears to have set a new
world record in March with 460 phone QSOs in one hour,
breaking the previous mark of 457 set by N5TJ in the 1993 CQ
WW Phone contest. His next goal—a single op CQ WW win. K9PG
has been successful in both team and solo contest
operations, but as reflected in his work with SMC, Paul most
enjoys the team aspects of working with friends in
multi-operator contesting. And the contest achievement of
which he’s most proud is organizing the effort to lead SMC
to its surprise Unlimited title in the 2000 Sweepstakes.
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