Repeater Sprint Contest and Practice  --  4-April-2020

It's a contest!

Your objective is simple:  Earn as many points as possible by contacting as many people as possible in 2 hours, on a variety of repeaters throughout the county, and accurately and legibly log the information they provide.

Certificates will be issued for the following:

• 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place overall score
• 1st place score within each city
• 1st place score on each repeater
• (county staff are not eligible for a certificate)

To Participate:  You don't have to compete to participate. But ***DO*** follow the rules (see below) so that you say the right things, copy the correct information, and properly share the frequencies with the other participants.

To Compete:  Send in your log (see the rules). You don't have to compete to participate. But why not? You get to see where you stand. And the per-city and per-repeater high score awards give even smaller stations a good chance to win.

Contesting and emergency communications have a lot in common. To be successful at either you need to:

• Copy call signs and information correctly
• Log information accurately and legibly (if it can't be read by someone else, it didn't happen)
• Operate quickly (but accuracy is more important)
• Follow procedures (rules)

This exercise will emulate a "sprint"-style contest. The key objectives are:

• Practice copying call signs
• Practice logging key information accurately and legibly
• Gain experience using multiple frequencies
• Learn how far your antenna can reach
• Have fun!

Saturday, April 4th, 10:00 - 12:00 Pacific

This contest takes place only on repeaters. This lets people with just an HT still participate in a huge way.

• If you have an HT with 5 watts or less and a directly attached antenna (rubber ducky or after-market; no coax), you won't be able to reach as many repeaters as others, but your points are doubled. (This is sort of like the low power option in many contests.)
• If you use an external antenna (such as on your house or on a field-deployable mast), you will be able to reach many more repeaters, but your points will not be doubled.
• Choose wisely. Once you start the contest, you must NOT change your choice of radio and antenna.

Following proper procedures is critical in emergency communications. The same goes for contests. Be sure to read and follow the rules carefully.

SCCo Contest 2020-04-04 Rules

Even if you're familiar with contesting, be sure to read the following to understand more about how this contest will work.

Intro to Contesting

Still have more questions? Read the FAQ:

SCCo Contest 2020-04-04 FAQ

You will log your contacts on the following log form. Logs must be completed and legible to count.

SCCo Contest 2020-04-04 Log Form

Logs must be scanned and e-mailed (preferred) or postmarked (if you must) no later than Tuesday, April 7th.

Those of you who have participated in contesting before might be thinking about a strategy for maximizing points. Here are a few things to think about:

• You get more points for contacting people in other cities; even more points for contacting someone from the county staff.
• So, you might be tempted to only check repeaters other than your own city's repeater. After all, that's where people from other cities will be, right?
• But people from other cities are probably thinking the same thing. So they might be calling on your city's repeater, looking to contact you!
• A few of the repeaters are very high level, meaning they will work well for those in most of the county. So, they would be great for contacting the most people from other cities, right?
• But because everyone can reach them, the high level repeaters could be very busy. And you can only make three contacts in a row before you have to move anyway.
• Whatever strategy to settle on, you'll most likely change your mind part-way into the contest.
• And there's very little time. Just two hours!
• So, don't over-think it. Get on the air and keep moving!

No sign-ups. Just get on the air.

Summary of Results (PDF - 1.1 MB)