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After months and months of tough conditions, the propagation Gods decided to give ham radio contesters a break, as Topband was on fire around the world in the 2009 CQ 160 CW Contest.
"The contest was historic," said new CQ 160 contest director Andy Blank N2NT.
"The best conditions I ever heard. There will be records broken in all categories," Blank added.
"Only the 1985/86 contests might come close to what we heard this weekend - the equivalent of 20M transplanted to 1.8 Mhz," said John Crovelli W2GD, whose Multi-Op team leads the US at 1.32 million points.
"It's a lock the USA Single Op and Multi-Single records will fall," Crovelli said.
In fact, just a few hours after the contest ended, there were already a number of claimed scores that would completely re-write the USA record books in High Power, Low Power and Multi.
Six US multis quickly claimed more than the record of 1,039,036 points set in 2008 by Team W8JI. W2GD is at 1.32 million right now, with K9RS at 1.29 and WE3C at 1.27 million, all with a good chance to set a new multi-op record in the US.
In High Power, the record owned by N5OT (@W8JI) of 838,113 is gone, as you needed to have a minimum of a million points to even get noticed in 2009.
Like the Multi race, the USA HP battle is tight, with Doug Grant K1DG at 1.33 million, Jim Roberts VE7ZO at 1.31 million from W8JI and Peter Briggs K3ZM right there at 1.27 million.
The US Low Power record is probably gone as well, as Bob Raymond WA1Z had a whopping 428,156 points for the top claimed score. The existing record by W8/T98T is 353k.
In second is Julius Fazekas N2WN, who also topped the old record at 369,380 from his QTH in Tennessee. Third is Ed Parish K1EP, who came in just above that record as well with 356k.
"It was a blast," Parish told radio-sport.net. "Sunday EU sunrise really woke me up!"
"Not a bad score from a condo."
The USA QRP record book is also being re-written, as two ops already have shattered that mark of 124,915 made by K3BU.
Leading the way is Gary Breed K9AY with 212,895 points. Not far back in second is Pat Collins N8VW at 200,000.
In early returns from Europe, there will also be records broken in some categories, though maybe not in Single Op High Power.
The score in that category right now belongs to Finn Hoffmann OZ7YY at 1.46 million, just ahead of Jan Almedal LA9HW, who ran LN9Z to 1.44 million, with Martti Laine OH2BH also around 1.4 million from CU2X.
One score not in as yet is from Clive Penna GM3POI, who had the top score last year from Europe. Whether he has a shot at OH2BH's single op Europe record of 1.8 million is unclear.
As of now, the European multi-op record is going to be broken, as Team ES9C in Estonia came in with 2.08 million points. OM8A in Slovakia is next at 1.8 million, both well above the old ON4UN record of 1.3 million.
"Indeed that was an awesome contest," said ES9C leader Tonno Vahk ES5TV. "I am waiting for other Multi Op results with great interest."
In terms of top worldwide scores, ES9C has the best Multi-op tally so far. The top single op at this point is Valery Komarov RD3AF, who operated EA8AH to 2.25 million from 1636 contacts and 138 multipliers.
As of now, no one seems to be threatening the records for World Single Op (D4B 2.9m) or Multi (CN2A 3.08m) this year.
Stick with radio-sport.net this week as we get the latest scores from around the world in the 2009 CQ 160 CW Contest.
CN2R (W7EJ) - Single Op High Power
TA3D - Single Op Low Power
OK1IW - Single Op QRP
CT9M - Multi Op
"Wow," was the simple statement from Chas Fulp K3WW, who knocked out 953k from the US.
The early leader in the new Assisted category is Harry Booklan RA3AUU, who claimed 1.96 million points from his P33W operation on Cyprus. As of now, that's the highest known score from a single operator in any category.
The initial top score in Assisted from the US is actually in the hands of the contest's director, Andy Blank N2NT.
"I had 966K SOA, and that will not be enough," Blank told radio-sport.net.
The creation of the Assisted category was one of a number of changes and tweaks that Blank made to the CQ 160 rules since taking over as contest director.
One new item was the exchange for stations outside of the US and Canada, as CQ Zones were used, though they did not count as multipliers.
Other than a few individual cases, the exchange did not seem to cause any problems for various competitors or their logging software.
Check out the details on those and all of the rule changes for 2009 at the CQ 160 web site.
2009 CQ 160 CW Contest
2200z January 23 - 2200z January 25;
more on the rules at the
CQ 160 web site.
