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Already the most prolific single operator in the history of the CQ WW SSB Contest, Rich Smith N6KT is on his way to a second straight win in 2009, a record ninth overall, as he claimed just over 16 million points from HC8A in the Galapagos Islands.
That gives Smith an almost insurmountable lead over his closest pursuers, 8P5A (W2SC), CR2X (OH2UA) and 4O3A (ES5TV).
"Another great CQWW SSB Contest," Smith said in his 3830.
The California contester ran away from the field by building up huge numbers on two bands that have been quiet in recent years, with 3043 contacts, 34 zones and 121 countries on 15 meters and 1586-27-76 on 10.
"Lots of activity and better conditions on 10 and 15 than last year," wrote Smith, who acknowledged that he had a rough run on the low bands. "160 and 80 were tough for me with weaker signals and strong band noise."
Smith leads Jim Sullivan W7EJ, who piloted CN2R in Morocco to 14.3 million points.
"My first CQWW all band effort in 5 years," wrote Sullivan on 3830, who has spent much of his time setting single band records in recent years.
"A little rusty but it was a great contest! "
Sullivan actually did better than HC8A on 10 and 15 meters in terms of multipliers, as he totaled 1828-34-117 on 15 and 1128-28-110 on 10 meters.
Those numbers put him ahead of third place Tom Georgens W2SC, who pushed 8P5A to 12.66 million.
"First time in a while I was able to beat my score from the prior year," said Georgens, who ran up 8,037 contacts overall.
Like Smith at HC8A, Georgens found it rough going on the low bands, as he grinded out only 155 QSO's on 160 and 579 on 80.
"80 and 160 were big disappointments but 10 and 15 were big surprises," wrote Georgens on 3830. "Great to run Europe on 10 again, even for a short time."
Comparing their scores, HC8A had 8,037 QSO's - just one more than 8P5A at 8,036.
After edging 8P5A for second place in the 2008 CQ WW SSB, Toni Linden OH2UA could not match that outcome in 2009, but he still has the highest score from Europe among single operators, with just over 11 million points.
"Conditions were not spectacular from the Azores and especially the low bands were down from last year," Linden told radio-sport.net, echoing a common theme from this year's CQ WW SSB.
"11.5 million would have been possible this year at CR2X but no matter what I would have done I wouldn't have reached 12 million," a figure that still would have left him short of 8P5A's second place score.
Linden has the lead in Europe over Tonno Vahk ES5TV, who didn't surprise anyone with his strong results from Montenegro, as he operated from the station of Ranko Boca 4O3A.
"I want to congratulate Tonno, ES5TV, for his great effort," said Linden. "At this point I guess we can stop talk that from mainland EU it's not possible to compete with Azores!" said Linden.
As for Vahk, he was very pleased with his results, and told radio-sport.net that he expects numbers from the 4O3A station will only improve.
"I feel very happy of course that we could take out maximum from the current station setup and we encountered no major problems," Vahk said after returning home to Estonia.
"This was a test run to start developing the (4O3A) station, automation, ergonomics, etc.. Definitely better than expected."
"Optimistic target was 8 million, but 10 and 15 meters were better than expected," Vahk said on 3830.
Vahk took full advantage of the openings on 15 meters, running up 2,341 QSO's on that band, with an average of 2.03 points per QSO.
A year after becoming the first US Multi-Multi to win the world title in 45 years CQ WW SSB, Tim Duffy's Team K3LR put in another strong performance that should bring them the US M/M crown in 2009.
"The 2008 CQWW Phone contest was a hard act to follow," acnkowledged Duffy K3LR.
"It looks like this will be the 5th straight year for Team K3LR as the #1 USA Multi Multi operation," Duffy told radio-sport.net.
The overall M/M world lead right now looks to be with Team PJ2T from Zone 9, at 24.9 million points, ahead of DR1A, with 22.1 million points, while K3LR checked in with 20.5 million.
That was more than good enough for the win in the US as well, as K3LR bested KC1XX at 17.8 million and W3LPL at 16.4 million claimed points.
"In many ways it seems as though the contest gods were smiling on us this year," wrote PJ2T team leader Geoff Howard W0CG on 3830.
"Part of our success was a significant amount of planning and looking at previous performance to spot shortcomings and missed opportunities," he added.
One of the findings was that PJ2T "had never worked a KH6 on 160 during one of the SSB efforts." So one of the changes for this year was a Flag antenna to pick up stations to the West.
"The antenna played its part as we worked several KH6 stations and a couple of other Pacific multipliers on 160M SSB this year adding to our overall score."
In the Multi-Single competition, Team CN3A has the worldwide lead with 21.9 million points, over Team P33W at 21.04 million.
The US leader is Team K3EST at 4.5 million, with W3BGN at 4.3 and Team N2IC at 4.1 million points.
In Multi-Two, the top world score is Team EE9Z at 19.6 million points, but that could be in danger depending on the score from defending champ AO8A. The US M/2 leader is Team WE3C at 13.7 million, up a full two million from a year earlier.
That's because K1LZ is barely 100k points ahead of Doug Grant K1DG, who put together 6.49 million from his Maine contest location.
Both K1LZ and K1DG outdistanced Dennis Egan W1UE, who was operating from the K5ZD station of Randy Thompson.
Thompson had won the US SSB title the last two years as he pursued a spot in WRTC qualifying, but played host this year in the SSB leg.
Meanwhile, the US low power battle was again a duel between Ed Sawyer N1UR and Art Hambleton K1BX.
Hambleton again has the edge this year, as he squeezed out 2.08 million points from 1616 contacts, while Sawyer clocked in with 1.84 million from 1407 QSO's.
"One down, three to go," Hambleton said on 3830.
Sawyer meanwhile said he gave it his best shot.
"In the end I beat my best score since 2004 and beat last year by 60,000 points," wrote N1UR on 3830.
Both will square off again in the US LP battle in CQ WW CW. In 2008, N1UR had the lead before log checks, but K1BX emerged the winner by just 27k points.
Check back for score updates on the 2009 CQ WW SSB Contest all week here at radio-sport.net!
From left to right seated: K6AM, N0VD, N0YY, W0CG/PJ2DX; Standing: W9JUV, G4XUM, K8LEE, G3NKC and WA4PGM.
Standing L to R - IK2SGC, IK2QEI, CN8WK, IV3ZXQ, IK1SPR, IK1HJS; Sitting L to R - I2WIJ - CN8WW - IZ2FFK - IK1RQT
Left to Right Rear: W2RQ, K8GL, K6AW, N2NC, N2NT, N6MJ, LU7DW, N3GJ, DL6LAU, K1AR, K3UA; Front - K3LR, LW8EXF
From left to right: OH2BH, OH0XX, KR2Q, JK3GAD, LA5IIA, PY5EG and NN1N.
P40A (KK9A) - SOAB LP
LA8O - SOAB QRP
LX7I (LX2A) - SO Assisted
CN3A - Multi-Single
AO8A - Multi-Two
K3LR - Multi-Multi
"80M seemed to be rather poor on Friday night - but improved on Saturday and Sunday nights," Briggs told radio-sport.net about his contest effort from VY2ZM on Prince Edward Island.
"I made the same amount of Qso's on Saturday as I did on Friday which is unusual and 167 Europeans were worked on Sunday night from 21z - 24z when the contest ended."
Briggs also found some other work kept his score up as well, as a recently installed generator kept him on the air, when the local power company turned out power to do maintenance on Sunday morning from 2-6 am.
"Normally this would have taken me out of the contest!"
"Two years ago they did this during CQWW CW 2006 and I lost out on 5 hours of operating time then - which cost me a world high win on 80 CW that year," said Briggs, "so it was worth the money I invested in the new generator - it runs on propane and worked like a champ."
