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The end of April is here, which means the Sunshine State moves to center stage with the 2011 edition of the Florida QSO Party, where the goal has become not "if" you can get a sweep of Florida's 67 counties, but how fast.
Until 2003, it took competitors until the second day of the FQP to get their sweep, but since then the pace of the sweep has been quickening each year, as in 2010 it took Bob Nash VE3KZ only 4 hours and 24 minutes to find all Florida counties.
The reason for that shortened time frame is simple - the FQP attracts a host of mobiles, which put all areas of the state on the air early in the contest, especially on CW.
That allows for all kinds of CW and Mixed sweeps, though the SSB sweep is very rare, pulled off only by Ken Meier W8MJ, who won his 8th FQP single op title in 2010 in a row (his 9th overall).
While W8MJ has made sweeps 10 straight years in the FQP, his 2010 SSB sweep was the first all-phone sweep since Meier did the same in 2004, along with Keith Pederson WA3HAE.
So, if you want to challenge yourself to something different in the 2011 version of the FQP, maybe try to see if you can pull off the 67 county sweep on phone - it doesn't seem to be that easy.
It's not hard to tell why the sweep has become so much easier over the years, as the schedules of the FQP mobiles demonstrates the wide coverage of the Sunshine State.
For example, the N4TO mobile will hit almost 30 counties just on Saturday and over 20 more on Sunday!
There were 24 mobiles in the 2010 FQP - a record - as they covered a combined total of 470 counties, averaging 58 QSO's from each county.
We'll see if higher gas prices put a dent in those numbers in 2011.
"We are gratified by the tremendous growth that the FQP has experienced in its 13 years of rebirth," said Dan Street K1TO in the 2010 FQP review, adding that he hopes "2011 will be another record breaking year for participation, now that the sunspots have returned in earnest."
With sunspots growing more frequent, that could present an interesting dynamic in 2011, with the chance for better openings on 10 and 15 meters, two bands that have been afterthoughts for many contesters in the US in recent years.
During low sunspot times, the focus was definitely on 20 and 40 meters - but now the high bands could play a pivotal role as well.
One special note about the schedule for this year's FQP is that the contest is normally held on the fourth full weekend of April - but with Easter on that weekend - organizers moved it to the split weekend of April 30-May 1.
The FQP begins at 1600z on Saturday April 30 and runs until 0159z on Sunday May 1. After a ten hour break, the contest resumes at 1200z on Sunday and ends at 2159z.
