Friedrichshafen Meeting Produces Plan For Judging HQ Logs In 2010 IARU, Possible Rule Changes

By Jamie Dupree NS3T  radio-sport.net 
Posted June 28, 2010

A group of European ham radio associations have agreed to take on the job of adjudicating HQ category entries for the 2010 IARU HF Contest, moving to fill the void left after the ARRL announced earlier this month that it would no longer judge the HQ competition because of past rules disputes.

In a German language posting on the web site of the Union Schweizerischer Kurzwellen-Amateure, the Swiss national radio society which sponsors HB9HQ, the USKA reports that the plan emerged from meetings over the weekend at the German ham radio convention in Friedrichshafen.

The posting says new IARU Region I Contest Manager Kresimir Kovarik 9A5K will lead the group, which included representatives of ham radio societies in Germany, Great Britain, France, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, the Czech Republic and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

A Croatian language posting on the website of 9A1CBB, the Radio Klub Novi Marof, says that 9A5K's "main task to organize a new way of analysis for the HQ category, and to develop proposed changes in rules for competition in 2011."

With this year's contest on July 10-11, there was simply no time to make HQ rules changes were possible for the 2010 contest, so discussions on that will take place after this year's IARU test.

The USKA report, posted on Saturday, the same day as the Friedrichshafen meetings, says that all three IARU regions will be involved in those discussions, "since all the associations worldwide will be affected by any possible changes."

So far, there has been no official comment posted from the IARU or ARRL, but ARRL Contest Manager Sean Kutzko had sent emails to interested parties in Europe earlier this month, signaling that the ARRL would not be opposed to others accepting responsibility for judging the HQ category entries.

"We understand that there is interest among European HQ teams in accepting responsibility for adjudicating HQ entries," Kutzko wrote in one email on June 10 that was posted on the internet by one of its recipients.

"We welcome this and will be pleased to cooperate. We will be glad to share the submitted HQ station logs and the results of our crosschecking with a committee selected by HQ station organizers themselves," Kutzko wrote.

That seems to be the plan which has emerged from the Friedrichshafen ham radio convention.

The actions stemmed from a rules dispute between Spanish and German hams over the entry of DA0HQ in 2009, which the Spaniards claim was riddled with illegal contacts, and should have been disqualified from the competition.

The acrimonious back and forth led to a surprise ARRL decision to simply jettison the HQ category, a move that was heavily criticized by contesters, spurring efforts for an independent team to control that part of the IARU test.