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NAQP Shifts New Year to CW for North American Contesters
By Jamie Dupree NS3T, radio-sport.net
The start of the New Year means a new round of North American contest action, with the renewal of the January NAQP CW Contest this weekend.
The contest features a unique exchange involving name and QTH, and is also limited to just two power categories, low (100 watts max) and QRP.
Back to defend his January 2007 NAQP CW QRP title is Julius Fazekas N2WN, who has used his Tennessee QTH to his advantage.
"I'm planning on running QRP again," Fazekas told radio-sport.net, adding "I think it is easier without all the monster high power signals. There's more room to run as a QRP station as well."
N2WN totaled 357 net contacts in January of 2007, with 129 multipliers, demonstrating how popular this contest has become.
While N2WN defends the QRP category, Dave N2NL is the defending champ. As usual there will be a host of big time operators looking to take the single operator crown, led by last year's top five that included KL9A, W9RE, N2IC and N6MJ.
In terms of strategy, one of the keys to this contest is successfully moving multipliers to other bands and working hard on the second radio.
"The NAQP is probably the best contest for SO2R," says Mike Wetzel W9RE, who finished 6th in last January's CW test, and won the August 2007 NAQP SSB.
What about moving mults as a QRP station?
"That's never been my forte," says Fazekas N2WN, who acknowledged he hasn't even tried using two radios.
Fazekas pushes himself in contests by setting "in contest goals for myself based on rates and multipliers, usually in 15 minute segments. It's very arbitrary, but seems to keep me motivated."
The down solar conditions have certainly impacted this contest, as last January, the top ten low power ops only made a combined 30 contacts on 10 meters.
Last year, less than ideal conditions on the high bands resulted in a lot of operators (including your correspondent) going quickly to 40 meters less than an hour into the contest.
The 12 hour test also requires a bit of strategic thinking for the two hours of off time that a single operator must take. Multi-ops may use the entire 12 hours.
For more on the rules of the NAQP, please visit the NCJ website.