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It's back to normal in 2010 for the Russian DX Contest, after three years in which it was a major qualifying contest for this year's World Radiosport Team Championships to be held outside Moscow.
The 2009 Russian DX was maybe the most important of all, the final WRTC qualifier for much of the world, as last year's results helped send a number of contesters to what's basically the ham radio version of the World Cup.
The extra competition was obvious by the number of logs submitted to contest organizers, as it went up almost 15% to 3,629 total.
To give you an idea where that ranks compared to other contests - it's not far behind the 4,087 logs that were submitted in 2009 for CQ WPX SSB - and it is more than the 3,148 logs submitted for the 2009 CQ WPX CW Contest.
Obviously though, the Russian DX contest is skewed towards Russian participation, as over one-third of all logs submitted last year came from the home country - still, not bad for a contest that began in 1994.
This year, an uptick in sunspots could well provide even more of a boost, as the Russian DX test gives hams the chance to work the world, no matter your location, though Russian oblast multipliers remain very important for all involved.
Among the records set in 2009, Team RK4FWX set the European Russia Multi-Single mark, with 8.39 million points.
UA9CDV meanwhile now owns the high Single Operator Mixed score from Asiatic Russia at 6.82 million.
New Worldwide records include Jack Danielyan 5B4AII (RW3QC) setting the Single Op Mixed mark of 11.9 million and Team 4Z5J now has the Multi-Two mark at 15.9 million points.
There are no major rules changes, but there is one important rules addition by Russian DX organizers, as they try to ferret out possible cheating by certain stations.
"RDXC the committee urgently asks participants to specify frequencies (CAT System) on which QSOs were made for more careful adjudication," states new rule 11.13 on the Russian DX web site.
There is no mention again this year of a public release of Russian DX logs, which was announced for the 2008 RDXC.
"Starting 1st July 2008, we plan to open access to RDXC participant logs at www.rdxc.org to bring you the possibility to analyze your friends and your rivals logs," said the RDXC Committee in a release two years ago.
But that promise disappeared from the RDXC web site soon after, and has not been revisited in public since, leaving CQ WW as the only contest that publicly posts the logs of all entries.
The 2010 Russian DX Contest runs from 1200z March 20 to 1200Z March 21. You can more information on the rules at the Russian DX website.
Maybe the most active will be the Oklahoma QSO Party , which starts at 1300z on Saturday.
As usual, a good number of mobiles will be on the road to help activate the 77 counties in the Sooner State.
"Lorna (K0WHY) and I will run the same 32 counties we ran last year," says Bob Harder W0BH, who will again roll in from neighboring Kansas. In 2009, Harder and his wife took home honors in the Mobile Assisted category.
The Oklahoma QSO Party is run in two segments, from 1300z March 20 to 0100z March 21, and then again from 1300-1900z on Sunday 21 March.
Also on this weekend, the North Dakota QSO Party, which runs 24 hours from 1800z on Saturday to 1800z on Sunday.
The Empire State has 53 counties to offer. It's the second straight year for the ND QSO Party on this weekend, after a 14 year hiatus.
Not only is North Dakota a rare state for some hams - but there will certainly be county hunters looking for some rare counties as well.
The third US contest is the Virginia QSO Party, which runs from 1800z Saturday through 0100z Monday March 22.
The VAQP organizers are offering two dozen plaques this year, including a new one for "VA Mobile Single Operator."
Virginia offers something different when it comes to multipliers, because there are more than just counties, as the Old Dominion has 95 counties and 39 independent cities - and both count as multipliers.
