The usual flurry of getting stuff ready and broken stuff fixed occupied the week before the contest.  Amazingly it all came together and everything was working pretty well except 902/3 which still didn’t hear as well I think it should.  Wonderful high pressure and thermal inversions yielded great tropo conditions right up the day before the contest.  Of course the bands were pretty much summer average for the contest.

The Rovers were out and I was able to track 5 of them in all the grids they
worked (plus a bonus rover that I don’t normally hear) on Saturday but lost
two of them completely on Sunday.  Only 3 had multiple SHF bands and I was able to sweep one from 222-3456 from all the grids he visited, then almost sweep the other two (missed a 3456 contact with one and a 2304 with the other due to them being around 300 miles out and the conditions/terrain not cooperating at the time). 

Almost all of the rovers I work are at least 100 to 300 miles away and many are very well equipped.  With good time schedules, favored operating frequencies and 6 digit grids published on the internet reflectors and spreadsheets before the contest, they are a lot easier to hunt and find.  We consider 100 miles a chip shot in the Midwest and run the bands on SSB.  Every once in a while (once every couple of years) someone will come into my grid and I’ll actually get to work it on SHF!  I’m still waiting for an EN41 3456 contact though.  While none of them make specific skeds with me (unless it’s something like - come back in 15mins I’m band running stations in a different direction now), they know the station can reach out to them, so they will look my way in every grid.  I just have to be there when they do and wait my turn.

It’s a good thing the Rovers were there because pretty much the only other
stations I worked were the 3 or more band stations.  Participation from the
single or 2 band ops seemed almost non existent.  The totals on 432 were way down from a few years ago.  I usually work about twice as many stations on 432 as I do on 222 in an all band contest, and maybe a third as many on 1296.  Even in the UHF a lot more 432 Qs go in the log than on 222. But this contest 222 and 432 were just about equal and 1296 was not that far behind!  Either more folks are finally getting on 222 or only the better equipped stations are playing in the UHF contest. 

73 De Bob