08/03/2009 | K2DRH The contest basically started out slow and pretty much tapered off from there. None of the wonderful extended Tropo conditions of last year were present. 400 miles seemed to be the absolute limit on 222 and 432 (thanks to N4QWZ in EM66), and very few QSOs beyond 350 miles went into the log. It was a grind right from the start and even the best hours were all under 25 QSOs.

At least conditions were stable all the way up the bands, and it was possible to work multiple bands above 432 with most stations I tried. I even worked K9IMM almost 100 miles away on 1296 FM! The highlight of course was Rovermania from NLRS. While some of the rovers were just too far away for conditions, it always amazes me how far and how well they get out. Once again W9FZ/R swept all 5 bands in all 8 grids Bruce activated. Other notable multi band rovers that were easy to work all the way up the bands were W9SNR, W0ZQ and KC0IYT. K0PG/R and K9ILT/R were really easy to find and work on 4 bands up to 1296. Without these guys the UHF bands would be a whole lot quieter. -- K2DRH