Hello, this is KC9REL, and my name is Mike. I'm a rookie, having just gotten my license in January of this year (2010). This was my first attempt at contesting, and I had a lot of fun with it. I knew going in that I wasn't going to go for the top spot, I just wanted to participate and see how well my old used Kenwood TS-120S, powerd by a repurposed computer power supply that can put out a maximim of 11amps, and my home brew 10 and 20 meter inverted Vees would do. I stuck with the contest pretty much the whole 6 hours, taking a couple of short breaks to answer the phone a couple of times. I had a great time, having contacted 10 states, and having one DX contact with Chris (G5KC) in York, England. I only had one contact in each of the 10 states I made contact with, and missed a couple of others I started to contact but lost due to shifting band conditions, but I had expected that, having worked a little bit on 10 and 20 meters since I got my HF rig up and running in May. I'm looking forward to the April and August contests next year, and maybe my 6 year old granddaughter will teach me enough CW to try that mode before I no longer qualify as a rookie!

It was a great event, and I also want to say thanks to Sean (KX9X) for manning W1AW as that contact, along with my first DX contact ever, really made my day!