WQ6X runs another Mixed-mode Mixed-BAG IARU Contest

My only beef with the annual IARU HF Championship event is that it is only 24-hours;
Then again, this is what makes it into a championship event.  As there are no 2nd-day
DO-overs, every band/mode choice needs to be considered carefully.

Prior to this event, I wrote up some of my thots on IARU.  ([CLICK HERE] to read that.)

This year's IARU contest event was parallel run with the 2o26 WRTC Team Championship
competition with 50 teams (and hundreds of support personnel) converging in England for
this every-4-year event.  Just before the event began, the 50 teams were randomly handed
a randomly assigned British callsign, along the lines of "MB" and "MD" prefixes. 
The rest of the world anxiously anticipated hearing the first WRTC callsigns on the air. 

 

For those who were interested, the World Radio League maintained a scoreboard enabling
us to watch the progress.  Bye the time I brought up the scoreboard, contenders for the 1st
7-places had been established - it was simply a question of which order they would end up.

The IARU GiG commenced at 13:00.  After a couple of logistical screwups, I made the 1st
contact at 13:30z and ran rather seamlessly until the start of a Zoom conference I was involved
in @9am local time.  Because much of the material was mundane, I was able to position the Zoom screen next to the VNC viewer (VPN) screen and slip a few QSOs into the log during presentations. 
Openings on 20 & 15 meters into Europe made the time spent doubly productive.

After an hour break, the focus was on 15-meters, with marginal but adequate openings to Asia
and even down under.  Unfortunately, 1-second internet jitter made calling CQ not very productive.  Most of the afternoon and evening was spent searching and pouncing on 20-meters.  

At 01:00z, running out of stations to work on Cw, the switch was made to 20-Ssb where eventually
35 Ssb QSOs made it into the log.  Thanks to loading up the K3/0 voice memories before the contest,
all Ssb contacts were made by using function keys - no microphone was needed.  Later, while tuning around 40-meters and then on 75-meters no IARU Ssb activity was heard.  Even later, returning to 20-meters produced no more Ssb entries for the log.

Just before 07:00z, the internet connection failed requiring a restart, after which the internet dropouts
all but disappeared.  Band openings
to Asia made running frequencies very productive once again.

 
At 09:30 with 20-meters all but
gone on the west coast, it was time
to move down to 40-meters, just in
time for the first of several JA pile-ups throughout the early morning until the IARU contest ended at 12:00z once again.  

With the east coast waking up, many USA QSOs made it to the log even tho the Yagi was pointed
at 300-degrees azimuth.  A handful of VK stations also called in, yet surprisingly, no ZL stations
were ever heard - seeing internet spots (only 2) is not the same as actually working them. 
Amazingly, an LU5 station called in via long path - wOw!

When it was all over, capturing the 3830 stats and contest scoreboard, it would seem that WQ6X managed a 4th place for the USA and North America overall.  The details on how the WRTC competition turned out have yet to be announced.  I may well post a follow-up blog on this very topic.

Meanwhile, DiD YOU work the IARU HF Championship?

Is WQ6X in YOUR LoG?