The first year of these contests started with an event with good conditions, with many entrants able to take advantage of the co-ordination of these contests with the Nordic Activity Contests. This co-ordination of dates gives a much better chance of good contacts into Scandinavia, and also with the higher level of European activity that the Nordic events have traditionally brought to the band. In this first January session, several stations made contacts into Scandinavia, with best DX distances in excess of 1000 km. Unfortunately, the other sessions seemed to coincide with much poorer conditions, and these levels of DX weren't repeated. Activity for the events started off well, but dropped off during the year, with the final few events being really poorly supported. High levels of activity breed more activity and so declining activity is a vicious circle. The VHFCC will be doing its best to encourage more activity into these series of contests during 2003, and we'd like to encourage everyone at home on a Tuesday evening to just take a little time to wander over to the station and see what's happening on the band. Openings which don't even touch 2m can be intense on 70cm and higher and can occur with surprising regularity, so if you don't check the bands, you have no idea what DX you may be missing.
In the Single Operator section, Roger Piper, G3MEH turned out for every session bar one and wins this section from Bryn Llewellyn, G4DEZ. Pete Lindsay, G4CLA takes the award for leading station with low power and one antenna. The Open section was conclusively won by The South Birmingham Radio Society, G8OHM who supported every one of the 12 events, with Tim Boon, M0AFC/P taking second place.
Andy Cook, G4PIQ
Single Operator Fixed Section Pos Call Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Total Pwr Ant 1* G3MEH 55330 20392 125025 67197 64736 43896 44550 90090 50232 49284 0 49536 5924 250 2 x 23Y 2* G4DEZ 73620 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 90104 136238 30105 50920 4405 400 2 x 28Y 3 G4BRK 15862 0 46673 10440 68068 66108 0 87360 73150 0 0 0 4310 60 21Y 4* PE1EWR 28800 36630 41790 35980 34280 10464 24256 32760 0 24291 942 25830 3454 130 2 x 21Y 5 M0GHZ 34184 23296 55616 64844 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2234 400 2 x 21Y 6* G4CLA 0 0 0 58630 0 0 35090 0 0 0 0 0 1660 25 28Y 7 G8VHI 181594 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1000 100 2 x 23Y 8 G3YDY 0 0 0 0 0 21728 0 21928 0 0 2992 0 671 50 19Y 9 G8HGN 30890 0 49401 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 565 50 2 x 21Y 10 G7ULL 5825 4944 3440 0 0 0 2310 0 0 0 0 0 246 50 15Y 11 G3YJR 0 1194 1780 2665 720 1422 115 2516 2850 0 0 966 172 10 19Y 12 G4APJ 0 0 0 0 0 0 7190 0 0 0 0 0 161 25 19Y 13 GW8ASA 5072 3738 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 130 50 23Y 14 G0DVJ 11270 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 62 50 5Y 15 G8VYK 6516 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 36 29 19Y 16 G0DTI 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 96 2 20 19Y 17 M5ADF 0 0 0 0 0 42 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 5 Vert Open Section Pos Call Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Total Pwr Ant 1* G8OHM 156720 12026 39070 54362 65923 40854 64572 118512 29360 63102 25263 55512 6000 400 26Y 2* M0AFC/P 0 0 10505 60710 0 8980 0 0 0 0 0 0 1489 25 19Y 3 GW8ASA/P 0 0 0 54320 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 895 50 23Y 4 G4APJ/P 0 0 0 16961 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 279 5 19Y 5 M0BPQ/P 11823 0 0 3744 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 137 100 19Y