Welcome to the VHF / UHF / SHF contest rules for 2021. 2020 has seen tremendously high levels of contest entries both during and outside of lockdown periods. For 2021, let's hope for those same high activity levels, but under more normal circumstances. We haven't made a large number of changes to the contest rules for 2021, but those changes which we have made are listed below.

Perhaps the most important change is that, from January 2021, we are removing the COVID based restriction against multi-operator entries, and simply requiring that all entrants must fully comply with all COVID-19 local restrictions and advice including but not limited to social distancing, meeting people outside of their household/bubble and travelling that apply to the location where they are operating and at the time of the event. Any enclosed operating space (e.g. car, tent) will be considered to be an indoor location.

So, for those stations and operators living and operating in areas where mixing of households is allowed indoors, they can re-commence multi-operator contesting, but should make sure that all the necessary measures are taken to prevent the spread of COVID (social distancing, sanitising of equipment between operators etc.)

Enjoy contesting in 2021!

73

Andy Cook, G4PIQ

Chair RSGB VHF Contest Committee

RSGB VHF Contest Rule Changes for 2021

• We have clarified the position with respect to remote operation of stations, using the same rules as in RSGB HF contests which are
• Remote operation of a station is allowed where the operator is situated within the same country on the DXCC list. Additionally, an operator's home station, as shown in the licensee's licence documents, may be remotely operated from a location in another country. A remotely operated station must obey all station licence, operator licence, and category conditions. The callsign used must be one issued or permitted by the Regulatory Authority of the remote station location. The location of the Station must also comply with the requirements above.
• The address of the operator must be included in the 'Address of Operator when operating Remote from Station Address' text box on the Station Information Page when entering a log. The RSGB VHF Contest Committee may place remotely operated stations in a separate results table.
• We have added a 6-hour section to the 432 MHz section of the October UHF contest. This already has a parallel section in the IARU co-ordinated event.
• We have clarified that the VHF CW Championship is Single Operator only and we will score based on operator callsign, regardless of station callsign.
• We will only award one trophy per entrant per contest.
• We will not allow non-UK/CD stations to contribute to club scores in the VHF AFS contests for the new 2021 AFS series, starting Sept 2021 although they can still enter as individuals. We are not changing the UKAC rules in this respect.
• We will allow the use of Special Contest Callsigns (SCCs) in the 4m Trophy
• We have added the 50 MHz Centre of Activity (50.150 MHz +/- 5 kHz) to the lists of band segments where you must not call CQ Contest.
• We have changed the Christmas Cumulatives for 2021 to be one band per day, 1 pt/km scoring with multipliers for both squares and countries, with individual stations allowed to change sections between bands
• We have moved the boundary between Open and Restricted section power levels in the SHF UKACs at 25W on 2.3 GHz, 10W on 3.4 GHz and 5W on 5.7 GHz and 10 GHz
• We have moved the 10 GHz Trophy to run 0800-1400 on the Sunday of the first full weekend in May
• We will run a new set of monthly MGM (FT8) contests aligned to an IARU co-ordinated event on 2m on the first Wednesday of the month from 1900-2100 UTC using UKAC scoring and sections, but with no Club scoring elements.
• There will also be additional events on other Wednesdays (at least on 70cm) for which we are not going to run an RSGB event this year, but stations are welcome to enter the IARU-coordinated events directly at http://www.ft8activity.eu
• Because we have introduced those new monthly short MGM contests, we have removed the 5th Tuesday MGM contests
• We have removed the 24-hour MGM events in April and December and replaced it with a single event in the full weekend on or before the peak of the Perseids in August
• We will be publishing a set of adjudication guidelines including standard penalties.