Julian, G4ILO wrote:
A couple of stations lost out on a point from me because they were sending so fast that neither the K3 nor I could copy them. Why do people do this? Surely the number of contacts lost because people like me who are not CW wizards just can't copy them must negate the benefit of any time saved? These stations were repeatedly calling CQ and if I could have read them we could have easily had a contact. Julian: I tend to send more quickly when I perceive a number of callers (who might be impatient and move on if I'm not working the pileup quickly) and slow down when there are few(er) callers. If no one is answering, I send CQ at 24-28 WPM, and if someone calls me much more slowly than that I'll wind it right down to their speed. However if there's a crowd, I'm more likely to keep my CW speed up, it keeps things moving. The contest station's objective is to maximize rate/score, not to be "fair". If there are plenty of callers, then the speed should be run up to work as many people as possible during the sometimes too brief opening to any particular area. I had very few common daylight minutes between W7 and Europe (single band 20). During that time I had to find as many mults as possible and also run as many European QSOs as I could. I called quickly. I can copy callsigns much more quickly than I can receive CW in a conversation. I've practiced this a lot. MorseRunner is a good training tool for this. I did have to listen to 5K0T a while to figure out whether it was HK0T or 5K0T. I still remember encountering 5H3TW in a CQWW contest when I lived in England and I had to listen to him for many minutes before I felt that I had the call. At some points in the contest I'm happy to work anyone, at any speed, and will slow down to the caller's speed. If I have a group calling, I return the call of the station whose complete callsign I get first. Usually that's someone loud and quick with good timing. The slower stations will wait until I've run out of the quick ones. Sometimes they move on. A real problem with working slow stations (particularly if conditions are poor) is that one can lose one's run frequency while going after fills. In some contests like Sweepstakes with an involved exchange, you sometimes have to just ignore a caller who is weak enough that you just know that you won't get the exchange reliably, and you don't want to risk losing the run frequency to try. I agree with you that if a station is CQing with no callers and doesn't slow down he's probably behaving in a manner that doesn't maximize his score. However when a crowd is there, the best strategy for maximizing score is to work people as quickly as you can. I can work people at much higher speed than I can copy normal CW. They send their call repeatedly, and it's short. When I'm running, I don't send faster than I can receive. When I'm S&Ping, I send at the speed of the station I'm working, even if I really can't copy that quickly normally. Dick, K6KR (W7RN in CQWW CW)
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