GARES Winter 2020/21 Challenge: Rules
This is a club-sponsored opportunity for you to do some targeted operating and to share your results with others. You are invited to work stations in as many countries (DX entities) as possible on bands between 160m and 10m (except for 30m and 60m). In any particular section (see below), a country (or DX entity) may be worked as many times as you wish irrespective of the band and antenna used. For scoring purposes, the first contact with a DX entity in a section will score 10 points and subsequent contact will score 1 point. To ‘level the playing field’, operation in contests is not permitted.
IMPORTANT NOTE ON COVID RESTRICTIONS: Please note that current national and local COVID rules must be observed, and to comply with the spirit of the new lockdown rules portable and mobile operation will not be permitted. These rules may need to be altered according to the changing situation with COVID.
WHEN: 14th November 2020 to 9th January 2021, both dates inclusive.
WHERE: All HF bands are permitted between 160m and 10m, except for 30m and 60m.
MODES: You may enter ONE section from the following:
- CW,
- SSB,
- ‘Conventional’ data modes or
- Weak signal modes.
You must choose your power level section as below. If you choose conventional data modes you may operate on RTTY and PSK, etc, and if you choose weak signal modes you may operate on FT8, FT4, JT65, etc.
POWER:
- High Power: 100 Watts or less.
- Low Power: 10 Watts or less.
ENTRIES: Contacts should only be made from your main station address in order to comply with the lockdown requirement to avoid unnecessary travel. Contacts should not be made with stations operating in contests, nor should you enter a contest and claim the contacts made.
AERIALS: No restrictions.
SCORING: 10 points for the first contact with a country/DX entity in your chosen section. Subsequent contacts with that entity will score 1 point. Duplicate contacts (i.e with the same station) are not permitted.
REPORTING: Scoring Entity (Country/DX entity, as per the countries/DX entities list), callsign of station worked, date, band, power (p.e.p.) at the output of the transmitter, and the aerial in use should be reported for each scoring contact as well as the claimed score. A suitable template will be made available.
AWARDS:Awards will be made to the leading stations in each section (CW, SSB, Conventional Data & Weak Signal Data) and power section.
NOTE 1: If you are licensed to use more than one callsign a country may be claimed once only for scoring purposes irrespective of the callsign in use.
NOTE 2: Accurate exchange of callsigns and signal reports should be considered the minimum requirement for claiming a valid contact.
NOTE 3: Contacts should be made directly on a one-to-one basis without assistance from others. This precludes the relaying of real-time contact information by repeaters, internet links, other amateur stations or any other mode of indirect transmission. However, the use of DX spotting sites such as, for example, DX Summit is acceptable.
NOTE 4: It would help considerably if claims are made using a standard spreadsheet format. A suitable template is available. When submitting claims, please include in the file name your callsign, mode and power section, as appropriate.
For mode section please use the following codes:
- CW = CW
- SSB = SSB
- Conventional data modes = DATA
- Weak signal modes = WS
Examples: G4BCA_CW_HIGH, or G4BCA_WS_LOW
Please submit claims to Dave G4BCA
Rules published 4th November 2020