Report 2014
The whole story of WAG 2014
Final results on this page.
And the winners outside DL are - introducing themselves with their final QSO:
And here are the German winners working each other
Congratulations to 9A3VM, R7MM, UA5C, CQ3L (DF7ZS), RT4W, HG7T
and DL3DTH, DK5DQ, DL5AXX, DL0WRTC (DJ5MW), DL6IAK, DR4A
We want to say "Vielen Dank!" ("Many thanks!") to all of you from around the world having made WAG 2014 possible and lively. Not all of you live in a competetive distance to Germany, not all of you have a station to compete for TopTen-ranks or records. The more we German hams enjoy your activity of longer or shorter periods during WAG. For us here it is the once-a-year chance to be "on the right end of the pile up" as one participant called it.
We hope that many of you enjoyed the contest as these ops did:
"Nice Contest - First time for me, many QRM and QRN but very fun !!!" (IW1BEF)
"Limited time, limited antenna but still made a few QSO's with 5 watts QRP from New York." (AE3A)
"Stations I allmost did not hear myself did respond to my calling! Lovely activity. I will be back next year!" (SM6E)
"It's amazing how many German stations you can work in 12 hours" (KC1XX)
Up and down of condx with special guest X-flare
We did not experience the extraordinary band conditions of 2013 when 10m had shown its full potential. 2014 had a fine start on the highbands but since local Sunday morning in DL a real X-class flare of the sun made for somewhat attenuated and shaky condx – but at least did not wipe out DX-possibilities on the highbands. More northern latitudes enjoyed less of this gradual improvement - so i.e. in Russia UA6 earned more with it than UA1.
Our log robot only eats cbr&stf – objects lnk&cst
The somewhat meager condx are reflected in a lower number of participants: 1723 logs (870 from outside DL) compared to 1927 in the record year 2013. Overall log quality was ok even if we wish that there were less creativity with category names, more care for all coloumns filled with the correct content and less variability of file formats: Our logrobot can not consume and will not be educated to consume other formats than Cabrillo or stf – stubbornly neglecting exotic flavours like .lnk or .cst.
Our database contained 448.398 QSO-lines and initially 11.769 different callsigns logged. The automatted crosscheck extended over 83 percent of all QSO-lines, having the log of the station worked available.
The remaining 77.600 QSOs occupied software again plus the small logchecking team looking into uniques, not issued calls and "new" DOKs. Also detected QSOs in the contestfree segments were removed. Overall from our point of view this segments were very well respected by participants with of course some very rare exceptions and some of them leading to extra deductions and Yellow Cards/Red Card.
After our "legal robbery" (described here) on the average 8,9 percent of claimed scores were deducted. But: TopTen-stations are on top not only because they are loud and fast, but also accurate: This group lost only 3,5 percent of their claimed scores. With the DOKs of German stations being rather distinctive there is not much room for sloppy logging hoping that the other station will not submit a log. If a DOK does not fit to the station in question chances are good that the QSO will not survive. This hits especially those relying too much on any "databases" of German calls plus their associated DOKs. Again complete series of contacts with a German station had to be removed as its counterpart inserted what the software prefilled instead of the special DOK the German station had sent like i.e. DR60INN with special DOK 60C15 instead of the basic C15.
The "natural enemies" of logcheckers: Uniques
Such calls, only appearing once in the whole database, again ate up a lot of checking time. From initially 6.300 their number shrunk to 2.300 remaining (and therefore counted towards scores). Most of the removed uniques represent copying errors – from not issued calls like DK3W to DL9VV which better had been deciphered as DL9W from the seemingly handwritten log...
But some of you out there gave us a real headscratching and from time to time a smile: The op from YO who appeared only once in the database and was logged with a sent serial of 101. "Copying error of 001", one may think. Listening to the SDR-recording not only confirmed the call but also the happily sent and repeated serial 101...
A friendly op form W8 was logged with sent serial 051 in his one and only QSO. It sounded that way on our SDR-recordings: "You're five nine, age is 51, ok?" Ahhh, someone making a short WAG-break from the simultaneous JA-RTTY-contest requiring age as exchange (the 051 then counted for a valid QSO).
And what special meaning may have the numbers 133 and 134 for a W5-op who sent them in his only two WAG-contacts?
That was close, really close
Our checking tools had to be used to their full range this year with an unsual high number of extremely close decisions. The popular and prestigious CW-LP-category in DL was decided by a tiny margin in score deduction between two extraordinary ops: Ben, DL6RAI, leading in claimed score lost only 1,7 percent during logcheck – a figure most would happily enjoy. But that was not enough to take the title away from defending champion DL3DTH: Tom lost only 0,4 percent during logcheck to win the category again.
That was even closer
Only a few ranks below in the same category DJ5MO had 81 points lead to DL5YL which are 0,018 percent - less than the value of one single one-point DL-QSO. Tina (DL5YL, here during a HB0-activity) had 1090 QSOs/3030 QSO-points and 150 country-mults while Jelmer, DJ5MO, managed less QSOs (877) with only some points less (2859) but 159 country-mults - which are very valuable in WAG with less countries on the air than in WWDX: Best multiplier number on a band was reached by German multi-op winning team DR4A, having 87 mults on 20m.
Victory decided by two QSOs
In the non-DL-categories even one victory was decided by an extremely small margin: In the Russian duel Serge, R7MM, surpassed Vlad, RA3Y, only in the logcheck with loosing only 0,9 percent of his claimed score. Vlad, RA3Y, still was better than topten-average with only 2,4 percent deduction but nevertheless lost first place by a margin of only 700 points - which would have been two more QSOs than his 1000.
Best distance?
It is always interesting to see which were the most favourable distances to Germany in a given WAG year. As long as 10 and 15m are in good shape those apart more than 1500 km can still make up for the lesser chances on 40/80m. Using the fine Madeira station CQ3L Helmut, DF7ZS, defended his Mix-HP-title from a distance of nearly 3.000 km to Germany. Doing 99 percent of his QSOs in phone it may have helped to be able to do it in German, to be heard in this snippet of the inital minutes on 15m:
In this category there were four more DX-stations with UA9MWA (Frank, DL8WAA, visiting UA9MA), KC1XX, PJ2/DL8OBY and K3IPK making it into the TopTen box (btw this category gained most from the increasing number of stations posting their scores in real time here). But the "winning zone" will move closer to DL with worsening propagation on the highbands, espcially in LP where already now Moscow-distance of 2.000 km is the maximum distance – even better chances for Balkan, Scandinavia and Baltic area to come.
Two times "fullhouse"
Luckily Germany could provide even the rare 26th "joker"-multiplier J on all bands. As there is no district J this mult can only be bagged via (rare) special-DOKs starting with J. Felix DL6JF operated DK0JRS (youth and training department of district S, Saxony) with more than 1100 QSOs and also Harald, DJ3AS, delivered additional 62 QSOs with DOK JK of DL0JK.
Only two foreign stations managed a "fullhouse" of all available 130 multipliers: Kruno, 9A5CM, at 9A5Y-station and also Allen, N2KW, at the big K1TTT station - really an achievement to catch all German districts from the other side of the pond especially on 80m. Congrats.
Most active districts in Germany were the neighbours X and S (federal states Thuringia and Saxony) with 82 and 76 logs with more than 27.000 QSOs per district. The smallest number of QSOs per district make Bavarian regions Schwaben (T) and Eastbavaria (U) the most difficult regular multipliers. They were in participants' logs with 2.100 and 3.500 QSOs. Saarland (district Q) was represented with 4.000 QSOs.
Most active country was again European Russia with 143 logs, followed by the USA with 79 and Asiatic Russia (48) - Спасибо and "Thank You!
For German ops enjoying on one hand the "sweet poision" of being target for so many callers it is on the other hand quite tricky to stay focused on the comparatively rare multipliers. Many of them can only be grabbed with "000-QSOs" when a non-contesting station is called for a quick QSO (then logged with 000 instead of received exchange - QSOs that will for sure be checked carefully, too, with several instruments). But sometimes the pileup rates are such that even seasoned SO2R ops like Ulf, DL5AXX, who had the highest mult total of all DL-stations on 15m with 78 countries, couldn´t do anything else but to stand (and possibly enjoy) the pileup like in this audio:
Three new records
Notwithstanding the lighter propagation WAG 2014 saw three new records: Manfred, DJ5MW, operated DL0WRTC to a new highscore in Mix-HP for Germany. He used the special callsign for the first time which announces the World Radio Team Championship (http://wrtc2018.de/en/) to be held in Germany 2018. Manfred took the Bronzemedal with teammate Stefan, DL1IAO, in the 2014 event held in New England. WAG will be one of the qualification contests 2015 and 2016 when contenders will look less for overall ranking but for the outcome in their respective qualifying zone ("selection area") – requiring of course different approaches and results when operating either from Moscow or from Auckland.
Welcome to all of you going for this big goal also in our regional event. Feel free to ask any kind of questions.
Another record was set by Bud, AA3B, who improved his own score showing extraordinary accuracy with only 0,4 percent score deduction over more than 1.000 DX contacts. Record number three was set by Igor, (RJ4P/RT4RO), improving his own result in Mix-HP for Europe.
We hear that you are unheard, but...
Year after year not only WAG hears how difficult it is for stations from Oceania and Southeast Asia to get heard in Europe. Even highpower stations with more than reasonable antennas complain that they don't get through. We'll continue to promote to turn antennas and to do everything possible for receiving. But especially on 40m Europe is special. Listen to two minutes from around 1730 during WAG. At the mike of DK0ED is the winner of the German Rookie-category Philipp, DK6SP. His special DOK CM13 indicates that his OV (=DOK) C25 won the internal DARC championship 2013 during a yearlong season with HF and VHF contests. A regular 40m band in Europe during evening hours sounds such:
Finally something to smile?
One (non submitting) station increased his sent serial number with ten after every break and with 80 after the night sleep.
Something to get annoyed?
The unbroken faith in "Saint Cluster's" word...
Mix-LP-stations seemingly avoiding to CQ in CW while doing it extrensively and successfully in phone, unnecessarily raising suspicion that someone does not want to see RBN-comparisons...
Statistics & Figures
For those wanting to dig deeper into results and statistics we have a few offers: First is our statistics page about activity distribution in regions, countries and categories plus score figures for rank ten.
Second there is a band-by-band breakdown of all scores plus score deduction, mode distribution, distance to next station and op times The excel-file for own calculations has the category in each line plus the WRTC selection area of every entry, so that WRTC-aspirants can get a first impression. One tab is grouped by categories, the other has only the entry lines (but with category and selection area still attached to each call).
Certificates are ready for download via menue item "Certificates" on the left.
Any questions please to wag-info(at)dxhf.darc.de
For now "Thank you" to Heiko, DL1RTL, and Klaus, DL1DTL, for the many hours checking and discussing still another case and to Franta, DJ0ZY, Michael, DL6MHW, Holger, DF1QR und Julian, DL6OCK, for patient tech support.
To all: A good and healthy 2015!
Chris DL8MBS
WAG Contestmanager