The North American QSO Party (NAQP) sponsored by the National Contest Journal is one of my favorite events. I especially like its 10 hour format because of the recovery that follows after time in the operating chair. This weekend was intense because I'm challenging convention and thinking as creatively as possible within my skill set. I'm demanding greater interactivity between myself, the game environment, and hardware.
My goal this weekend was a first step in broadening the scope of interaction mainly driven by the reverse beacon network (RBN) and N1MM Contest Logger. I was amazed by the information not only signal-to-noise ratio measurements but whether or not one was an LoTW participant. Potentially, in the future, could an application program interface be written by an enterprising software engineer, that taps into Twitter's fire hose? Then, one could read participant tweets, while the cursor hovers above the callsign?
The first two hours on 15m kicked serious butt as my 10 minute rate meter touched 170 before falling into the 90s then settling at seventy. However, tempers were dicey, as it is my standard to send my callsign after each contact. Likewise, I send dit-dit after completing a contact instead of TU, and this attracts the ire of a few. However, I noted on a few occasions some confusion on the frequency when sending my exchange, that is two stations simultaneously copied my information.
I sent target station callsign including TU as a counter measure against not-in-the-log whether it was effective is another matter.
For the first time ever, I experienced a disconnection with the event clock, as an effect of being in the zone. It was both physical and mental much like those precious few minutes when surfing a wave. I discovered my personal RadioSport meaning when all of my capacity was fully engaged in the game. The same is said about gaming leaving one with the want for more always wanting more.
Extreme wireless action on high frequency lasted all day from Red Bull like rates on 15m to three cans of Mountain Dew later in the day on 20 meter rates. My fave experience happened a few hours before sunset pacific standard time. I tracked one Big Gun station transmitting on 40m using RBN telemetry. And, something clicked, knowing my mentor's antenna system on 40m, indeed; a solid 30 minute rate beaming northeast in addition to activating three different RBN sensors in three different locations. Bingo, baby.
The next step in my process is to begin flow charting my project and examine the relationships between hardware, software, Internet, and wetware.
Contest on!