CQWW CW           Category          QSOs    Zones   Countries   Score
---------------------------------------------------------------------
W5KFT (K5PI, op.) SO AB HP          2408     142     385    3,447,634
N3BB              SO AB HP          2124     119     338    2,862,133
W5GAI             SO AB HP           478     100     227      417,906
K5NA              SO AB HP A        1198     186     584    2,502,500
AF5Z              SO SB HP 80         68      20      37       
N5AW              SO AB LP          1314     152     450    2,193,086
W5JAW             SO AB LP           184             154       
W5ZL              SO AB LP A         508     103     233      463,344
NZ5A              SO SB LP 40        147      22      60       34,112

"Wow -- after all the predictions of poor conditions, I expected to be disappointed, but I had a blast! Conditions to Europe on 10 meters and 15 meters were great both mornings, and I had four hours with over 100 QSOs. The Japanese just kept calling on 40 meters in the wee hours Saturday morning, and I intended to come back for more on Sunday morning, but 20 meters to Europe was smoking! While my multiplier total was down from 146/436 last year, my QSO total was up by 400, making this a personal best." - K5PI (@ W5KFT)

"My real intent in entering this contest (given recent medical developments) was to bolster my country count, so I was not concerned with rate and points as much as I was finding new ones. Through trial and error, I managed to find a reasonably comfortable way to sit in my chair without overly aggravating my back. My shiny new back brace (fondly known as the "roll cage") proved rather a handful - severely restricting my movement (as it is designed to do). Though one tends to think of operating a radio in a contest as a pretty sedentary activity, you don't realize how much moving around, reaching for knobs and keyer paddles, etc., is involved until you can't." - W5ZL

"I did a stupid thing and worked on fixing the 160 meter sloper at the last minute. I spent five hours on Thursday and five more hours on Friday on the hillside with a chainsaw doing back-breaking work. When the contest started, I was spent. All for eight contacts......" - N3BB

"I was experiencing some erratic behaviour in receive on my Yaesu FT-1000MP Mark V Field. The night before, I had been rearranging my coax cables, and when I plugged in the cable to the Field, I thought I heard a small zap.... After screwing up my courage to disassemble the transceiver, I quickly found that my initial hunch was correct - the first PIN diode in the input circuit was blown. It had become a 1.4 Kohm resistor instead of a 1 ohm resistor when turned on. This explained the almost 30 db of attenuation I was hearing. Well, Friday night I decided to tune around and at least see how the local guys seemed to be doing, not expecting to hear any of the DX they were working. To my surprise, I was hearing a lot of DX, even though my S meter never moved off S0, even for the locals. What the heck, let's see if I can work a few. It soon became clear that if I could hear them, I could work them. My ears will never be the same after straining to hear anything at all. Even Gary W5ZL, who lives a mile away, was only S5! Yesterday, replacement diodes arrived in the mail, and I fixed the receiver. I almost blew my ear drums off after getting used to near silence." - W5JAW

"Conditions were great and operation was problem-free, so why is my score down a little over 10% from last year? I did operate a few hours less - I just couldn't stay awake in the wee hours of Sunday morning - but that didn't have any effect on 10 meters and 15 meters, where most of the decrease occurred. Please don't tell me it's old age!" - N5AW

"40 meters was wide open to Europe and Africa on Saturday night. The over-the-pole opening on 20 meters on Sunday afternoon was fun. I snagged the TO4 (Europa) station on 15 meters and 20 meters." - W5GAI

"I decided to just chase DX for the weekend, instead of contesting, and I had a great time without the pressure of CQing and holding a frequency. The funny thing was that I spent 48 hours in the operating chair anyway, taking an occasional catnap between QSOs." - K5NA

"I operated a few hours in search of new countries on 80 meters CW to complete my CW Five Band DXCC Award. I ran a KW into an inverted-L, but I did not have a dedicated receive antenna. There was more DX on the air than I expected, but only a dozen or so new countries for me." - AF5Z