2026 NAQP contest

 

The January NAQP is always a contest I look forward to. It starts at 2:00 PM local time, and my plan was to operate for about eight hours of the ten-hour event. This contest is always well attended, and with the maximum power limited to 100 watts, everyone is on a level playing field.

As always, I reviewed the previous year’s results, the bands I used and when, and my balance between running and search-and-pounce. Last year, 10 through 40 meters were all open and I made good use of those bands. This year was quite different — 10 meters was poor and I spent only a short time there. The best band turned out to be 20 meters, followed by 15 meters and then 40 meters. I knew going in that solar conditions were not going to be as favorable as last year.

The contest started off a bit slow, and I initially wondered if many operators had seen the predicted solar conditions and decided to sit this one out. Like last year, I spent about 95% of the contest running, and things did begin to pick up later in the afternoon. My highest hourly rate was 115 contacts, and three hours in, it was time for dinner. I was very pleased to have logged 300 contacts by that point.

After dinner, however, that’s when things really went downhill. Before the break, the Kp index had been holding steady at 3 and the Bz index was around −6 to −8. After dinner, the Kp jumped to 6 and the Bz index dropped as low as −19. I was wrapping up my time on 20 meters and transitioning to 40 meters as evening set in, but under these new solar conditions my hourly rate dropped from around 100 contacts to barely 25.

 

The deteriorating band conditions brought severe QSB  stations would be there one moment and completely gone the next. The combination of high Kp and strongly negative Bz also made CW signals sound as though they were gurgling underwater. Given these conditions, I decided to pull the plug at 8:00 PM local time and call it a day.