[CW] Friendship RadioSport and Chris R NW6V

Tue Sep 1 19:53:26 EDT 2020

I asked Chris to give us some details about his accomplishments in the
RadioSport competition. He was able to send over 25 wpm with a hand key and
if you've ever tried that, it's very difficult and requires a lot of work.

See below for information.
73
DR

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Chris R. NW6V <chrisrut7 at gmail.com>

Hi DR.

You asked for some info...

To my chagrin, there isn't much available about the Friendship Radiosport
Games (FRG). The Wikipedia page
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship_Radiosport_Games lists which teams
have won overall, but has no individual results, and
https://friendshipradiogames.wordpress.com/, has some photos and a video
documentary about the event which was made by a young Russian fellow who
knew nothing about ham radio and concentrates on the FoxHunting event - in
which his family participated.

N6TR, a well-known contester who ran the CW events kept no records - and
the event organizer. being an RDF fox-hunter, has that info but didn't keep
any CW stuff... So there are no detailed records - at least none that I've
found yet. I'm planning to update the Wikipedia site with what I find.

So, the only record I have as of now is the attached picture of me at the
awards banquet wearing the medals (Picture attached - it was the same time
as the Summer Olympics, so, I was very proud to represent the USA!), and
the medals themselves, which have the event names on the back (picture
attached): I won Gold in CW (individual), and the USA won bronze in HF
operating and overall.

[image: medals (1).jpg]    [image: 20200901_090854.jpg]
As the fellow who put together the video was not a ham (son of a
Fox-Hunter) and had no clue about CW, his choices in the documentary are
questionable :-) The video has about a 2-second clip of me sending Vs at
the beginning of a quick warm-up, and shows only one other competitor - his
father as I recall - who is sending torturously at about 8 WPM - the
slowest person there. Looking at it, I can tell you the short clip of me
was made just as I'd sat down and learned that the chair had no arms (my
normal "modified American style" has the elbow on the arm of the chair to
free the forearm), and worse, the leads to the keys didn't allow the key to
be anywhere but at the back of the desk! Which forced me into "American
style" for the competition. Arrgh...

The CW contest had three sections: Copying, copying calls (pileup), and
sending. When the winners were announced, It turned out I'd placed second
in both copying and pileups, and won the sending contest. That combination
made me the overall winner of the CW competition.

I trained hard for the sending contest, and while I'd hoped to win, one of
the Russain ops had won the previous two events, so I sure didn't take it
for granted. But as for copying and pileups - I hadn't trained at all -
zero. The last time I'd "copied" code - written it down in earnest - was
when I took my extra test back in the 80s, and then, 20WPM has seemed hard
to write. And although I'd copied calls in real pileups, I'd never used any
of the training software. So, placing second in both those events came as a
surprise.

The copying test was given in sets of five, 5-character alphanumeric
groups, sent at 2 WPM increments, starting at about 12 WPM. To my surprise,
I hung in up to 32 WPM. The winner went to 36. We were writing it down,
pencil on paper, BTW.

The pileups contest was given in the host's livingroom - piped through his
loudspeakers - with calls: weak, loud, fast, slow, low-pitched,
high-pitched, etc. and of course at the same time. The winner did
30-something. I believe I managed 26 - quite a bit lower but still good
enough for second.

But in sending, I smoked em'.

The fellow who ran the CW events said that I'd gone "just over 26 WPM"
sending 5-alpha/numeric groups. This was slower than I'd hoped - but there
was that weird - for me - arm position. But worse - I hadn't
practiced numbers! The only reference I had when training was that
well-known video of the German fellow sending with a key not connected to
an oscillator - doing a full page of 5-letter groups. So, t thought that
was the standard for radiosport - and practiced doing the exact same
(albeit with an oscillator). If memory serves, 27+ WPM for a full-page was
my best in practice, so I didn't know if that was good enough or not; the
fellow in the video was faster. But although this contest had harder
content - alphanumeric instead of just alpha - including numbers - it was
MUCH shorter - only 30 groups (words) total - so it was more like a
200-meter dash than running a mile. But I won :-)

Which, makes me the "Friendship Rasiosport Games Champion." But since there
haven't been any other contests in the USA in a long time - other than
earlier FRG contests - I figure I could lay claim to the title "National
Champion" without stretching the point too far. In candor, I'm kind of shy
about it.

= = = = = =

When the FRG was first announced at a local club meeting, my ears when up
when the speaker mentioned it included a "Straight key sending contest." I
didn't know I was even interested until he said that, and I heard this
voice in my head say "I WANT TO WIN THAT!!!" There ensued about 6 months of
training; I committed to at least one hour per day and missed very few
days.

I learned that the sending contest for FRG had three parts. The first was
sent with a straight key, the second with a bug, and the third with
paddles. So, I bought a used bug (my first since I was a 13-14-year-old
kid) and learned to use it. I mentioned this at the next club meeting and
was told I'd misunderstood: the second sending section allowed a bug OR a
SK, and the third allowed SK, bug, OR paddles... And the previous winners
always stayed on the SK for the whole event, because the change-over times
killed the advantages of faster keys. So really, in effect, it WAS a
straight key contest. Hallelujah!

For background, I got my ticket at 11 back in 1960, and my general at 12, 6
months later. My dad was a Navy op before and during WW2, and all through
my childhood was in the reserves - retired as a CWO4 after something like
30 years. He was a ham before he joined the Navy out of high school, back
in the 30s. He's the guy who taught me the code. His picture is attached. I
spent many a Tuesday night playing in the Naval Reserve Center's radio room
while the crew did whatever. :-)

[image: JJR radio officer r2.jpg]

In May of 61 I was the "Noteworthy Novice" in CQ magazine.

[image: img011.jpg]

By the time it came out, I'd already upgraded to general. And wouldn't you
know it - that was the first time (but only the first) that the press got
the story wrong.:" I had my first QSOs in Aug of 60, at a friend's house -
whose dad was a ham (I picked my friends...). But I had a deal with my dad:
if I got up to 13 WPM (on the instructograph) he'd build me a station -
which I did and he put up a proper dipole and I was off and running. But
then he made me another deal - if I got up to 18 WPM he'd put up a DX
antenna: I made that by March of 61 when I passed the General. And
magically, that summer, a tower with a tribander appeared in the yard... We
kept up that way until I had a bedroom full of great gear :-) Note the 1936
MAC bug on the desk... I still have all those QLS cards :-)

[image: img002_1.JPG]

So, that's the story. There's more, of course, and my dad's story has some
pretty amazing bits in it. Read the blurb "The Flame Burns On" from Spring
of last year, on my QRZ page.

73 Chris NW6V

On Mon, Aug 17, 2020 at 5:11 PM D.J.J. Ring, Jr. <n1ea at arrl.net> wrote:

> Chris,
>
> I learned about your radio sport accomplishments from somewhere, I'm
> thinking ARRL news letter, but a search of my email finds nothing.
>
> Could you share that with me if you can find it?
>
> I wanted to share with the CW email list a bit of your history.
>
> I know because I have some CW fame in my background that fame is not
> always fun, gunslingers often had kids with a gun trying to set them up
> which sometimes was fatal to them. So far only my ego has been stomped on.
> I just tell people "I was at the right place at the right time."  That's
> the truth.
>
> If you can't find the write up, send me something you have, I remember you
> told me about your father, wasn't he a USN radioman?
>
> Maybe you sent it with a different email address.
>
> 73
>
> DR
>
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