RadCom April 2024, Vol. 100, No. 4

Report April 2024 49 in memory of Gavin Nesbitt, MM1BXF (SK). This was awarded in the Beginners Category in the Construction Competition. Three trophies were retired during the year, as the RoLo Contest was discontinued. There are now a total of 125 trophies, split between 72 HF contest trophies, 35 VHF contest trophies, 16 AGM trophies, and 2 construction competition trophies. Of the 72 HF contest trophies, 26 are non-returnable trophies, 17 of which are donated by IOTA Ltd, GMDX and CDXC and several other individuals. For which many thanks are due. The Trophy Management Team would like to congratulate all trophy winners and wish them well for 2024. Jacqui Goodey, G6XSY trophy.manager@rsgb.org.uk VHF Contest Committee The VHF Contest Committee is responsible for setting the strategy and rules for the RSGB’s contest programme on 50MHz and above. With our aim to reach out and encourage as many members as possible to participate in VHF contests, our key measure of success is the number of entrants who we have participating in each contest. Covid-19 brought a big bump in participation levels during 2020 and 2021. Subsequently, the first part of 2022 saw activity levels retrenching somewhat as people spent time doing all the activities which they been prevented participating in during the previous two years. But 2023 has seen a rebound, which started being sustained at the end of 2022, and entry levels are broadly on the increase again. The short weekday evening UK Activity Contests (UKAC) with their friendly, but competitive club rivalry, continue their success, with 109 clubs and 652 entrants taking part this year. To some, these events are their main radio activity during the year, to others they are just another part of their radio repertoire, and to most they are a way of joining in club/group activities. The short 2.5-hour format of these contests proves popular and fit people’s modern lifestyles better than 24-hour long events. We strive for a wide variety of formats, sections and contest structures within our calendar, and to make them all as accessible as possible through, for example, 6-hour sections within the 24-hour events. Our longer weekend events are also generally gaining in activity and these events, often co- ordinated with wider European contests, provide great opportunities for good DX to be worked due to the large number of very well-equipped and very well-sited stations active across Europe. Contests now provide far and away the best opportunity to make substantial numbers of QSOs on SSB and CW on the VHF and UHF bands. The success of digital contesting at VHF continues and we maintain our position of consciously not mixing it too tightly with the traditional events. There are a significant group of entrants who are keen on digital contesting, but we don’t yet see the volume of digital entrants that are associated with the CW/SSB events. The Wednesday evening 2m and 70cm FT8 events are proving very successful with around 200 entrants. Going into 2024, we have made a change to our 55-minute-long FM activity contests on the 70cm and 2m bands, which run prior to the UKAC events. We’ve split the entry sections by license class, so Foundation licensees will compete only with Foundation licensees, Intermediates with Intermediates, and Full licensees with Full licensees. This is an experiment, which is based on feedback received, and which we hope may encourage more newcomers to enter. The VHF Contest Committee role is to set the rules and the strategy for events. The really hard work of adjudication is done by the Contest Support Committee which, as ever, has done an amazing job of getting the results for around 180 events in a really timely and accurate fashion. We could not run these events without them and I thank them for their enthusiasm and commitment. Pete, G4CLA and Mike, G0GJV do fantastic work on the software needed to automate our website and adjudication and are critical to the speed and accuracy of adjudication. This year, I should make particular mention of Jacqui, G6XSY who looked after our trophies. Jacqui has done an amazingly thorough job making this work so effectively over many years, but finally retired from the role during 2023. Our sincere thanks to her for the tremendous work that she put in. We continue to seek a replacement for her. Thank you all on behalf of all our entrants. Andy Cook, G4PIQ vhfcc.chair@rsgb.org.uk Youth The annual YOTA camp in Hungary was represented by a team of four young members Alex, Jake, Henry-James and Hanna. Following the camp, the team members made a presentation at the RSGB Convention and wrote pieces for the RSGB website and RadCom . During the year, several queries of what to do with licensed young people have been replied to. Most often the answers have been to encourage and enable frequent use in simplex or repeater conversations. There were also conversations with clubs setting up within schools, providing help with funding and ideas for activities. It’s great to see these clubs now well established and flourishing with good interest from the pupils and excellent leadership from the teachers. It was good to see several clubs taking part in the Scout’s JOTA event. A good number sent in reports to RadCom. We’re looking forward to next year’s event and hope to have some coordination between participating clubs. This year the Youth Team is hoping to grow with the introduction of Country Youth Representatives and more on-air events organised in the UK. British Science week in March will see the RSGB supporting activities at the RSGB National Radio Centre (NRC) at Bletchley Park, and around the UK, trying to attract more youth members to join the Society and play radio. Liam Robbins, G5LDR youth.champion@rsgb.org.uk Visit rsgb.org/youth to read more about what the RSGB does to support young people in amateur radio.