This exactly Joe. We aim to encourage activators to operate from as many different summits as possible and to work as many people as possible. Likewise for chasers we want you to try to chase as many activators as possible on all their summits. Some of these contacts will be easy, nice strong signals etc. And sometimes they will be challenging. So you can get a better score if you work CW, SSB, FM, AM and the digital modes.
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Should 1 10m AM QSO be worth 5 10m FT8 QSOs? 
[Disclaimer: as an Old Fuddy Duddy I normally eschew emojis but made myself use one in case any one didn’t realise I was joking … well, maybe pretending to joke … okay! okay! covering up my true opinion]
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I know you’re joking but it’s an interesting point. Tom M1EYP uses all modes, DV, FM, SSB, CW and many digi modes. He’ll get a good score because he will end up working people who only do 10FM or FT8 or SSTV or whatever. Myself, I just don’t find the digimodes interesting and so don’t do them and I will miss lots of possible QSOs.
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Tom @M1EYP as well being a true multi-mode guy also does quite well in contests from summits, working lots of unique stations who are not SOTA Chasers. He spends an extraordinary amount of time on his local summits too. He also travels around a lot operating from lots of different summits.
Tom will therefore be very hard to beat in this challenge for those activators who are viewing it as a sort of competition. It will be interesting to see if anyone “throws down the guantlet” to try and challenge Tom. Good luck to anyone who does, it could make an interesting spectator sport. I will make some 10m activator QSOs no doubt, but I’ll concentrate more seriously on the Chaser side of the 10m challenge I think. I’ll enjoy taking part as many others will!
73 Phil G4OBK
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Oi - stop sharing my secret tactics!
Already done. How do you think ARRL got their hands in it…? 
I have no idea whether I’ll do almost 300 summits a year again, like I did in the last two years.
And … The number of chasers is limited!
If you really want to score points, then you probably have to take part in contests (which I won’t do!) … that’s not quite the SOTA idea anymore… but it gives you points!..
73 Armin
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I would attempt spiking his soup, but we seem to have stopped receiving regular soup updates so I would be unsure of which brand to buy 
I have a pass out for the 30 December which is really unhelpful for the challenge (not that I’d be anywhere in the table) but could be useful for others if they want to test their setups. After that I have no idea when I’ll manage to get out again due to various factors. Shame as I really do like 10m.
Anyone like to fund my retirement?
Ian
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I, though, would be thinking in terms of places like Glencoe or Kintail, with a shed load of the sort of summits that you don’t like!
Another clarification on the rules please Andy:
These were what you published in the first post:
The challenge runs from 0000Z January 1st 2024 to 2359Z December 31st 2024
Scoring for chasers:
For every unique summit you chase on 10m you get a multiplier.
For every unique activator you chase you get 1 chaser challenge point.
Your final score is chaser challenge points * multipliers.
Scoring for activators:
For every unique summit you activate on 10m you get a multiplier.
For every unique chaser you work you get 1 activator challenge point.
Your final score is activator challenge points * multipliers."
From that, there is no mention of modes. Are we now saying that working Chaser XY3ABC on 40m SSB and then on PSK31 will count twice? What about if the same chaser who is contacted from the same summit on two different bands?
I understand of course that if someone works multiple modes they are likely to find more (different) chasers - which is a nice way to spread SOTA across more modes, but for clarity - One chaser only counts as 1 point in the year and the total number of different chasers worked in the year is multiplied by the number of (different) summits activated - irrespective of mode - right?
So once I have worked Phil G4OBK (operating as a chaser), from Summit A another call from him a week later when I am on Summit B, brings me (as an activator) nothing, but for Phil, it’s another chaser-summit-mulitplier.
73 Ed.
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Only if you have a new definition of unique chaser
There’s no mention of modes in the text you quoted so modes do not enter into the scoring.
Seems to me the best way to achieve this would be to first post an alert as usual for a particular summit, deal with the SOTA chasers as long as they’re calling, and then trawl the 10m band in S&P mode to snap up any random station which can hear you. If the 10m band is playing nicely, that could be fun.
Looking forward to the masses of snow here to dissipate, or at least solidify, before venturing onto a summit hereabouts.
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Exactly that. The same chaser on a different mode won’t add to the score, but the use of a wide variety of modes over the period of the Challenge will reach out to a greater number of stations. Ultimately we aim to bring SOTA to the attention of as many radio amateurs as possible!
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So if I want to work lot’s of Europe in this event, which day of the week is the best for USA stations to activate a summit to work into Europe (I’m thinking about Contest QRM)??
Pete
WA7JTM
Possibly Friday, if only because contesters will be trying out their station in advance! But Friday is often good for some reason.
I love SOTA and certain don’t do enough of it. I say it every year but I’m planning on doing a lot more this coming year, life has taken over post lockdown and I’m determined to change that.
I play a fair bit of radio from home. My experience is that you can work a LOT of stations on 10m FT8 when the band is open.
I know this isn’t supposed to be a competition but everyone likes a bit of friendly rivalry right?
There is no way on earth that a station working anything other than FT8 from a summit is going to be competitive.
I love data modes from home as I can play while I’m doing other things, chatting with the YL, playing with the dog, eating dinner etc. I rarely work SSB from home.
However there is nothing better than keying the mic on a summit and waiting for that voice to return my cq call, its that unknown similar to walking the hills that lights my fire.
I need to decide whether to lighten my digital setup to work FT8 and remain competitive on the hilltop in this challenge or to forget about it and continue to enjoy SOTA in its old fashioned form.
73 MM0ZFG
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The 10m Challenge is only a small part of SOTA Steven - so I would carry on as you did before if I were you.
73 Phil G4OBK
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There is! Hearing your callsign come back to you in CW from a DX station beats this hands-down
The maths of the unique call x unique ref keeps everyone in the “game”. Someone could make 100s of QSOs on FT8 but still be easily surpassed by someone who went out activating lots of different references.
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You make a good point Steven, if there is no split by mode in the challenge and hence activators are purely looking for the maximum number of contacts with unique (new) stations from as many summits they can activate as possible through the year, whichever mode has the most activity (i.e. the maximum number of different stations to be contacted by the activator - not necessarily SOTA chasers) is going to score best in the challenge simply based on activity levels.
There is the possibility to run FT8 from Smartphones these days, so taking a laptop out to the summit is no longer required but I like you, prefer to operate SSB rather than FT8. Others prefer CW and there may be at times more CW ops on the bands than SSB, at the moment there is FT8 activity when there is nothing else on the bands, so I would be surprised if the top-scoring activators in the challenge were not using mainly digital modes such as FT8.
Looking at the chaser side of the challenge it’s different as only SOTA activators can be worked for points, not just any station as is the case for activators. In this case if there are activators not running FT8, other modes may have a better chance of coming out ahead.
It is going to be interesting to see the data at the end of the challenge.
73 Ed.
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This topic was automatically closed after reaching the maximum limit of 100 replies. Continue discussion at It’s time for… the 2024 10m Challenge. (Part 2).