CQWW SSB – a close call!
Here we go again – the CQ WW SSB 2025 is final and it was freaking close!
Like for the last couple of years I operated CQ WW SSB from Madeira as SO 10m Assisted.
You can read the full story here: CQ WW SSB 2025
I felt pretty good that I could lift my score from 2024 slightly in 2025.
The big surprise came with the official raw scores shortly after the contest!
HK1T was in front of me by about 3.44%. I belive he actually did unassisted and after Louis at D4C put up a world record score from Cape Verde he decided to move to the assisted category, what is totally fine of course.
I still belived that it might change after log check, as my score reduction with 4-5% usually is pretty low. My research showed that Salim usually was more in the 7-9% category. So I knew – only a miracle at log checking would turn this around.
The final answer came with the final scores published February 5th by the CQ commitee.
The good news: I was right: My log check came out better than HK1T. His reduction was 7.79% and mine only 4.50%, but …..
Congratulations to HK1T for the #1 world spot!
I have to settle for #2 world (and last place Afrika) with a gap of 0.011% in score and 269 points.
Given that a 3 point QSO from Madeira is worth 567 points, the gap is about 0.5 QSOs!
I have not seen a closer call in all these years of contesting and I have to do a few more QSOs in October 2026 again.
What I have learned?
- Further improve my error rate!
- Keep pounding – one QSO can make a difference!
- I would love to be single mult one time in my live.
Here are som pictures from Madeira:
See you in CQ WPX SSB 2026 and CQ WW SSB 2026 again from CQ3W!
73 and good dx
Helmut DF7EE
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