Contact Sport: A Story of Champions, Airwaves, and a One-Day Race around the World

by J.K. George

In the woods of Massachusetts, pairs of contestants huddle in tents filled with communications equipment. Their voices soar through the air, riding waves into the atmosphere, as they comb through static and noise for a response from the other side of the world. They’re searching for loot—in the form of other voices in the sky. The rarer their contact, the more valuable their treasure. Joining them in their quest is author J. K. George, an experienced radio operator himself, who guides you through the exciting world of amateur radio competition and the intriguing characters of the 2014 World Radiosport Team Championship. The competitors hail from across the planet—from youthful challengers to veterans with decades of radiosporting experience. You will meet fascinating personalities not only among the teams themselves but also among their “widows”—spouses left behind for the allure of the airwaves.They battle computer malfunctions, getting lost, and staying at the top of their game for 24 hours in a hot, stuffy tent. The final scores bring surprises, disappointments, even a recount, and decades-long friendships will be stressed in the fight for the crown of amateur radio—the ultimate “contact” sport.

Genres: Nonfiction

319 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 2, 2016

About the author

J.K. (Jim) George (N3BB) has been an avid reader and amateur radio enthusiast, with special love for Morse code and radiosporting, since his teenage years -- over fifty years ago. He started his hobby listening to short-wave broadcasts and long-distance AM radio stations. He is a graduate of Virginia Tech, where he was president of the VT Amateur Radio Club and was inducted into the Virgina Tech Academy of Engineering after serving as Chair of the Advisory Boards for both Electric and Computer Engineering, as well as the College of Engineering. He is an avid Virginia Tech sports fan. He completed his graduate school at Arizona State University, specializing in semiconductor materials physics.

George's professional career was primarily at Motorola, where he worked in the semiconductor business for nearly forty years and served as corporate vice president for nearly fifteen years. Following his retirement, George was a founding member and served for several years on the advisory board for KUT-FM, the public radio station at the University of Texas at Austin. George enjoys reading and writing and has been a member of a small men's book club in Austin for over a decade. He and his wife live in the Hill Country west of Austin and have three grown children and five grandchildren.

He has written two books: "Reunion," and "Contact Sport: A Story of Champions, Airwaves, and a One-Day Race Around the World."

Reviews

[Kazen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm a sucker for championships. If you gather the world's elite in almost anything I'll tune in, from soccer and the Olympics to competitive crossword puzzle solving and Starcraft. I figure it gives each sport (define as you will) a fair shot - if I don't like watching the best of the best it's obviously not for me.

So I jumped on this book when I saw it - radiosport! Who knew there's such a thing? And complete with a World Championship, where teams have 24 hours to contact as many people in as many different locations as possible via shortwave radio. To do so they set up low-power radio stations with standard equipment at assigned sites like a state forest, an abandoned mental hospital, or next to a military runway. Generators set up in the woods, what could go wrong?

A lot, of course, making things interesting. After introducing the cast of characters (more on that in a moment) George eases the reader into the terminology, technology, and allure of radiosport. An amateur operator himself, George's enthusiasm for the competition is contagious. I ended up cheering for one of the German teams (the only women in the competition, ever) and fretting over little things like antenna direction and lost multipliers.

That being said, the writing strikes me as unsure. George relies on punctuation to get his meaning across instead of trusting words to do the job. From a section about computer-generated Morse code:

"In addition, the electronic circuit allowed the dits and dahs to vary (ditzy dahs... I just couldn't resist) in relation to each other - it's called weighting - so there was personality possible, even with this new-fangled mechanism."

Clunk.

This is George's first foray into non-fiction as far as I can tell and he took it upon himself to be a reporter. It's good to be thorough, but I wish he did more work distilling the information instead of repeating facts by rote. The lottery to determine sites read more like a list than an introduction of the key competitors. Likewise a chapter about the Ham Widows' Ball lets details interfere with the mood of the event, making it seem frivolous and scathing in turns when instead it was a way for partners of contestants to vent and cut loose.

There are some fun sections, don't get me wrong. George driving a team out to one of the most remote sites reads like a Bill Bryson mishap:

"[The ranger] whipped out a forest service map and proceeded in rapid-fire proper Bostonian to rattle off names. 'This road' - he motioned over his shoulder - 'is Fearing Pond Road, but the bridge over there' - he nodded to the right beyond some trees - 'is out.... Just take Lower College Pond Road.' Now he nodded to the left. 'Go up that hill and keep to the right. Just keep turning right. You'll end up back on Fearing Pond Road.' At this point, he swiveled his head and nodded back toward the right, to the bridge that was closed somewhere over there."

I also enjoyed the technical asides explaining the finer points of radio operation and quirky anecdotes.

Whether you like this book or not will depend on your reaction to the writing - if you can get past the clunkiness there's a fun story about a world you've likely never heard of. I was tempted to pull out a red pen now and then but I still enjoyed the ride.

Thanks to Greenleaf Book Group and NetGalley for providing a review copy.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disclaimer – I received an advance reader copy of this book through NetGalley in return for an honest review.

Contact Sport is a book about a somewhat obscure, and unknown (at least to me) sort called Contesting or Radiosporting, Specifically a competition which took place in 2014. This somewhat anachronistic event involves ham radio operators from around the world coming together in one location – in this case America – to compete against the other teams over a 24 hour period to make the most contacts with other radio operators in Europe.

The author does an excellent job of teasing out the history of previous events, and the characters who are involved in the whole competition. The fact that the author went out involved himself in the action, working alongside one of the teams made the story that much more interesting.

While not all of the concepts involved are explained particularly well – for instance, how the point scoring system works in the contest – but it is generally very accessible for people who don’t necessarily know much about ham radio. It was also interesting to hear about the use of, and integration of modern technology in this old

As a fan of bird-watching, and other obscure sports, I can appreciate the obsessive nature of some of the contestants who took part in the event. Even the slightest mistake can ‘ruin’ everything.

I really enjoyed reading the book, and learning about something new – I had no idea that there were such contests still going on around the world, and while there is something “old-fashioned” about it, it still has a certain charm.

This review also published on Book of Bogan

[Joe · Rating 5 out of 5]

As an amateur radio operator, or ham, this was a great book. I love contesting although I'm about as close to being as good as the ham contesters described in this book as I am to being a hall-of-fame baseball player. In other words, I'm a long, long, long away from either.

I could tell that the author struggled a bit around the middle of the book trying to describe the heat of a ham radio contest to readers when he talks about being close to a tent containing two contesters and not being able to hear much. What could they be doing? Why is it so quiet? How could anybody think that this is in any way exciting? Well, I know, and I can appreciate how hard it might be to describe to non-hams.

One little criticism is that I would have liked to read more about the site preparations and other preparations before the event started.

I think the author did a good job of showing the physical and mental stress involved with a contest like this. He described some things that did not go very well for some teams which almost scuttled all the work they did to participate. There was also some bitter feelings described after the contest was over that was felt by a few hams who did not think that they got fair treatment.

The ones who won the contest, especially the gold medal winners are amazing operators. I don't know how they rose to that level. Especially considering that one is more of a "hired gun" and does not do much operating except in big contests at other ham's or group's station.

[B. Andersen · Rating 5 out of 5]

The allure of amateur radio is difficult to convey. To those on the outside, it might seem arcane and anachronistic. In fact, it is anything but those things, and this book does a wonderful job of showing readers what ham radio is about, and how the very best in the hobby compete.

I was fortunate to be able to volunteer and assist in a small way during the 2014 ham radio olympic event held in New England. Reading this book allowed me the chance to relive that time, and see what I was missing in the other fifty plus operator sites. There's even a chapter in there about the fun the competitor's wives had while their husbands competed.

If you are interested in ham radio, this book is a must read. If you want to know where telecommunication executives, engineers, and even the highest ranks of the military brass go to compete and have fun, this will provide hours of entertainment.

[Vic DiCiccio · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm a ham and my main amateur radio activity is radiosport, so I know some of the WRTC contestants in the book and have worked some of them in contests -- including, it turns out, Jim George, the author. Jim has been very successful in making the excitement of ham radio contesting accessible to non-hams, and I hope this intrigues some readers to consider getting involved. His description of the problems that can arise, and the challenges that face contestants at the elite level of radiosport engages the reader in the human part of the competition. The idiosyncrasies of the participants, and their individual ways of doing things in this 24 hour radio marathon, tells the reader much more about amateur radio than most introductory books and guides.

It's a must-read if you like to find out about why people do the competitions in their particular hobbies.

[Carolyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book details the amateur radio World Radiosport Team Championship of 2014 in New England. It was interesting reading about the various teams, their set up, and their contacts. It brought up childhood memories of my dad sitting in his radio shack in the backyard trying to contact hams around the US and if lucky around the world

[Jonathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

My father's an amateur radio enthusiast so I gave this book to him a few years ago. Now, during the long goodbye of his Alzheimer's, I read this book in his honor. As a child, I remember him participating in similar 24-hour contests and recall falling asleep to the blips & beeps of morse code as well to his calls of "CQ-CQ-CQ" wafting faintly through the walls. So, thanks for this entertaining read that reflected my father's (N4QY) passion.

[Eric · Rating 2 out of 5]

I won this book from a Goodreads giveaway.

I started this book off with pretty high hopes. I know next to nothing about amateur radio and nothing about radiosporting. My father in law did some very minor amateur radio stuff when he was a kid and we've had some very high level discussions about what he did, but that's about it. That being said, one of the stated objectives of the book is to get people interested in and excited about radio and radiosporting.

The first couple of chapters did that for me. Some of the stuff, like history of call signs, was fascinating and my curiosity about the whole thing was piqued. I continued in the book looking for more insight into amateur radio, how it works, what it is, and how this world competition got started. After the first couple of chapters, it felt like the book got bogged down in the back and forth of the event itself. Not knowing the people involved, the sport, or how it really works I wound up getting a bit lost and losing track of who was who. The author bounced around between teams a bit, which wouldn't be a bad thing if I was familiar with the players involved. It probably would have been more interesting if I knew more, but with the lack of knowledge I got kind of frustrated and lost.

On the whole it was interesting, but I started losing interesting about 75 pages in. Likely a good read and successful book for someone with knowledge of the sport and the players involved, but not likely for the average person.

[John Bastin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amateur radio operation is a popular hobby, and within that hobby, the activity of participating in contests is a favorite of thousands of "hams."

Jim George presents an engaging, fascinating look into contesting in amateur radio, Radiosport in present-day vernacular. The story unfolds during a ham radio contest, the World Radiosport Team Championship that occurs once every four years; this particular event was in 2014. It talks about the immense amount of work performed by volunteers to make the effort work as smoothly as possible for the competitors. It also looks at the ups, downs, successes and failures encountered by the individuals competing for the top slot.

This book is a very good read, with descriptions that are easily understood even by those who are not "hams" themselves. I found it particularly interesting because I was reading about many of my own friends and acquaintances who were involved in this running of the event. Even if you're not involved in the hobby, you'll find this a captivating book to read.

[Kenneth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good look into WRTC and amateur radio contesting. Engaging.

Well written, researched, and presented. I learned things about this competition I didn't know, and I think it's a good introduction to amateur radio contesting in general for non-hams.

I would like to have seen more photos of operators actually operating and an overview of the different equipment used by the top contenders. Not using color photos, at least in the digital Kindle version seems to me to be an opportunity wasted.

I enjoyed the book and polished it off in an afternoon. As a result of reading this book I'll pay more attention to the next WRTC.

[Randy Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Contact Sport has great insight into an intense activity

It is difficult to describe competitive activities and still write about it in a more relaxed style. Jim has done a remarkable job in maintaining the proper balance. There are so many human interest aspects to the event when you consider that over 100 competitors were on hand plus hundreds of volunteer staff.

Great job!