Radiosport

a technical type of sport consisting of various multiple-event competitions using radio receivers and transmitters in conjunction with general athletic tests. The modern ra-diosport program includes competitions in shortwave and ultrashort-wave radio communications, the rapid establishing of radio links, “fox hunting” (locating three to five hidden low-power shortwave and ultrashort-wave radio transmitters—the “foxes”—using direction-finding receivers), and the radio-communications combined events competition (reception and broadcast of transmissions, orienteering on a course, and exchange of radio transmissions within a radio net having three stations).

Shortwave radio competitions have been held regularly in the USA, Great Britain, France, and the Scandinavian countries since the founding of the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) in 1925 and in the USSR since 1927. In the USSR, the first ultrashort-wave radio competitions were held in 1931, and the first competition involving the rapid establishing of radio links was held in 1940; the latter event was first held abroad after World War II. The radio-communications combined events competition originated in Poland in the late 1950’s and was first held in the USSR in 1961. Fox hunting events were first held in the USA in the 1940’s and in the USSR in 1957. The major international radiosport competitions are the CQ-M championship (since 1925), the European-USSR VHF/UHF Contest (annually since 1956), and the European Fox Hunting Championship (once every two years since 1961). The radio-communications combined events competition and the rapid reception and broadcast competitions are held only in the socialist countries.

The Radiosport Federation of the USSR was created in 1959 and became a member of the IARU in 1962. Radiosport was added to the program of the ail-Union games for technical military sports in 1958, and to the program of the Spartakiads of the peoples of the USSR in 1967. In 1962 radiosport was included in the Uniform All-Union Sports Classification, and national championships have been held regularly since that year. Championship tournaments are held annually for the Union republics, various state agencies, and sports clubs.

The development of radiosport in the USSR from the 1920’s to the 1940’s was associated with the Society for Assistance to Defense, Aviation, and Chemical Construction (Osoaviakhim), and in the 1950’s, with the Voluntary Society for Cooperation With the Army, Air Force, and Navy (DOSAAF USSR). Prominent figures in this development have been E. T. Krenkel, I. T. Peresypkin, and the radiosport enthusiasts F. V. Rosliakov, Iu. N. Prozorovskii, I. V. Zavedeev, N. M. Tartakovskii, G. A. Rassadin, A. F. Kamaliagin, A. I. Grechikhin (four-time winner of the European Fox Hunting championship), L. V. Zorina, V. I. Semenov (winner of the CQ-M championship), L. M. La-butin, and I. M. Martynov.

In 1977 in the USSR there were about 200 radio clubs in DOSAAF radio-engineering schools (the Central Radio Club in Moscow was founded in 1946) and approximately 800 radio-sport sections in technical sports clubs; more than 400,000 persons, including more than 1,000 Masters of Sport, took part in radiosports. Teams from Soviet radio clubs in Donetsk, Riga, and Cheliabinsk were world champions in 1963, 1968, and 1970.

Abroad, radiosport, especially shortwave and ultrashort-wave competitions, is most developed in the USA, Great Britain, the Federal Republic of Germany, Argentina, Brazil, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Italy, and Sweden. CQ-M and European-USSR VHF/UHF champions include T. Stewart (USA), D. White (New Zealand), D. Frico (Brazil), W. D. Wordsworn (Canada), R. Spenzelli (Virgin Islands), P. Kinmann and G. Svensson (Sweden), R. Stephens (Great Britain), B. Mačnusek, K. Souček, and J. Gorski (Czechoslovakia), and A. Hiedrojc and E. Masajada (Poland).