SARL National Field Day

South Africa's field day, run twice a year over the second March weekend and the first September weekend: 26 hours on six HF bands, scored on contacts into the SADC region.

Rules at mysarl.org.zaThe rules are the sponsor's. This page holds the dates and the facts.

When it runs

Second full weekend of March, and First full weekend of September

0800Z Saturday → 1000Z Sunday

Times are UTC, as the sponsor states them.

Next runnings

0800Z Sat 13 Mar → 1000Z Sun 14 Mar · 26h2027
in 162 days
Logs due 1000Z Fri 19 Mar
0800Z Sat 4 Sep → 1000Z Sun 5 Sep · 26h2027
in 337 days
Logs due 1000Z Fri 10 Sep
0800Z Sat 11 Mar → 1000Z Sun 12 Mar · 26h2028
in 526 days
Logs due 1000Z Fri 17 Mar
0800Z Sat 2 Sep → 1000Z Sun 3 Sep · 26h2028
in 701 days
Logs due 1000Z Fri 8 Sep
0800Z Sat 10 Mar → 1000Z Sun 11 Mar · 26h2029
in 890 days
Logs due 1000Z Fri 16 Mar
0800Z Sat 1 Sep → 1000Z Sun 2 Sep · 26h2029
in 1065 days
Logs due 1000Z Fri 7 Sep

Operating

Modes: SSB / CW
Bands: 160m80m40m20m15m10m
160, 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10 m, excluding the 60, 30, 17 and 12 m bands. The segments 7 100-7 130 and 3 651-3 699 kHz are contest free.
Exchange: A contest-specific exchange; phone and CW on one band count as separate bands and a station may be worked once per band per mode.
Logs: ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel · due 5 days after the end
Who can enter: Anyone, anywhere.
The focus is SADC: 'QSOs with stations outside the SADC region score less points' -- fewer points, not no entry.

Where this comes from

Checked against the sponsor: Yes. The rule on this page was read off SARL's own published rules. Link last confirmed 2026-08-19.
What the source says: 2026 SARL Contest Manual Version 1.1 (2025-12-15), mysarl.org.za, 'The SARL National Field Day': '2.1. 08:00 UTC on Saturday 14 March to 10:00 UTC on Sunday 15 March 2026 (2nd full weekend of March)' and '2.2. 08:00 UTC on Saturday 5 September to 10:00 UTC on Sunday 6 September 2026 (1st full weekend of September)'. Bands: '3.1. 160, 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10 m.' Modes: '3.4. The modes that may be used are Phone and CW.' Logs: '10.1. Logs in ADIF or Cabrillo with a summary sheet or MS Excel shall be submitted by 21:59 UTC on Friday 20 March and Friday 11 September 2026.' Checked against SARL's own published dates as well as its rules: SARL publishes SARL-Contests-2026-Calendar.ics on the same page, whose times carry TZID="South Africa Standard Time" (a fixed +0200, no DST -- its own X-CALSTART confirms 09:00 local as 07:00Z). That calendar is an independent second source for every date encoded here.
Recorded caveats: Two legs a year off ONE record, because both share a start and end offset -- 0800 UTC Saturday to 1000 UTC Sunday -- and differ only in which weekend they anchor to. SARL states both readings itself, weekend AND date, and both agree for 2026. log_deadline_days is 5, which is the right DAY and not the right hour: SARL states 'by 21:59 UTC on Friday', and the contest ends at 10:00 UTC on the Sunday five days before, so the engine's derived log_due lands at 17:00 rather than 21:59. The day is exact in every year because both ends are tied to the same Sunday. The five hours are recorded here rather than papered over.

Something wrong? How to report it — a link to the sponsor's own page is all it takes.

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