I've been using Morse Runner, a software CW practice program for contesting
skills, for so long, I can't remember when I first downloaded a copy.  I
really have improved a lot just by using the program.  It uses a sound card
to generate, for those unfamiliar with the program, basic contest operations
including fading, line noise, Artic flutter, or sometimes called polar
flutter or just echo,
pile ups from a couple of signals to bunches of people calling you all at
once, and all types of commonly experienced problems working a contest.  In
this case, all the settings can be turned off and on and you can also tune
up and down the band using the arrow keys.  The filter
bandwidth I think can be set from 100 Hz to 600 but I'd have to check.  You
can set it for single stations to call you one at a time, or as I said, pile
ups.  You can set the CW speed and also work full break in, known as QSK, or
semi Break In which makes you drop in and out as you begin transmitting and
stopping for listening mode.  There are many other features but the best one
is that it is free.  A Colorado ham friend turned me on to it back just
about the time I went to windows from DOS.  I did so kicking and screaming,
going to windows that is, just like I did when incentive licensing forced me
to study for my advanced license and then for my extra so I could get all my
CW bands back, haha.  I said once before, I'm still mad about incentive
licensing but I never would have gotten the advanced, or extra, without it
forcing me to do so.
Anyhow, without detailing all the features, let me explain what Morse Runner
can do for you and also share a few general tips about CW, contesting, and
working pile ups for what it is worth.

Let me say that although my top speed is about 50 WPM these days, and back
in the early 1980s I got up to 70 WPM, my basic rag chew speed has always
been about 28 to 35.  I've spent hundreds of hours at 50, 60, and 70 words
per minute but after awhile, I got tired of pushing and just let my speed
drop back to a more comfortable level.  20 WPM is fine but I have no problem
working slower than even 5 WPM.  In short, I like CW at about any speed.
With this in mind, I started the Morse Runner program at 20 WPM when I first
started it up because all the function keys and command keys were unfamiliar
to me, plus, all those signals coming out of my speakers sound so freaking
real, it was hard to believe I wasn't really on the air.  Anyhow, 20 WPM
worked just fine for a couple of three days and then I began jumping up by 5
WPM.  That's another feature of the program; you can only move up and down
by steps of 5 WPM but that's ok.  In a real contest, I prefer 37 or 38 WPM
regardless but I still believe what the old timers taught 50 years ago when
I began studying for the novice exam: "Phil, don't ever go faster than the
guy you are talking to.  If you call CQ at 25 and he answers you at 5, then
QRS. slow down, and go his speed until he tells you otherwise.  It's just
habit for me now.  Contests are a little different but later in a contest,
when contacts are harder to make, even slow, or weak signals, a contester
will go slower just for those extra points they are pushing to get logged.
Keep in mind, those stations going 40 and 50 words per minute in a contest
are punching memory buttons with pre recorded strings.  If you sent 50 WPM,
they very likely won't copy you so send at 20 WPM or whatever you want.  The
big contest stations have more than one person at the rig and normally more
than one transmitter on the same band using different directional antennas.

Before I continue, I've run big pile ups, other than in contests, especially
on 40 meters when I had a beam at 70 feet, and especially when I had the
call of AF0H which is a horrible CW call.  Anyway, I ran pile ups all the
time to Japan because they love collecting new prefixes so Morse Runner
shouldn't have spooked me so much but as I said, I had just started using
windows so I didn't know half of what I was doing and still don't.  I'll be
dad blamed if my computer dies to buy another.  I think I'll just use my
iPhone instead, haha.  Just kidding.  Plus, I've run pile ups during CW
contests, too, and dad gum if it isn't hard work.

I preset Morse Runner to 600 Hz bandwidth because I grew up using an old
BC348 military receiver that only had a 1 KHz CW crystal filter.  Shoot,
that's not much less than the band pass of the better transceivers on CW
when the filters are wide open.  With my Icom 7000 today, using the lowest
filter, which I think is 250 Hz, and then using the additional crystal
filtering, I can literally squeeze a signal, and I've tested this many times
to be sure, down to a band width of just 19 Hertz.  I rarely drop down to
250 Hz, on the other hand, unless it is a contest or the QRN thunderstorm
static is bad.  I'm used to listening through a wide filter and I like to be
able to hear the whole pile up so my brain can automatically pick out which
signal to focus on.  That means I pick out a certain signal and my brain
helps to filter out all the others, for the most part, so the weakest
signal, at 300 Hz, below the body of the pile up, may be the one I answer.
Then, too, I may focus on the highest pitch signal instead of the middle of
the pile and work him.  In a pile up of any size, 99 percent of the time,
you are going to automatically focus on the absolute strongest signal you
can copy but that isn't necessarily the way to work a pile up.  This is why,
however, the contest stations have such big antennas and big amplifiers and
the real dedicated contesters don't always run just 1500 watts output
either.  This is especially true in Europe, the United States, and Russia.
The Russians, believe it or not, to this day, run some amazing power.  You
want to know where all the old big power amplifier tubes are today?  Talk to
a Russian that's a club member over there and you will find out where those
big tubes are.  Anyhow, we all generally are going to focus on the strongest
signal in most pile ups, unless, that is, he is going too fast for us to
copy.  I personally let my mind do the choosing of whom to focus on and then
zero mentally on that one signal.  From that point on, I often, even in
Morse Runner, can only pick out signals around the edges, even if they are
weaker than the body of the pile up, and I'll get part of their prefix, or
part of their suffix, and reply with my exchange to that much of the call.
The idea, of course, is to get the entire call so you don't spend time 
trying to reply more than the first time but even in a contest, things are 
not always as they seem.  A lot of CW operating is copying by rhythm and 
that has nothing to do with
contesting as much as it does when practicing to increase your rate of copy.
For example, I literally put K0NX, my current call, at the top of my list of
25 calls I would take when applying for the vanity call sign back in 1996. 
Why, it has a
short rhythm with the NX.  I wanted a lot of calls that were already taken.
For example XX, CQ, CW VV, and I could go on for a whole page listing
calls easy to copy.  This time, though, I picked out a call that sounded
rhythmic, could be remembered so you won't duplicate in a contest as easily,
and that rolled with the flow, sort of speak.  Building speed works by
listening to slightly higher speeds than you can copy, then dropping back
and working someone at the speed where you can copy every single letter for
the whole contact, this increases confidence, and then calling the next guy
who is sending a little faster than you can get fully.  Another old timer
rule.  Never be afraid to ask a person to slow down, that is, to QRS, but
this normally is negated in a contest operation.  Back
to the rhythm of the code.  letter such as ING, ER ED, EST, UA, VE, TNX,
RST, and dozens of others have a almost musical, or rhythmic, sound to them.
Guys at 40, 50, and faster, aren't copying letter for letter but mostly word
by word.  In other words, they copy hearing the background rhythms of the
words and their brain fills in the rest.   Even back in the day of copying
with a mill, that's the old timers word for typewriter, or in my case, a
Braillewriter, too, I used, we copied two, three, and more words behind what
was being sent.  Why?  Because we were listening for rhythms.  Again, OU,
ON, OX, OR, VK, ZL, and the like have rhythm.  So when it comes to
contesting, your mind listens for those sounds and especially the DX
prefixes
so you can pick out a call in a split second and let your mind crank down
hard on that single note when there might be a dozen tones coming through
the headphones at you.  Speaking of CW rhythm, let me prove there is really
such a thing as almost a musical rhythm to CW.  Get out your old hand key,
or pull your old bug over to where you operate, or center your electronic
keyer where it feels right, or even set your CW keyboard, or software
generated CW program, on your lap, or in bed, or wherever you practice or
operate on the air, and try sending the next few words or lines of text.

Test
Bees Nest
Bens best bet

An old ship to ship one used to be:

Bens best wire.

My favorite is the following.  It will take you a lot of slow practice to
even copy the next one right; trust me.  The guy who taught me the below
line of CW text, was on 15 meters one afternoon and we were sending about 35
WPM when he sent it to me.  I missed it flat out.  He repeated and I
missed it.  He slowed down to about 20 WPM and I got a couple of words.
Finally, I got him to slow down to at least 10 WPM before I copied it right.
Just trying to send it correctly is very difficult at first and I'm even
talking about typing it on a keyboard is hard.  Here it is but don't send
the apostrophe in one of the words.  I just added it to make the synthesizer
say the word correctly.  So leave all punctuation out.

Tennessees sissies are sissier sissies than Mississippi's sissies.

Ok, how did you do?  The line alone proves you have to learn the rhythm of
the code if you are ever going to get passed letter by letter copying.  My
favorite, though, is Bens best bet but another goody is bees nest.  .  The
whole sentence can be
mentally learned as if it were one letter or at least one word just by
rhythm alone.

The nice thing about CW pile ups is that, as I have already mentioned, the
strongest signal isn't necessarily the one you need to answer.  My mind,
unless the strongest signal is dead center within my passband, automatically
searches around the edges of the pile up.  I also do not wait to focus on a
call being sent in its entirety.  If, in the middle of the can of worms, my
mind's snags only two letters, or a number and a letter, or a prefix, I
reply to that and let the pile up drain away from that one signal.  Even if 
more than one signal thinks I've called him, you've at least scaled back the 
overall
size of the pile up and only have one or two or three signals calling you 
and you can
focus on whichever call catches your attention.  Most people start out at a
slower speed regardless if they are calling someone or answering in a pile
up and then build on that speed as thing develop.  For example, with Morse
Runner, I now have worked my way up to starting at 40 WPM and I work at
least 20 stations, normally it is about 30 to 33 stations, and then I page
up and the speeds jumps to 45 WPM.  I miss more, and the dynamics of the
software develops a slightly altered pile up.  I'm referring to the shape
the pile up makes.  Stations answering my CQ set at 45 changes with a wider
range of fast, and slow, stations calling me including some right at 45 or
even 50 WPM.  Sometimes the fast stations are easier to copy than the slow
stations and contacts are quick made as a result.  Other times, it is a slow
station, weaker than the main body of the pile up, so I pick him off.
Another tip, which may be obvious, is two, if possible, and based upon the
form the pile up has taken, copy at least one call whom you will answer
first, then copy a couple of letters from another station in the pile up,
and then when you are finished with the first, you can query the part of the
second call and make a faster double exchange; it hitting a double in
baseball sort of speak, haha.  This becomes easier than you might think and
often you can snag two or three double letters in the pile up and work them
one right after another before sending QRZ or T U for Thank You indicating
the contact is confirmed.

I have, over the years, learned the nature of the Morse Runner software,
that is, I know about how many contacts I can make before I have to slide my
receiver down with the arrow keys one or two clicks for 100 to 200 Hz.  I
almost am aware of other characteristics of the software so, at best, it is 
just a
tool and not like the real thing all the way around.  The best way is to
simply tune the band during a contest, pick out the loudest signals first,
work them, and keep moving up the band.  Then start over from the bottom and
start tuning the knob slower so you don't miss the weaker signals.  Snag as
many of them as you can as you move up the band.  Don't spend an hour trying
to work some guy who can't hear you through the pile up.  Move along and
then you can work him when you run across him later when the pile up has
diminished.  If you have
a big antenna with big power, you can shoulder your way into the louder
signals and run a pile up but you need a good basic working knowledge of
propagation for any given band and hunting and driving a pile up is
concerned.  If you are running lower power and a smaller antenna, climb
higher into the band, like above 7075 on 40 meters or above 28.100 on 10
meters.  This way you can get away from the can of worms at the bottom of
each band.  In the last CW contest on 10 meters, I heard guys up above
28.150 and nearly to 28.200 working Europeans.  Few of us are going to be 
working pile ups but the Morse Runner contest program will improve your CW 
skills regardless if you ever work a contest or not.  The important thing to 
remember is to have fun.  If it isn't fun; try moon bounce or some other 
phase of the hobby.

Phil.
K0NX