Paintball Journal

Adapted from last year’s version.

Twas the night before PSP World Cup 08, and all through the house
Not a paintballer was stirring, not even Yosh Rau
The bunkers were washed by the field crew with care
In hopes that more teams soon would be there

The ballers were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of bunkerings danced in their heads.
And my team in their gear, and I in my Dyes,
Had just settled down and just closed our eyes.

When out on the field there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I bumped in a flash,
Picked up my marker and screwed in the gas.

The moon on the breast of new-laden turf,
Gave the luster of midday to a very confused smurf,(/ot)
When, what through my wondering i3s should appear,
But a MINIature Invert, and bagful of gear.

From a new Evil Driver, so milled and slick,
To an Ego 08: Oh my god, sick!
More rapid than eagles my eyes went insane,
And I called all the teams, called them by name!

“Now Dynasty, Trauma! Now, Avalanche and ‘Canes!
Arsenal, Legion! Assassins and Strange!
Down to the the field! To that place where we ‘ball!
Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!”

As fast as recballers that before the Hurricanes die,
When they meet up at Pevs, attempt stupid dives,
So down to the dead-box the ballers they flew,
With Empire bags, and all their gear too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the field
An incredible challenge that couldn’t be real.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
T’was indeed Dynasty making all of the sound.

They were dressed all in blue, from their heads to their toes,
And their clothes were all covered in paint from Egos.
A couple of guys they had shot in the back,
One dude in the ass, and right in the pack.

His eyes how they burned! He was obviously pissed!
His marker was up, that rage couldn’t be missed!
He called to his boys, he wanted a fight,
And Dynasty figured that that’d be alright.

But who was this guy, armed to the teeth,
Smoke from his ears encircling his head like a wreath.
He had a small face and some interesting fangs,
“Good Gravy!” I yelled, “It’s Oliver Lang!”

This dude marched on down, with his other teammates,
In the match of the year, that would decide all their fates!
The blink of the eyes and a twist of the thread,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And broke to the snake, diving into the turf.
And laying his fingers across his trigger,
He laned down the tape, fast as a… a mongoose!

He bumped to snake two, to his team gave a whistle,
And down field they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he shot down his sights,
“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good-night!”

Merry Christmas everyone! Hope you all are having a wonderful holiday.

Thinking about fortifying your Christmas list or about what to get your teammates? Well here’s a list of inexpensive stocking stuffers that no paintballer is going to say no to.

Cracks, broken springs, and busted lids all cause us to lose these, our best friends in the middle of intense games. These are always welcome in any player’s gear bag for tournaments in particular when turnaround times can be beyond quick and pods mysteriously grow legs and walk away. This is a very cheap way to fill a paintballer’s stocking. Also cute gift idea alert: stuff a paintball pod with random paintball related items, for example, barrel condoms, stickers, or batteries.

Okay, since I already mentioned them batteries are next on my list. If you play with any electronic equipment, I guarantee you you’ll always want fresh batteries for the best performance. This includes, but isn’t limited to, your gun, hopper, and mini-fridge. Don’t forget how important these small alkaline doohickeys are to your performance. Put ‘em on the list.

There are some awesome DVDs online that are a year or two old and are therefore a bargain! Of course, even the brand new DVDs like the NCPA Series coverage and Dynasty Dysected 2 are only $30. I highly recommend both, by the way. If Grandma’s looking for a little, inexpensive extra something to top off your gift list though, point her in the direction of the bargain bins at online stores. Nothing like a little ‘04 NPPL coverage to get you through the winter.

Sunday, December 9th. Splatz Indoor Paintball, Evansville, Indiana. Over 75 paintball players united for one cause: to raise as much money (labeled in picture) as possible for Toys for Tots.

It started over a year ago, when Evan and I were talking about what we’d do for our senior project, and how exactly we’d tie in paintball. The idea of running a tournament for charity came up, and I was set on the idea from the beginning. Evan took a little more convincing than I did, but he a pragmatic person who, I think, understood better than I exactly how much time and effort we would put into such a project.

Last year, senior projects for our school did not have to be completed until late spring. This year the time schedule got bumped up so that all projects had to be completed by early in the year, sometime in January.

This posed a significant challenge to those of us who wanted to do outdoor events, especially considering our school took their sweet time informing us about the changes to the senior project requirements.

However, Evan and I still were set on this idea, and took the initiative very early on to approach Eric Coblentz at Splatz Indoor about our tournament idea. Supportive from the beginning, Eric encouraged us to get our sponsors as early as possible and agreed to host an open tournament for us at Splatz.

So in late October and early November, we started getting our sponsors together. We raised $675, which was enough for us to guarantee $1000 in prizes. Team entries cost $90, and we only needed four teams to raise enough to give our prizes. We printed our flyers, and started distributing them through Splatz and Paintball Players MD, a local store that would be one of our platinum sponsors.

The week before the tourney rolled around and I totaled up all of the teams that had registered so far. Turns out there weren’t any, and wouldn’t be any until about the day before. Needless to say, a little bit of tension hung in the air in that final week.

I called Splatz the night before to make sure everything was a go, only to have a near ecstatic Suze Coblentz answer, telling me that 13 teams had signed up.

I slept well that night and woke up at 5:30 to leave for the field. We arrived around 7, having picked up some girls (labeled for your convenience) and donuts on our way over.

Though it took quite a while to get the schedule sorted out, we started the tourney around 10AM. With 19 complete teams competing, things had to go smoothly. The whole place looked pretty great, with lights and just enough space to fit everyone in comfortably, even if it was a little nippy in the main staging area.

We ran 54 preliminary games for two brackets, pretty much shotgunning the games one after another in order to get through them quickly. I spent the whole first half of the tourney manning the chrono and yelling for different teams to get their butts in gear.

Overall the tournament went pretty smoothly. One team got a little riled up when they won every game but didn’t make finals because they were in a tougher bracket. Unfortunately sometimes that happens, and I’ll be honest, we weren’t expecting so many teams and didn’t really want to have brackets in the first place just in case something like that happened.

Now, the information you really want to know.

The real winner was the Marines Toys for Tots Foundation. With the help of all who attended we raised nearly $1,400 for the charity, just in time for Christmas.

A very sincere THANK YOU to everyone who made this possible. That includes out sponsors, and especially

Paintball Players MD, who also provided free all day air and our reffing staff Team JFK!

I’d also like to thank Go Team Magazine for covering our event for their January issue, when our local newspaper wouldn’t.

The definition of a sport, as defined by the Free Online Dictionary:

1.a. Physical activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively. b. A particular form of this activity.
2. An activity involving physical exertion and skill that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often undertaken competitively.
3. An active pastime; recreation.

As defined by Merriam-Webster Online:

1 a: a source of diversion : recreation b: sexual play c (1): physical activity engaged in for pleasure (2): a particular activity (as an athletic game) so engaged in.

According to the Sports section of our local newspaper, the Evansville Courier and Press, paintball is not a sport, and therefore they couldn’t possibly cover our tournament to benefit underprivileged children.

Well that’s unfortunate, because they missed a great event, which you can read about here.

But what’s more is, it takes a very uneducated person to believe that paintball isn’t a sport today.

Well, what would you like?

The eight million participants within the US obviously isn’t good enough a qualifier, even though that’s larger than Olympic sports such as snowboarding. Obviously the fact that anyone can play no matter how old doesn’t do anything for it. So what else does paintball have to offer?

We have college teams; big colleges like Purdue and University of Connecticut are paying big bucks to allow their kids to play. The NCPA is one of the most successful and consistent formats of today, and is organized largely on a volunteer basis.

Or perhaps you’d like to focus on athleticism. The lack of athletes in paintball is obviously why professional teams practice three to five times per week and typically have medical staff and athletic trainers at every large event. It’s why paintball has been rated as a medium workout, and highly recommended for the work to rest ratio in a typical day’s paintballing excursion.

Then of course there are the two professional leagues within the USA, the PSP and NPPL, both of which drive millions of dollars every year through the paintball world. Of course, then you have the PALS, Millennium, and every other world-wide series that you can think of.

When asked how important teamwork is, you might point to players like Nicky Cuba or Ollie Lang and say, “Teamwork? What’s teamwork?”

But you can trust me when I say teamwork is incredibly important. In fact, you can trust them when they say it is. Because they do.

Here’s your Ollie Lang quote for the day. “I never regarded myself as anything other than another team member… I couldn’t have achieved any of it [multiple, consecutive national championships in the National Paintball Players League] without these guys.”

That’s Ollie Lang, immediately following his breakup with Dynasty. I think both he and Dynasty have proven that his words hold true this year, with Dynasty taking the NPPL, and the Ironmen dominating many of the events and the PSP by storm.

Here’s a little more proof to you. When you look back at Paintball Journal, how many of the tips have been about bettering team cohesion? Let’s take a stroll down memory lane…

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Specs? So far all we have is a rough outline, but here’s what I know.

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Good evening, I’m Dana Granholm, reporting from PBJ Headquarters in Evansville, Indiana. Here are tonight’s top stories…

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NXe JRNY

You saw it in the preview, and you saw it on my birthday / Christmas wish list. Now you get to see it with your own eyes as NXe’s webcasts bring it into your home. Not… literally. I wish…

Anyway, down to business. Here’s a not-so-brief overview of what we have in the videos…

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Don’t tell me it’s too early to be posting my wish list. My birthday is on the 14th, so I’ve got an excuse! Okay, here goes my paintball wish list!

Oh goodness, what isn’t to like about the Threshold? It’s got some of the sickest stock milling I’ve ever seen, it performs with the very best of them, and it’s made by an incredible company. A screaming deal for around $500.

Yes, although my current high grade aluminum 48/3000 rocks my socks, I would greatly prefer the 45/45. I love how it’s just like a slightly elongated softball. A great choice for any mid or front player, and tucks perfectly for those of you rolling the snake. This plus a nice Planet Eclipse tank cover would run me about $190. All that money for something that weighs about a pound…

Well, for a mere $70 you can get this sick pack. I’ll admit that that’s a little steep, but still this pack is amazing. It’s all checkered, and uhh… blue. And magic?

The JRNY is the latest addition to the burgeoning loader market, and rounds out my list for this year. It can pretty much keep up with anything, and I’m very impressed with what NXe is claiming for this hopper. I certainly hope it’s not another Pulse, nothing against DXS…

Merry Christmas, and Happy Birthday to me, and happy holidays and what not to all, and to all a good night.

Every once in a while I see something posted somewhere that makes me go, “Wow, I have a lot to say about that, but I really don’t feel like taking the time to answer on this thread.”

And then I realize that I’m in a constant struggle to find topics for this blog.

Which brings us to today’s (and many past and future) posts.

Today I’ve got a bit of a guide for choosing the best cleats for playing paintball.

Playing Surface

The surface that you play on makes a big impact on the types of cleats you’ll want to choose from.

The most common surface for most of you will be the standard outdoor grass. It’s that green stuff that grows on the ground for the better part of the year outside of your computer room and house.

I like the baseball and soccer cleats for grass. They are typically lightweight and cheap, as well as offering a good amount of traction for those “Oh, snap!” moments, when suddenly leaping sideways seems like a good idea. They’re fairly durable and should withstand even the most brutal running on rec-ball fields.

For those of you who prefer to rough it in the woods, I’d suggest boots or high ankle cleats. Support and comfort are two things you should look for, because often woods games last a long time and you want to be comfortable staying on your feet for hours on end. Traction becomes less of an issue because being quick on your feet often isn’t nearly as good as tactical knowledge.

Now, all you indoor and tourney players, here’s what you’ve read through all that duff for. Probably the best traction you’re going to achieve is with paintball cleats. I’m not gonna lie though, unless you’ve got way too much money laying around, then you won’t be able to pick up a pair. If you play on thick turf, go with the soccer or baseball cleats as a more economical solution. If you play on thinner carpet, track cleats work very well. However, track cleats also tear up turf pretty bad, so you should definitely ask the field owner if metal spikes are allowed.