Paintball Journal

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.