Post Campaign, Pre CPS Paris training July 13th

So I headed up to Cribbs nice and early this Sunday to train with the Entity guys plus a couple randoms. We did some more fitness in the morning to warm up, going back to basics with some snapshooting against a target, moving up to snapshooting against eachother (I was undefeated, by the way) before 20 second dominance / moving drills (1v1 both players starting in Teabag 1, goal is to get to Teabag 2 within 20 seconds) and then playing some situation 2v3's and mini games.

I did great where the skills were concerned, beating everyone who was there at least once, whilst remaining undefeated. However in the situationals and mini games I was making a bunch of stupid mental mistakes. The same stuff that made me inconsistent at Campaign and in Belgium. I feel like I'm going through a bit of a slump with these errors causing me to waste myself stupidly. I'm hoping persistence will push me out the other side of it.

""If you're going through hell, keep going"

- Winston Churchill"    

- Luke Williams   

We talked about next year and the team's roster. We are trying to sort out exactly who can commit to playing both European events and UK events, and who can only do one or the other. So far all in for both we know that we have 4 guys. I really want to see 6, but definitely at least 5 100% all in players who will commit to all training, all European and all CPPS events next year. If we can that will help push us towards either playing in the Mills or sticking with the CPS in 2015. 

I shot a box and a half so 3,000 balls this weekend. Once I have the campaign paint worked out the total will be back!

Campaign Cup 2nd-6th July

Wednesday evening: Another session at the Cribb where Dave, Parkey and myself headed up to work on some skills. Got some last minute work on my snaps and my R&G in before heading over to Basildon for the 3rd round of the Millennium Series. I shot half a box so an extra 1,000 paintballs

Thursday:

I had to get half the day off work so that I could head up to site on time for training at 6:45pm. I picked up my wingman Kelvin from Worle station, we stocked up on supplies and I finally packed my shit.. (there's no such thing as too late to pack) and we got there with just over an hour spare. As I got there I found my teammates from Manchester Firm and they politely informed me that training was actually an hour earlier than I was previously told! Turns out I'm pretty good at getting my shit together and we took to the SPL2 field to train against Low Life Uddevalla (the team that knocked Entity out on Sunday last year at Campaign ironically) alongside a couple Lucky 15's players and the GB team. We rotated about 4 different lines against them and I mostly played the teabag corner and the teabag 1. What I learned in the corner this time round was that it was damn tight when the snake 1 and your mirror was in. It wasn't the best training session as we only got a few points in as a full team and even then we were missing Clarkey and Bishop who were arriving tomorrow, but at least it got us aware of the field. I was also relaying the calls a bit better than I was last weekend at least.

As I'm poor I decided camping would make the most sense to try and keep on top of my outgoings. Me and Kelv set up the tent before going out to get our healthy eat on (chinese takeaway). We were pitched near my pals on Collateral Damage and also the London Tigers 3 team, we socialised and hit the hay pretty early. Sleeping on air beds with slow leaks is a pain in the arse. It's all fun and games until someone slightly moves, then you might as well hit the reset button on your sleep.

Friday:

Our games were late in the day, at around half 1 and half 3. I had time to kill in the morning and I bumped into Ash and Gran from Nexus who asked if I could help out in the pits in their first game of the tournament against Tigers. Yorkie was running a tight ship in the pits, which was lucky as there was a pot shortage after we had potted up loads of the BRITTLE Evil paint which was just smashing up in their guns and we had to run to the truck to get the slightly harder batch. The game ended 5-3 in Tigers' favor and you could tell it hurt the guys on Nexus. The other two teams in their group were Outrage who have been on top form this year and Polar Bears who are a strong team before you even inject Greenspan and Lang into the equation, unfortunately they didn't win any of their games and remain in the relegation zone. Whilst it's refreshing to see a team pushing Nexus off the mantle of being the best team in the UK, it would be a shame to see another UK team knocked out of the CPL.

At 10:30 the registration for the last remaining places of the 1v1 tournament was opening, so I lined up to pick my number. I was shocked to see I was already signed up! But then I found that it was a guy, also called Luke Williams, from Madtoxic. Anyway I paid my £25 - this shit's getting expensive - and I was up against Romain Moreau of team GK Paris, a new team in the CPL. I seem to only draw CPL players in these fucking things! But I suppose that if I want a chance of winning then I gotta beat the best of them and this guy I hadn't really heard of so it wasn't the worst draw I could ask for.

1v1 tournament round 1:

So Me Wozza and Barlow are all signed up from the Firm and it started at 12pm so we got a box potted up and filled our packs. Everyone I was speaking to who hadn't really done it before were saying how nervous they were and how stupid it was that they were nervous. I know exactly why: whatever happens out there, it's on YOU. You can't blame your teammates for not doing their job or the game plan for not working out, this is you out there on the line proving you're better than someone else. Plus there was an audience as it was lunchtime.

So I went to my start gate and got ready, my gun was switched on, the loader was on, I fired a shot into the ground and everything, 10 Seconds. Beep. Beep. Beep. I'm ready I know where I'm placing my lane and I'm just gonna shoot loads of paint and then work from there. BOOOOOP. game on, I bring my gun up hella fast and shoot 1, 2, 3 balls and then nothing.. the gun isn't firing, I duck behind the back centre and hold in the trigger to turn the eyes off, the gun shoots but no paint, "ORANGE" I hear from the sideline. I hit the hopper switch, put my gun up, pull the trigger, bang bang bang, no paint, I duck behind cover again, "TEABAG OOOOONEEE!!!!" hit the side of the hopper 3 times, 'Fucking 1v1 tournaments' I think to myself, I hit the hopper switch back to how it was originally "TEABAG TWOOOOO!!!" I pull the trigger, PAINT! I pull my gun up to shoot 3 balls at teabag 2, I don't even see the guy but I just hear "Ooooooh!" from the sidelines and then "OUUUUUT!" From the ref's next to him.

I was fucking lucky to be honest, there was no skill, (well okay a bit of skill) involved, just luck of the game. I seem to play better with malfunctioning equipment: Read Rome 3rd-4th placement game vs Black Legion

Barlow got through and Wozza was sweating it out as he didn't wanna be the only guy on the Firm not to get through.. but fortunately he did! His 1v1 is one of the few to get webcast, I'm really upset mine wasn't up there as it must have been quite funny to watch.

13:10 Manchester Firm vs Vienna United

As I had attended the previous training sessions I was put on the starting 5 for this game which I was pretty happy about. In the first game I went out to the teabag-side corner however the hopper was doing the same shit it was in the 1v1. I told Karl about it but luckily we had shot some guys on the break and I just survived in the bunker soaking up a gun until we won.
1-0.

Next point I got to the corner, I swapped the hopper in the pits, my mirror was in and shooting down the wire - maybe I didn't have to dive but I was in the habit of it and he seemed to run straight in, so I was tucked in from him and decided to look to see if the snake was in. He was and he shot me. We still won the point.
2-0.

In the 3rd point I ran out and got shot by Apple off the break, the small cake cross-field. They won the point. I told the team after this point I can't run the can if they put someone in Apple.
3-1.

In the next point I broke short to teabag 1, we shot people on the break and it ended up being a 3-2, someone called G4 and I knew there was someone either the door or the snake corner, so I was a bit shocked to get shot out of my bunker by the snake 2! Karl also made a move from teabag 2 (he moved past me from the corner) and got shot by the guy he didn't realise was still in and it became a 2-1 that Barlow didn't pull out from the snake 1.
3-2.

The last point we won quite convincingly to wrap it up 4-2.

15:20 Manchester Firm vs Ipnoz Paris

You know, I can't recall much of this game. Truth be told, after the first game I used my notepad to record what happened, but got distracted and forgot about it for the rest of the tournament! I think I'm going to keep using my pad for notes, not only will it be good for keeping the blog accurate but it's a useful tool for reflection.

What I do know is that I played a couple points in the bags, I specifically remember one point I got to bag 1, came out to shoot my mirror and took a face full of paint where he beat me to it. I'm going to work on getting into my bunker and then up on my feet quicker when I get the opportunity.

I also played a point in the diesel (tall temple in the middle snake side) and between me and Wozza we had shot their snake player off the break and 2 more players trying to get the width back, before cleaning up and scoring the point. However I had an old hit in my hair which I thought I had cleaned up but evidently not well enough. Fortunately we had 4 guys on the field so we still got the point! This was one of the few times I've played a central tower attempting to lock someone out and I did enjoy it to be fair. It feels good to add more strings to the bow to become a more diverse player instead of just a teabag attacker.

Cartel Media: Give them a like

Saturday:

10:50 Manchester Firm vs Dagnir Dae 2

As we had won our two Friday games and the division isn't full, we were pretty much guaranteed a place in the Sunday club. Therefore this game was more about trying stuff out than pushing the win. I sat the first point which the team won. The second point I was sent to the Diesel to lock out the snake side. They made the snake on the break and so I simply stood there and dumped my hopper and 2 pods around the knuckle to contain him, I wasn't going to stop shooting as all it would take is one gap for him to put me in or shoot me out. A ref ran up to me shouting out with the 1-for-1 signal, turns out one of the guys got a 3-for-1 behind me. In the next point I was sent to the teabag corner where I must have either got shot on the break or by the snake 1 very soon into the game, as I had a hit on my pack I wasn't aware of. I was called out and a 1-for-1 was pulled. The penalties at the millenniums are harsh but at least I suppose it's consistent!

I was sat for the rest of the game which is fair enough. Penalties kill teams. Plus I seemed to be dying quite quick in the games whereas Bish plays a slower more controlled game than I do.

1v1 Tournament

Saturday's 1v1 games made it onto the webcast. You can see them here. Times below

Round 2: 6:45

Next up I was against Andreas Persson from Stockholm Ignition. You can watch the game here:  At the start of the game I was just shooting over the back centre and he ran through my lane to get to the small M on the teabag side.. I thought I had got the shot on him a couple of times but he started to move up the Bags so I started moving snake side. As I pass the 50 I narrowly dodged a ball as I hit the deck, then I noticed he wasn't shooting anymore so must be making a break for the buzzer, so I bolted for it and only just beat him there! The commentators

1v1 Tournament Round 3: 32:44

My next (and final) game was against Kyle Spicka of Dynasty. We broke out and minced around the back centre shooting back at eachother for a few seconds, I was convinced some of my paint was on point and should have caught him but evidently not as he didn't check for a bounce at any time. I moved out towards the bag side and for some reason I went to the corner with the intention of moving down the bags, however thinking proactively, Spicka took some ground in the center of the field on the snake side and pressured me into the bunker. I couldn't move now whereas Spicka had the real estate. I was just having to try and gunfight with him for as long as possible. I was snapping trying to gain dominance, but as you can see in the video, Kyle was just relentlessly dominant and keeping me in. He was down to his last pod, but I didn't know that, he stopped shooting out of one side so I figured that he had switched hands to come the other side, so I took a bite and ran out to the teabags.. If I had stopped at the first one then maybe I would have had a chance of surviving however I thought I had eluded him so carried on moving - turns out he was just posting his gun on the gap and shot me between bag 1 and 2. I finished in the last 16 so I'm pretty happy with that! Much better than #lukeoutfirst anyway!!

Sunday:

Lucky 15's

Sunday morning and as we had placed first in our bracket, we were to play a wildcard, which just so happened to be Lucky 15's. We were in this same position in Puget, however against Redball Paris. Unfortunately we lost that game and were knocked out of the tournament. Unfortunately that happened again.

I was sat, I guess because I wasn't playing my best paintball yesterday and they had more faith in the 5 core guys - which is fair enough. After a couple back and forth points, Karl said they needed more aggression on the bag side. Being an aggressive bag-side player, compared to Bishop who rolls his gun and is controlling but not necessarily so aggressive, I was hoping they would swap Bishop out for me, however they didn't and so I sat the entire game. In the first point Wozza took a shot to the hand which he received a major penalty (3-for-1) however just as the ref went to pull Karl, the last player alive, he had just shot the last remaining Lucky 15's player, making it a no point. After some back and forths, it was 3-2 to the Firm and there was just under a minute on the clock. With some decisive play the 15's tied it up with just a second or two to spare. They went into the overtime point and the Firm got a G off the break, however soon after threw a couple bodies away, bringing it to a 2v2 with Karl and Barlow left on the teabag side, James Ough in the bags for 15's and another player (sorry, I forget these things) left towards the snake side. Barlow tried to make a move on James, however James had came out just in time to shoot him without being hit himself, making it a 2v1 against Karl which unfortunately he couldn't pull back. It was 4-3 and we were done.

The 15's were very humble in their win and almost apologetic that they had knocked us out. They would go on to get knocked out in the next round unfortunately, placing the highest in the division out of the brit teams (Tigers 2, DV8 & Nexus 2 behind us). The Firm guys were very disappointed in themselves and I couldn't help but feel for them. I felt a lot more like part of the team this tournament compared to the first time in Puget, however I suppose this time I can avoid any pangs of guilt as I didn't have any responsibility for the game the team lost. Would I have made a difference? Who knows? If I was playing as I was on Friday then probably not. But my aggressive teabag play could have paid off if I did it well.

I watched some pro games with Dave for a while who had come up on Saturday with Kayleigh & Parkey who had left on Saturday night. Watching games can be a bit dull sometimes, however gambling £1 on the winner of the game but also betting on each point does make it a bit more interesting!!

Shot count is TBC as I am waiting to hear how much paint we shot.

Training, Midweek Sessions & Ladies Cup 27th, 28th, 30th June

Midweek evening sessions: 27th & 30th June

Me and Dave decided to head up after work on Friday the 27th to work on some skills. Without the option of bunkers as we didn't have the site keys we went to Cribbs and just placed a target in the middle of the field and I set up some cones in a box to practice running and gunning whilst changing directions & hands. I am going to create a post for drills you can do without bunkers where I will go into more detail but here is some footage of us training on the Friday:

On Monday 30th we also went up, joined by Parkey this time. Instead of running the same drill we mixed it up slightly and stacked a couple barrels to use as cover to snap from, with a cone about 6m to the left and another to the right, practicing snapping as well as working in some running & gunning and changing direction. Here's the footage:

Here's the link to the post 'Cones, Barrels & Boxes: Drilling Without Bunkers'

28th June @ CPPS:

Ladies Cup

CPPS round 3 was a good event for Entity, placing 5th out of 10 in the Elite division - our best result so far! However in the main the team has taken a weekend off, not only to let the wallets rest, but also to support our girls, the Entity Wags, at the 3-(wo)man ladies cup at the CPPS site on 28th June.

When I rocked up at midday with Dave (We had a couple brews on Friday night) we had missed the morning session and they were just reseeding for the final few games. All the girls were excitedly chatting about the games and the points they had won. It's great to see the boom of ladies getting involved with the game over the past year or so. Whilst the Entity Wags didn't get the result they may have liked, Kayleigh, Chloe and Gabby all seemed to have a great time and can't wait to play some more! It was Chloe's first ever paintball tournament and she was awarded 'Player of the day'! Liam must be proud. Kayleigh's come a long way since she got back onto the paintball horse at the end of last year and showed it when she managed to pull back a 3v1.

Hopefully we will see more of the girls at Cribbs over the coming months. Credit where it's due, Emma seemed to put on a pretty good show with smiles all round.

Training with The Firm

I was there so that I could train with the Firm before playing Campaign with them this weekend coming. They were scrimming with Lucky 15's in the afternoon. I got to play where I play my best as the attacker / insert on the teabag side, alternating my breaks between going straight to teabag 1 and running it out to the corner. The very first point I got shot off the break getting to the bag - a lane which I did shoot pretty well last weekend - which was a pain as I wanted to prove myself to the guys so they had more faith in me at the tournament. I changed my run slightly so I hit the ground on the backline behind the teabag and scurried into the bunker, missing their lane. From there I played some pretty steady points, moving up the bags methodically, sometimes being a bit too aggressive but luckily I was getting away with it and won a couple points.

I was communicating well with Karl behind me.. Well I was once I had started to internalise their calls! They have names for their corner bunkers, their apple and orange are switched around and the names of all the floating bunkers were new to me. Plus instead of a G count they use numbers which threw me off a few times.. So there was a bit of "G1.. wait, I mean 11! Apple and back left are on.. I mean Orange and Turret are on me!" going on but by the end of the session I think I had internalised them again.

I feel that I played well, fitted in a lot better than previously and did exactly what I was told so hopefully that will translate to a few more spins at Campaign so long as I perform during our Thursday training slot and during the tournament. I'm quite confident on this layout too so I'm looking forward to a good event!

I'm shacking up at the campsite with Kelvin et al - If the stories of people getting smashed at campaign are true then I may need to bring some earplugs to make sure I get my full 8 hours in!

Good luck to all the UK teams playing, if you see me out there either come say hi or if I'm playing just save it until after. The ref's get pretty funny about fans on the pitch. Peter Bourne compiled a list on p8ntballer of all the UK teams attending so give them your support as and when you see them:

Champions Paintball League:
(Race to 5)

London Nexus
London Tigers

Semi Professional Paintball League 1:
(Race to 4)

Birmingham Disruption

Semi Professional Paintball League 2:
(Race to 4)

Durham DV8
London Nexus 2
London Tigers 2
Lucky 15s Staffordshire
Manchester Firm

Open Division 1:
(Race to 4)

GI London Defiance
London Tigers 3

Open Division 2:
(Race to 2)

Ashby Onslaught
Belfast Escarmouche
Collateral Damage London 2
Durham DV8 2
Edinburgh Din Eidyn
Ipswich Unwanted
London Disciples
London Nexus 3
London Samurai Rage
London Samurai Topcats
London SMG
Mayhem Knights Essex
Middlesbrough Lethal Bizzle
Operation Sandbaggers
Salisbury Cardinals
Salisbury Cardinals 2
Salisbury Cardinals 3
Sneaky Snorkels Tamworth
Stoke Quest A.D.
UK Masters London Allstars
UK Masters London Allstars 2
UK Redskins Essex

Oh and so far this week I have shot 2 cases (Friday's session was with old paint from CPPS and Monday I split a box with Dave). An extra 4,000 to make it 125,500 overall this year!

Cones, Barrels & Boxes: Drilling Without Bunkers

So recently I've had to resort to training without bunkers on a few occasions. Once because it was so windy the bunkers were just going to destroy themselves and join the traffic on the M5 if we blew them up and recently because we only have scarce amount of time to make use of the training field. Lugging the bunkers about wasn't really a viable option.

Therefore when we wanted to practice some of our core skills we had to make use of static targets that don't shoot back. We used cones, barrels and boxes as targets, temporary bunkers to snap from and markers.

Here are some examples of the drills we were doing and how to replicate them.

Box Drill: 

Skills: running and gunning

Set up 4 cones in a wide rectangle with a single target in front of you. You have plenty of options with the box drill to practice running and gunning laterally, diagonally and forwards whilst shooting your target and of course switching hands whilst you go. You can go side to side as often as you want but due to the set up of the box you only really go forward once with each run through meaning you're either going to go forward (red) or diagonally (blue):

Make sure you mix up your 2 starting cones so you work on each direction / hand equally.

Here is the box drill in action:

 

The Line drill: 

Skills: Snapshooting and Running & Gunning

So for this one we put a barrel on top of another so we had something to snap from. Whatever you can fit behind and snap from will work. Put a cone a distance away to the left - maybe 7m or so - and another one the same distance away to the right. Snapshoot our from one side of your makeshift bunker and then when you've hit the target x amount of times (3, 5, 10, whatever) you then run and gun out that same side to the cone, switch hands, then run and gun back. Rinse and repeat on the other side. Don't forget to work at all heights, mix it up from standing to crouching and everything in between.

Here is the line drill in action:

I will post up more options when I have some more footage to share. 

CPPS Rd 3: The return to Elite 21st-22nd June

Well this one is a bit easier to write than my last tournament write-up. For those of you that haven't been keeping up with your reading (entity), we competed in the Elite division of CPPS in 2013 after rebuilding during the latter months of 2012. We placed no higher than 6th (6th, 8th, 6th, 6th, 8th). At that point we knew we wanted to compete in Europe and were looking into buying a spot into what is now SPL2 and so figured we might not be able to financially commit a team to the Elite division again this year. Then we decided we could - but it was too late so we've been fighting to get back into Elite since then.

Saturday Training

This time we booked a slot with Disruption, Tigers 2 & Nexus 2 where we started to work out the field. We realized it was a relatively balanced field however the teabags were a little more dangerous than the snake. Our laning appeared to be pretty bad however we were shooting rock hard paint so it's too be expected that we didn't see much production. I was playing Apple (the mini M on the teabag side) and shooting a lane either at my mirror or cross field at anyone running to the snake / corner / insert bunker.. it was quite a good lane.. before returning back to control the bags whilst Andy or A-man (Adam) worked up the bags. Sometimes however when they were taking heat I was bumping out to the corner and then over taking them to get some progression. Shayne was shooting for any centre runners going to xbox (the Maya temple) whilst backing up Liam in the snake and we learned throughout the day that the Back Center HAD to stay on the teabags to stop them hitting the 50 in seconds. 

Saturday's 1v1 tournament

Ainsley came up to us whilst we were in the pits during the day and alerted us to the opening of the 1v1 registration. Me, A-man and Liam from the team signed up for it. I was desperate to redeem myself from getting smashed out of my first round (#lukeoutfirst) in Belgium. 

My chance came quicker than I thought as I was to play the very first point. My match was James Granville from London Nexus. Andy started the obligatory Horse Puncher chant, spreading further, the rumor that I once punched a horse to death. This time it was straight up elimination - one shot and you're out of the game entirely. If it was a draw after 2 minutes the player deemed 'most aggressive' by the head ref would be named the winner After a bit of mincing around at the back I moved my way up the bags as Gran was using the bunkers around the start of the snake. I got onto his side of the field and was gunfighting with him relatively defensively - using all heights and sides of the teabag. It felt like a good 30-40 seconds had gone past behind that teabag, I would guess 1:20 had run off the clock and then bam - clipped on the side of my lense. #lukeoutfirst trended worldwide and I shook hands with my opponent and left the field. The other guys ripped into me that I'm shit at 1v1's and should stop wasting my money, I got changed and watched Liam and A-man's attempts. Gran did say if it was any consolation I did hit him with a bouncer - how frustrating! Liam lost to a guy from care bears and A-man lost to a guy from celtic druids, both in their first rounds, which made me feel a lot better about myself. Besides I didn't even bounce the Vision guy so I'm evidently improving - next time I might actually manage to fucking shoot someone.

Saturday evening

We got to the hotel and got showered etc etc and had fun with the refoofies..

.. before going to Nandos for munch. 

When we got back we spoke about the game plan and the importance of their positions - what lanes we know we can shoot and what options we had on the break. One thing Shayne and I had discussed on the car journey up was our tendency to panic whenever we lose a point and try to change too many things with the game plan to make up for it. There's a cliché about paintball game plans and it is this: "A poor game plan, well executed, is better than a good game plan, poorly executed." It certainly rings true and with this in mind Shayne brought it up with the rest of the team on Saturday night as something we need to focus on. Sometimes we can lose a game and it's just down to individual error, or someone getting bounced by your lane, or any number of variables, 2 teams can play 2 consecutive points with the same game plan and end up with 2 very different outcomes. Basically we need to keep our composure and only alter small details instead of turning the whole thing up on it's head at the first sign of trouble. 

Sunday

We got on-site with plenty of time and warmed up. Our pits were next to Nexus which was good as it was a short walk to the trade village / car park - but I also had a couple opportunities to quietly observe their demeanor in-between points. They would always come in and straight up say who shot them and how, asking each other either why they didn't do their job or what stopped them from doing it. We had started to do the same throughout the day, echoing what we spoke of the previous night. I had also started pushing for tidier pits - Liam has been a big advocate of a tidy pit and I figured we should try and make it a ritual to tidy up after each game in prep for the next. 

Game 1: Lucky 15's

I've touched on the grudge between us and 15's before - it feels much healthier between us now but of course we still wanted to put one up on them. I imagine for as long as both teams are competing there will be some rivalry between us, but it's the stories of rivalry that make for the best tales to tell in any competitive sport. Especially one as adversarial as paintball. We came out pretty flat and lost the first point pretty poorly! I was shooting for my mirror and trying to control the bags as I had in training yesterday. The next point we came out and slowed them down after I had shot their teabag player soon into the game, and we won it to tie up 1-1. We switched ends and this time they came at us from the snake side. They were steady in the bags but made it to snake 2 / snake 50 quickly winning two consecutive points to make it 3-1. They had the momentum and we got into the pits and calmly (for a change), called a time-out and made some game plan decisions. Andy was to take A-man's spot in the bags, Harry was shooting a teabag lane from Back Centre and instead of mincing around trying to shoot my mirror I switched up to shoot the cross-field snake lane. Next point we went out - I shot the lane and then ducked into Apple to get more guns on the bag side so we could push it. Me and Andy worked together to push up the bags and after the point Dave shouted that I hit the snake runner with my lane. I was quite chuffed as although I've been pretty good with lanes in training I've never had many confirmed OTB kills in tournaments! We carried on with the same plan to tie it up 3-3 and then in the final point we had just over a minute on the clock. I was in the corner and Andy was up in the bags and I heard Dave shout "20 SECONDS LEFT!!" so I took off down the field causing some chaos - just as everyone else had the same idea, I got eliminated trading with the snake player cross-field and Andy felt a hit from their snake player, hesitating to ask for a check pointing at his head, he hit the buzzer and Liam also followed him up and hit the buzzer not knowing exactly what was going on. It was damn close and the refs had to talk it out but gave us the point in the end. 

It could have been anyone's game but we definitely took the momentum back towards the end, everyone's confidence had boosted with the result - it was easy to forget that this was not only A-man's first Elite tournament but also Liam's! 

Out of respect for the 15's I must mention that it appeared they were missing a couple of their core players - a post on their facebook confirms that they didn't have two of their snake players "due to holidays and illness". Therefore I look forward to our next match up to see what they can hit us with!

Peter Bourne - www.fullboreimages.com

Game 2: DV8

We took the confidence and momentum from our first game straight into the next against DV8. Last time we played these guys back in 2013 they beat us, but we scored a quick 3 points, shooting good lanes on the break and following them up making it 3-0. Backs to the wall however DV8 didn't want to go down, just as we didn't against 15's. They brought back 2 points, winning them very convincingly as well! We called a timeout to take the momentum back off them and took to the field - they then took a time out too before coming out to play the next point with 1:20 on the clock. We aren't typically great at our defensive play so we went out there looking to score another point. We got a G on the break and had 5 alive, we pushed the teabags a little and they tried to push back towards the end however with the body advantage we stayed alive and the time ran out with 5 of us on field and the score 3-2. They did have us worried, however we didn't crumble as we have been known to when things aren't going out way.

Game 3: London Tigers 2

Not really playing this squad before I didn't know what to expect. After learning the field as the day went on and after a long break for us we took to the field and both teams played smart, slow playing it and not giving much away until the end game. The first point we lost was a slow point after we lost Andy off the break. It wound up being a 3v2 with them in Teabag corner and Apple. I was up in the bags halfway up the field and we lost Liam on the snakeside. Harry filled the snake and I was well aware that from where he was he wouldn't be able to stop me from being run down. I let them shoot either side of my bunker and posted whenever I was given an opening. At one point Apple had stopped shooting at me so I tried to snap him out - I thought I had hit him for a moment however he remained in. Turns out I had bounced him in the head! Damn bouncers! I moved up another bag and tried to snap him out again however this time I took one in the face. They closed Harry down and won the 2v1 making it 1-0. Next point we came out and won, another slow game but with a bit more conviction on our side we tied it up 1-1. This next point Tigers 2 pushed the snake pretty hard, Shayne was in Xbox so I just had to trust he would shoot him the moment he did anything, Harry switched off the bags to help Shayne, however this tiny lapse of judgement meant that they attacked the Teabag 50. Whilst Shayne managed to bag their snake player, they made good work of us from the bags and it was only me left in the teabag corner. I shot one of their players moving up the snake side and was trying desperately to make something happen, frantically trying to scrap any kill I could get. I believed I could win the 3v1 but eventually I got shot as you'd expect. This brought it to a 2-1 game and left us with less than a couple minutes on the clock. The game played out and we got a couple G's but again I ended up as the last guy in the corner after crossing up with Harry in Back Centre for a long period of time. I tried to make something happen and mugged their bag player on my side of the field, however it wasn't enough as I got shot cross field. Not enough time had passed for them to score another point however. 

There were 3 pivotal factors which could have swung a point that I noticed during this game. That bounce during that 2v2 point would have made it a 2v1 in our favor if only it broke. Just after, if my snapshot was on point or a bit quicker and I didn't get shot when I did, Harry could have got some more real estate and we could have pinched them out. In the later point we lost, Harry staying on his teabag lane could have bought us more time to push that snake side by containing their bag player. Fortunately, other than the paint being a little bouncy, these are things we can work on to make the difference next time. I am going to work more on my snap shooting and I'm sure it will be a long time before Harry switches off his job again.

Game 4: Tigers 1

I don't have much to say about this game, I got shot off the break shooting for their delay/ghosters in the first point and they went on to beat us out of 3 consecutive points. Some were closer than others. We did pull back a point though where me and one of the guys closed down their corner. I brought my snapshooting game back to hit him in the bottle to win the point, but they came back to close out 4-1 win in the next point. 

At the end of the last point I heard, not just from Andy, but from the spectators that one of them had laced Andy up the side as he left the field with his barrel sock on, those that I spoke to who knew Andy's temperament expected him to kick off - but he kept it together which I'm proud of. I didn't see the incident so I can't comment but if it was how it was described, I'm glad Andy was the bigger man - even if he was tamping in the pits after. 

That point we won against Tigers 1 was enough to push us just in front of London Samurai MV (AKA: Paris Camp Carnage - Samurai couldn't make the event due to a wedding so got them to fill in!) and give us 5th place overall! This was our best ever result in the Elite division and so I am pretty stoked about it! The best part is that we know what to work on for next time too. The games were close and the Elite division is cutthroat. Each point matters - if we lost another point then we would have placed 6th again. If we won another point against Tigers 2 we might have managed to qualify for the 3rd/4th playoffs. We have been a hairs breadth from beating Disruption in the past so it's a shame we didn't get a chance to try. But that's the Elite division for you - tight!!

There's a chance I may be playing Campaign with the Firm, in which case I will be making every effort to switch a shift at work so I can train with them on Saturday coming at CPPS - which will also be the day of the Ladies cup where the "Entity Wags" Kayleigh, Gabby and Chloe will be waving our banner! 

This weekend however the team shot 14 cases in training and 22 cases during the tournament. As I played every point and shot my fair share of paint I must have gotten through 7 cases, or 14,000 balls. Bringing my total to 121,500! Heading quickly towards that next milestone of 200,000! However only 2 CPPS remain and 2, maybe 3 major tournaments lie ahead.. We shall see!!

The filling of the tournament sandwich: 15th June

Belgium was last weekend and from a paintball perspective it blowed! But you only learn when you're losing and I am aware of the things I need to work on. One thing I have been working on over the past year is my composure. In the Elite division of CPPS last year I was quite erratic, not really paying attention to what's going on around me, just getting tunnel vision on what I need to do. How I've found myself combating that is by getting to my primary, taking some moments to compose, rolling my gun at gaps whilst working out what's going on. Once I've taken stock that's when I then work out what I need to do. That's great, it's really helped me with my field awareness and all, but it's still not feeling right, I'm a long way from the finished article.

I headed up to Cribbs this weekend, shooting some leftover paint from Belgium with Andy, Shayne, A-man and some of the REC guys. Also up on site was a bunch of Going Postal & Bad Moji guys and girls, plus Kayleigh and some of the ladies were looking to get some practice in before the women's 3 man tournament coming up in the next few weeks.

To start off with we just worked on our snapshooting skills as we hadn't really worked on skills since.. umm.. the off-season? Damn..

I had noticed some bad habits had reformed with the lack of self-awareness you get consistently drilling e.g. that stupid foot leaving the ground when snapping. After a good pack's worth of ironing out the creases we did a few situation-games (starting in predetermined bunkers playing 3v4's / 2v3's) and we got chatting to each other on the field, business as usual. I have noticed that Andy has started to really get used to my play style - he always knows when I'm coming for him and how I'm doing it. I often leave my wide bunker to run in field to make the move so that if he comes out to battle on the tape he wont see me coming, but he caught me out a couple times - time to pick up the dictionary and add some new words to my put-down vocabulary it seems!

The good people at Cribbs had set up the Campaign Cup layout:

It seems pretty interesting, quite fun to play the bags so I'm hoping to be getting stuck in at CPPS. We did play a few scrims both as a team and split up. Going back to what I was saying in the opening paragraph; my play-style has been lacking something. Maybe being a bit too relaxed to get some composure has reduced my intensity. Instead of picking my gunfights I've just been avoiding them, instead of pushing the issue I've been letting it go. I thought about that halfway through this Sunday and so I set out to be a bit more dog. I went out to the teabag 1 shooting heads up towards their bag 1 and I hit their corner runner, I slid into the bag and came right out onto my mirror and just kept shooting until I could see they decided to switch infield - I too went infield to put in their back centre who started to shoot back at me - giving me a window to hop to bag 2, I posted on the teabag and when he heard the teabag 2 call he came out, from there it was an easy wrap up and yeah whilst I probably lost a bit of cross field awareness, I made sure I kept my comms going and had one hell of a methodical yet aggressive game. That is how I want to play in tournaments and that is what I'm hoping you're going to see at the CPPS next round.

Talking of the CPPS for those living under a rock we are back into the Elite division and so I am very excited to be playing with the big dogs again!!

Refining the way you play the game is a balancing act and something you can see from the very start of a baller's 'career' if you can call it that. Some people start too aggressive whereas others start to hesitant. I was one of those that was too hesitant, then I tried to tune up my aggression and ended up suffering too much tunnel vision, so then I started trying to compose myself more and then switch on the aggression when appropriate, however I feel that now I'm being a bit too relaxed and need to start pushing the issue a little more as default - play with some heart and start being proactive instead of reactive. If you don't already follow Paul Richard's blog - viewfromthedeadbox - I seriously recommend you follow that previous link and learn yourself some real knowledge from someone who genuinely knows what he is talking about.

Talking about other paintball media - specifically other written formats - I got my hands on a copy of the paintball magazine. The production is very high quality and unlike other magazines I have seen (including the e-mags) is actually well written. I would really recommend taking a look if you haven't already.

Anyway down to brass tax. I shot about a case of leftover paint (not counted in the figures) and bought another case on top making the total 107,500. We're at about the halfway mark so we should expect to see a 200,000 by the end of the year. That means it might take another 4 years to hit 1,000,000. Daunting right?

See you all at CPPS - come say hi and see how we're getting on / give me a back rub I'll probably need it with all that tension I'll have playing with all that intensity I'm planning on bringing!

CPS Belgium: Breaking down at Breakout. 5th-8th June:

Wednesday evening. I finished work, packed my bags (about time) and set out to pick Liam up from Bristol airport. As we were getting back, Andy was repeatedly circling the same roundabout as he felt lost nearby so we sent a search party. I had some of Dave's kit in my bag as well as (Andy) Leach's kit that he couldn't take in hand luggage and some spare markers in case we ran into problems. We condensed the kit into as few bags as possible and got about 2 hours kip before our 2:45am alarm went off. We bundled everything in the car, picked up Shayne and set off for Dover.

I did the first stint of the driving and we got to the ferry in time. I've never driven onto a ferry before so it was an exciting experience, for a few minutes at least. Pete of Full Bore Images posted on facebook that he's on the same ferry and for us to come find him at the front. That we did!

#letmetakeaselfie

Anyway we got over to Dunkirk and followed Pete to the venue - we were running a bit later than planned so I had to call the accommodation to say we won't be there until 7.30pm.

Thursday

We rocked up at the venue after about 11 hours of travel and stretched out the cramp before training against ECI. They gave us some good game and luckily enough for us they had 6 guys. As Leach wasn't flying in until that evening we only had 4 players to use so we took their spare player, Harry. To be fair he was a good player and I didn't see him get loads of spins on Friday, but he fit in pretty well with us during the scrim. Unfortunately it was indoors in what we called 'The Thunderdome' or 'field 2' on the timetable. We worked out our lanes and were consistently getting G's off the break shooting cross-field at teabag 1 as we were in training last weekend. However their snake player is pretty damn fast and he was often beating our lanes. We usually matched their aggression though and we won a fair few points and by the end of the scrim we felt we had learnt the field quite well. Shayne played in front of me on the teabag side as I played the Apple which I was comfortable doing at Cribbs. I was also shooting back up the gut on the break to hit anyone delaying or making center moves. I felt pretty confident on the field and was looking forward to Friday. We finished up and headed off to the chalet.

The digs were alright, although there were only a few chalets being used - there was a bunch of derelict ones surrounded by unkempt grass which made it look almost post-apocalyptic. It was just outside a small town/village called Malmedy (I just googled it to check the spelling.. turns out there was a big massacre nearby during the Battle of the Bulge, don't know how to feel about that) and it was a little better than the usual campsite accommodation I'm used to when playing abroad. Shayne and I shortly had to go and pick up Leach and Rogan from the airport which was 90 minutes away, so we went and found the only place that looked open and got us some pizza. It was surprisingly good for a place that looked like we were the only customers there all day! I had salmon and creme fraiche, in case you were wondering. We picked up the queer Northern folk and spent another 90 minutes driving back. Yippee! We got in real late so just crashed straight to bed.

Friday

Fortunately we had some time for a lie in as our games weren't until 15:30 and 16:40. We headed to site a bit earlier to help the other UK teams and watch a few games.

Warsaw United: 

As we have never played Warsaw United we didn't know what to expect, I did know that in Rome they didn't get through to Sunday but that was a different layout at a different time.

We managed to net ourselves some penalties to lose our first 2 points. I got a hit on my pack in the first point as I delayed and moved to Apple - I didn't know about it until a ref was running over to me with the yellow flag in hand. The cross-field lanes that were there in training on Thursday and at Cribbs the previous week simply weren't there on this field and we weren't adjusting well enough to shooting our own side to get many G's on the break if any. We came back after being 2 points down to tie it up 2-2, however the next point was a long one that unfortunately we conceded. 3-2 down and with little time on the clock, we had to try and make something happen. I made a center move going to the tall temple next to the A, not getting a G on my way there but getting shot out shortly after, I lived in the temple for a good 5-6 seconds, but in retrospect I should have carried on going all the way to take as many as I could. Lesson learnt for next time. As we threw some bodies trying to score the quick point, Warsaw had enough time to mop up the last couple of players and make it 4-2.

Helsinki Cyclone:

These guys we trained against in Rome and throughout the training session we had the stronger hand, winning most of the points with some quick kills off the break being taken advantage of. However this wasn't a particularly good shooters field like Rome was, and again it was a different layout on a different date. To start with I went up the middle again as we figured it might work as no-one picked me up on that last point. I got a single G on my way but I was shot just as I made it into one of the center temples. We lost another soon after and Cyclone took the first point, before taking another as we suffered some individual errors. Again we scrapped and the score became 3-1 without loads of time left. We were down a body and so were they and I went from the teabag corner (which I had filled to get some width as Shayne was stuck in teabag 1) to run down the highway and shoot their teabag 1 and corner player, my boys got the next point after the chaos and again we were in a 3-2 situation without much time on the clock. We made another push but lost G's and got stuck in our bunkers as time ran out, making it a 3-2 loss.

By the end of the Cyclone game I was exhausted. We didn't have enough water and so were getting dehydrated in the heat under all the kit. We didn't quite know what to take away from the day. There didn't seem to be a major hole in our game plan, just personal errors and penalties made us suffer.We didn't have much time to talk about the games as we had to split up - some had to stay on site and wait for Dave to arrive after his long drive as we only had a few seats in my car. By the time Leach, Rogan and Dave got back to the chalet, I had gotten to sleep. Which was lucky as we were about to get an early wake up.

Saturday:
On site for our early games at 9:10 and 10:20 am.

Bandits: 

In Rome, Bandits were one of our best games, we 4-0'd them. But paintball is about how you're playing now, not how you've played in the past. This time we were one of the Bandit's top games as they took as 4-1. Their snake player was something to contend with, in the 50 pretty much straight away and stopping us from moving on the teabag side. We weren't matching him in the snake and we were still suffering a couple penalties. We were struggling to adjust to beat it, in hindsight I feel we should have used the teabag 1 to contain the snake and start pushing from the corner.

We helped the ECI and the fearless guys in the pits to keep warmed up before our final prelim game. We were pretty certain we were out of Sunday now so we just wanted to settle the score with Phoenix.

Phoenix: 

The final game. These guys 4-0'd us in Rome, the only team to beat us convincingly all tournament and we didn't have an answer to it. To be fair in all the previous games I didn't feel like we played well as a team, it felt as though we were all playing an individual game and getting shot out making individual errors and losing that way. We were gelling more and the points we won were more convincing, the points we lost were close, but not close enough as they closed us out 4-2.

At this point we knew we were skunked 0 wins to 4 losses and I just wanted to forget about paintball. Then I remembered I had signed up for the 1v1 tournament..

1v1 tournament

I was quite excited on the run up to the event about playing this. It was a race-2 format where you just had to eliminate the opponent. I was up against Jeremy Azoulay of Vision Marseille and it was a knockout tournament. Once you're out you're out!

Burridge decided to try and instill fear into my opponent, as we were waiting in the pits for our turn to play, Andy stood on the other side of the fencing and shouted towards the rest of the team "HEY, DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THAT LUKE WILLIAMS GUY?! TURNS OUT HE PUNCHED A HORSE TO DEATH WITH HIS BARE HANDS! I WOULDN'T WANT TO MESS WITH THAT GUY - I MEAN HE KILLED IT WITH FISTS!"

The ruse was obviously a success, the French pro must have been shaken up, as instead of taking me lightly, my opponent brought his A-game and smashed me out 2-0. The first point was a longer one where I tried to lose him by bumping out to the corner and waiting for him to try and come find me. As I thought he had stepped out I tried to shoot him on the move out of my bunker towards the snake - he shot me on the move to the snake. It didn't work. I probably shouldn't have chosen to go to the small corner bunker and tried to move a bit more around the middle. In the second point we both moved out to the first can shooting at each other, as I thought I was in cover I got shot on my peak. Like, where the fuck did that come from? Even the refs look confused for a second. And that my friends is how you throw €35 down the drain and look a bit of a mug doing it. In my defense I was deflated as hell after losing the 4 prelim games.. I wasn't in the mood to be playing. Dave said I didn't look like I was playing how I'd normally play 1v1's and I suppose that's true - but then I suppose usually I'm very confident that I'm going to win, whereas this time I was against a pro and was playing as though I had something to lose.

Pictured: Not knowing what you're doing

Mentally this event was pretty taxing. There was a dark stage after I knew we had come last when I considered quitting paintball altogether. I mean all that money spent, the £5-600 for the event, travel, accommodation, paint and spends and the time I spent organising the above. Not to mention the hours and the money spent on training on the lead up to the event, just to come last?! Staying in a job that I don't particularly enjoy that gives me no room for development - purely because it pays well enough so that I can afford to train and play as much as I do. Those times I had to say no to my friends when they wanted to go do something fun on a Saturday evening / Sunday - all just so I can go to a tournament and fail not only as a part of a team but also as an individual, to beat anyone. Early wake ups to set up fields or travel to play, the tens of thousands of miles I've clocked on my car in a couple short years. Is it all worth it?! It's easy to doubt. But then you remember what it felt like last time, when it was different. When you didn't feel you were going to do it but you and your brothers pulled it back. That buzz when you realise that final point is yours and you're closing down the last player. That pause in momentum when you've hung the flag or pressed the buzzer and you're being checked out by the ref, before that feeling of ecstasy when it hits you that you beat that team you didn't think you could beat, or won that tournament you needed to win, or made the podium on your first international tournament. That is worth all the money. Yeah you could probably just buy the same damn chemical reaction from some guy down a side alley for a fraction of the price. But earning that high from grit and determination is what makes you carry on, and why I will be pushing myself for next time.

This weekend we shot 26 cases of paint + 1 each at training meaning I shot 6 cases (rounding down slightly as I must have dropped about 5-6 fucking pods worth on the floor). Total: 105,500 WE HIT 100,000!! TIME TO CELEBRATE... WITH BEER!

Oh yeah sorry we aren't finished here yet are we?

Saturday Afternoon:

Needless to say, no-one particularly wanted to hang around and watch other people play anymore..Selfish smug bastards not getting knocked out and hogging all the paintball. We decided to go and get a few key ingredients to have a good commiseration barbecue.

We couldn't work out whether it was cheaper per beer to get a few crates of smaller beers which were on offer, or 2 crates of larger beers, so we got 2 crates of each to make sure.

Nailed it.

We had some good times from about 3pm onwards, playing drinking games, eating meat, doing shots out of each other's belly buttons, playing drinking games.. until this happened.

I got so drunk that I stole someone's belly.

Fortunately though the next day we made up for it. We headed into Malmedy for le petit dejeuner (I learnt French) before eventually finding the community swimming pool! We were denied entry as our shorts didn't have that netting in that stops your poo from floating about the pool as one massive turd and instead allows it to be grated into many mini-poos. At least I think that's what it's for. We thought we were out of luck as Belgium appears to be closed on Sundays. As luck would have it, we went into a petrol station as a last resort and lo and behold, they had a promotion on where buying two 6-packs of beer netted you some netted shorts - suitable for Belgian pools! Real men would have bought the beer, however we had no way of carrying it or consuming it between the non-drivers so we asked nicely and the lady let us take them off her hands for just €5. Leach and Rogan were blessed with shorts that had the poo-netting attached. But naturally they wanted to be a part of the Belgian swim team too so handed over their notes.

The boys were firmly back in town

CPS warm-up scrim 1st June

The last weekend before the CPS round 2 in Belgium and the layout for PSP Chicago had only just been released. The good people at Cribbs Pro Paintball Center set up the layout for us as best they could with the Mills layout we have. Fortunately the sideways centre A with 2 tall temples either side isn't a million miles away from the full M + M legs, however I'm sure we will have to change up our lanes slightly when we arrive on Thursday for training.

There aren't massive lanes on the break and the snake seems to be playing a little faster than the teabag side, nonetheless we have come up with some different game plans that I will discuss after the event (spies everywhere!). Even so we are usually quite strong at hitting people off the break with some tourney paint in our guns and the aggressive tapes will hopefully tailor to a strong showing from us at the event.

We had invited Snatch & Reflex (and any other teams up for it) to come scrim with us and also got the REC team there too. At first we were pretty shaky - Snatch beat us up for a few points in the morning as we lost some players early after the break and I was trying to push the teabag side too hard and getting chopped up trying too hard to make stuff happen. However once we had found our groove and figured out our game plan we barely lost another point all day.

Personally I was looking for too many kills and trying to attack the Doritos when playing the 1 to start with, so I swapped with Harry who's a lot more comfortable shooting paint to lock down the field whilst playing the bags slowly, than I am. Which worked out just fine as my shooting off the break was on point so I was getting a G quite consistently before holding down the Teabag side as the insert player and allowing the game to play out before making game-finishing moves.

This is the first time I've felt really comfortable playing behind someone else, as usually I am just hunting for kills - maybe I had learnt my lessons from last week's scrim or maybe I just preferred the layout to the Bitburg one for playing the '2' position. Towards the end of the day I moved back to playing the teabag attack just so I had a good grasp of the shots and the moves that can be made. Don't be surprised if in Belgium you see me playing Apple, Teabags or maybe even Orange at some point.

Talking about watching in Belgium - the link is up and the timetable is here:

(UK time)

Fri 4:30pm Warsaw United
Fri 5:40pm Helsinki Cyclone
Sat 10:10am Bandits
Sat 11:20am Phoenx

And if we make it through:..
Sun 2:50pm Semi Finals
Sun 5:10pm Finals

My thoughts on the prelim teams:

Warsaw United - didn't see them play last event and so I have no idea how they looked. All I know is that they weren't in the final four in Rome. 

Helsinki Cyclone - we trained well against them on the Thursday before Rome, but how a team performs in training and on game day are two very different things - besides a new layout can mean a new story.

Bandits - we played these guys in Rome and won 4-0. We did have a scrappy point against them which came down to a 2v1 which we did pull back so these guys are capable of challenging us.

Phoenix - Rome semi-finals and these Russians knocked us into the 3rd-4th playoffs before going on to win the tournament. They 4-0'd us and seriously outplayed us so I am a bit worried about how we are going to deal with them. I do have faith in our team though as we have been getting better and better as the season goes on at dealing with being on the back foot. Should make an interesting game to watch!

The other team to watch at this event is Black Legion who beat us 4-3 (before we beat them in the 3rd-4th playoffs: 4-2) in Rome. If we match them in the playoffs it will be another close game I'm sure.

Other UK teams to watch (UK times):

London Shock
Friday: 9.30am & 11.00am

London Impact:
Friday: 10.00am & 11.00am

London Fearless:
Friday: 1.10pm & 5.05pm
Saturday: 10:45am

ECI Veterans:
Friday: 1.45pm & 5.05pm
Saturday: 10:45am

I'm expecting to see a strong showing from ECI after the intense game they brought with them to our scrim session last weekend at Bricketwood. We will be training against them on Thursday, however with Leach (our guest from Disruption who has always looked better in an Entity jersey) not flying in until Thursday night, we will be having to borrow an ECI player for some of the points during training - which isn't ideal but at least it maximizes their training time too without people sitting.

Follow the action here: http://new.livestream.com/epbn1/ArenaParty

At the Cribbs scrim day I shot 3 cases of paint so an extra 6,000 onto the total makes it 93,500 so far this year. Looks like I'll finally break the 100k in Belgium!

Scrimming with ECI Veterans 25th May

ECI Veterans are a rebuilding team, just as we were last year, coming back from disbanding for a couple years. We hadn't really seen them at the CPPS so far this year or anywhere else they've been, however they did head to the EPBF French Open in March where they placed first in Division 2, knocking on the door of the pro teams such as Ton Tons & Outrage in Division 1.

I personally didn't know what to expect from them, never seen them play, wasn't sure how many were veterans and how many would be new blood. They had asked us before Sunday if we wanted to do the open training session on the Thursday in Belgium before the CPS and I wasn't too sure as I didn't know how these guys would challenge us compared to another team from the Semi Pro division. Turns out they challenged us pretty fucking well.

We were there to scrim and build on our team play, we didn't necessarily want to win all the points so long as when we were losing we were going down as a team, communicating well. To boost this communication we decided not to use coaching for the entire session. We also wanted to give as many reps as possible to Adam on the snake side, as we are looking at losing Liam at the end of the season when he gets back to his university studies. We had already played the field a lot on the lead up to and including the CPPS round 2 so we didn't need to work out breakouts or anything like that. The session was also good for getting our less-committed players some reps playing with the team, with Harry, Malone & Parkey getting some reps in as well as a guest appearance from Kayleigh who played a few points with us.

We came out with our relatively conservative breakout - knowing it's a lockdown field, however ECI were pushing it pretty hard. We were using training paint and not walking on bounces - amongst ourselves we always walk on bounces but when scrimming against another team it's best to only walk on breaks unless your doing breakout drills, as it can cause more unnecessary "I shot you!" arguments. This meant our lock down approach wasn't really working as well as it had in the tournaments, giving ECI the edge with their aggressive snake play.

ECI also threw in some practice of winning 30 second points, making some super aggressive moves down the middle and cutting us up. Whilst I do see the importance of practicing winning points in 30 seconds, in a tournament situation your opponent is also going to be aware that you only have 30 seconds to score the point and so will be breaking out to counter that. As opposed to ourselves who were under the assumption we were playing normal points and so breaking out accordingly.

Training at Bricketwood is a bit different with the astro turf. The sun was out however there was still a puddle behind one of the teabag corners which I had a run in with. I decided I would avoid it by running wide but when people are shooting at you you tend to throw that out the window and I dived (flopped) chest first into the puddle that consisted of stagnant water and rotting paint. 

Pictured: Sun and good times. Not pictured: Asswater and copious spitting until I felt safe from disease.

I personally used the scrimming session to be played out of position, instead of always playing the teabag attack I played a few points in the snake, playing the insert (not my favorite role) and sometimes the back player / middle attacker.

Playing the snake was fun, I got a few G's from it the few points I was in there, however the importance of relying on your teammates to communicate with you was massive. I got 2 G's shooting guys on my side of the field from Snake 1 in my point in there, before I started to wrap thinking my side was clear, however their snake corner got a blind shot on me - I had no idea anyone was in there! It's a lot more heads down than playing the teabag attack, I'm used to personally having a good field awareness from the taller bunkers which isn't gained as easily from a non-coached snake side.

Playing the insert was hard. Instead of trying to contain their attack I was also then wrapping to see if I could get shots on my mirror, trying to do too much cost me where I would get shot by the teabag 1 when pushing the wrap. I should have just kept on him and carried on doing my job. I feel that playing predominantly the teabag attacker has given me an instinct for looking for the kills which I haven't yet conditioned myself to switch off when playing the insert.

Being the 3rd player however is a lot more fun. Shooting lanes off the break is something I've come to enjoy as it's only recently come natural for me to be able to put my paint almost exactly where I want it to go off the break; choosing which lane to shoot is still a dice game when you're looking at multiple options however. From this position I was able to watch for their middle moves, either shooting them out or making them have to stop somewhere they didn't want to, but also it gave me opportunities to mirror their moves through the center of the field or to run through and eliminate the threat with a counter-punch. It's fun getting to make these moves from these positions, you get an extra level of field awareness in the tall back center bunkers making it easier to break the games open.

In one point from this position they had made it to the teabag side of the M and were preventing us from moving so I made the move to run through and trade out with him. After coming through their side of the M and shooting him, I switched hands as I saw someone making a move on the other side of me, I thought I had shot him out as I had caught him by suprise and he fumbled mid move to shoot back at me.. however I must have bounced and/or missed as he shot back at me. Thinking I was in the right and in the heat of the moment I went to carry on going, causing a bit of a fallout with him but we talked it out on the way off the field. If you're reading - sorry pal!

There was another heated moment involving myself where we had shot most of their players out and I was about to make a move to shoot out the last guy in the teabags as I heard people shout to end the game. The guy I was about to shoot was arguing that he was still in - little did I know that he was arguing with Parkey who thought he had already hit him, so as he was shouting "I haven't been hit, I'm clean!" I thought he was shouting it at whoever decided to stop the game and so I went to 1-ball his hopper to stop the fussing. A combination of my bad aim and a greasy barrel meant I shot him in the arm (sorry!), however he shot me in the back as I walked away so I feel we're square in the eyes of the paintball gods.

Paintball is a very adversarial game and even though there was nothing on the line and it was a friendly scrimmage, it's easy to lose your cool when you're trying to shoot guys who are trying to shoot you and your boys. Fortunately though that was the extent of the bad blood and to top the day off, Dave Simpson went to his car and brought out a bunch of beers for us all to share, which was a very kind gesture and really brought the session to an end on a high note. Overall it was a great day, very productive for all and it was good to get some spins playing out of position. However I honestly can't tell you how or why this happened

After ECI had finished I did some 1v1's against Andy and Adam in preparation for the 1v1 tournament in Belgium. I'm looking forward to it and won most of the games I played although as I started to fatigue Adam got a few shots on me towards the end. Time to work on some cardio!

After today's games I was confident that ECI will give us a good challenge in future and so I confirmed them in to train against us on the Thursday of Belgium. This will hopefully make it more productive than the last pre-event training session against Helsinki Cyclone where we just rinsed them most points.

I'm looking forward to watching these guys play and seeing how they get on in Belgium and beyond.

This coming weekend we are scrimming at Cribbs on the new layout with our REC boys, Reflex & Snatch. Andy Leach from Disruption, not unfamiliar to wearing an Entity jersey, is guesting for us in Belgium and so will be coming to join us next weekend at Cribbs.

Last but not least we shot 24 cases between the 7 Entity players, so we're looking at 3.4 cases each of which I probably shot a bit more due to the 1v1's so I'm going to round up to 7000, making it a total of 87,500 for the year.

P.S check out this picture by Amy of "Stroodle Paintball" from CPPS Round 2. I mean I'm not vain but.. wow.. look at me.. such majesty.