PSP Dallas Texas 2013

The first PSP event of the season is already here, and the energy is pumping.  Canadian Express is playing in D3 race to 4, and helping out Infamous in the pits and running pods during their pro matches, working hard all weekend.

The PSP Dallas live webcast is being broadcast by Paintball Access, with coverage of all of the pro division games.  Divisional matches will also be shown during the finals on Sunday.  Here's the link for the live PBA webcast:
http://www.paintballaccess.com/live/

I'll be posting again once I'm home from the event to give a recap of how the divisional and pro matches over the weekend went.  Until then, sit back and watch the action unfold on the Paintball Access webcast!

Paintball Extravaganza & New Gear Releases from Empire, JT, Eclipse & J4

This week marks Paintball Extravaganza 2013 with the launch of tons of new products from leaders in the paintball industry.  

New Marker Releases:

• Empire Vanquish - A brand new ergonomic high-end spool valve marker from Empire, packed with tons of useful features, including: OLED board, easy 1 Allen key maintenance, gas-through frame and a hinged design for easy cleaning between the trigger frame and body.  It also comes with a full Superfreak barrel kit. Below is a full breakdown and review of the Vanquish from Infamous' Drew Templeton who has been testing it for a few months, brought to you by Grind paintball magazine.

• Empire Axe - New colour combos, including Camo, Carbon Fibre & Chrome pattern:

• BT TM-7 and TM-15 - New colour combos.

• BT Mechanical G36, Slice & Omega markers: Reliable markers for the casual rec ball player or field owner to use as rentals.

• Empire Resurrection Autococker - A mechanical, single-trigger autococker.  Appears to be an Empire Sniper, with a front block and pneumatics instead of a pump kit.  Perfect for the old-school ballers who love autocockers, but still want to purchase a brand new marker.

• JT Impulse - A new take on the Smart Parts design with an OLED board, this should be a strong competitor in the stacked tube poppet market.

• JT Splatmaster Z300 Rifle - Another addition to the Splatmaster line or .50 caliber spring-action markers.  It looks like it would be easy to pump while holding a steady aim.

• J4 Paintball's Torque STS (Stacked tube spool) marker - a cool new marker design that is a spool valve, but also has a top tube with the bolt & barrel separate to help combine the ease of maintenance of stacked tube markers and the smooth shot of spool valves.  Apparently they aren't finalized and ready to ship yet, but J4 has released pictures of the body of the marker.  So far, it looks similar in appearance to the Vanguard Creed.

• Eclipse Ego LV1 - Has no macro line, but still has air going to the inline reg through a transfer tube at the trigger guard.  The placement seems like it may be clumsy to hold.
 

New Masks:

• JT Proflex update: New colours for Spectra goggle frames & bottoms, Flex Revolution ear style, and retro style goggle straps.

• Limited edition E-Flexes: cool camo patterns & skull face bottoms.

Sources: Huge thanks to the people at Social Paintball and PBNation & SwapMyTank.com for the images.

PSP Preseason Practice & Pro Infamous Clinic

This last long weekend over the Family Day holiday was packed full of paintball experience for me. 

Saturday PSP  Prep Grind Session 

On the Saturday, the Canadian Express team hit the field at Flagswipe Paintball for the preseason grind with a special guest, Travis Lemanski of LA Infamous.  The team spent the night running drills on top of drills to prepare for the upcoming PSP Dallas event next month.  Expertise from Travis helped to mold our practice plans for the rest of the season, with a whole host of drills and preparation ideas, with the Race-to format in focus.

Sunday LA Infamous & Canadian Express Skills Clinic

Sunday is where the magic happened, and the local paintball community came together to learn from Travis and pick up some pro tips for their game.  The skills clinic was hosted by Canadian Express and led by Travis Lemanski, with 30 players of all skill levels attending to get the whole experience.  Basic drills covered paintball skills including snap shooting, running and gunning, lane control, communication and general teamwork.  The day started off and ended with scrimmages so players could see how their skills improved over the day.

Kaz from Visual Reviews was also on hand recording the clinic and put together this video coverage of the event, watch it on YouTube here:

New Airball field is up at Windsor Rush Paintball!

This has been in the coming for a couple of months now, and it's finally here.  Windsor Rush Paintball now has a new airball field to add to their collection of bunkers.  The field is complete with a full snake side, a dorito side, and more bunkers in the middle including cans, temples and car washes.  This opens the way for more speedball style paintball to be played in the Windsor area, and gives new teams a field to practice on during the week.

There are still some huts and walls on the field, but for the speedball purists, don't worry! The huts are set on wheels, and can be rolled right off of the field to make a wide-open, purely speedball field for team practices.  If you're interested in team practices or playing speedball with the big boys, talk to the staff at Windsor Rush and ask them when their next open airball practice will be.

I had to check the field out for myself this past Saturday as it had been almost a month since I had last played paintball, and I was feeling the itch to play.  I made sure to try playing the entire field, spending games in the snake side, dorito side and even up the middle.  My GoPro was along for the ride, and I took some barrelcam videos of my games.  

Paintball Gear Maintenance: Reliability vs. Real Liabilities

When you step out onto the paintball field, you have a job to do.  It is your responsibility to hold your lanes, get into position, and communicate with your teammates.  If you have an issue with your marker during a practice or tournament, it effectively makes you a useless body on the field, letting down your entire team from a problem that could have been prevented.  Basic marker maintenance is key to ensuring that your gun will shoot every time you pull the trigger.

An unreliable marker makes an unreliable player.

Your marker setup is an extension of yourself, and having unreliable gear leads to you being an unreliable player, as fixing issues at the field severely cuts into your practice time or even worse, actual game time.  It sucks to be the person at a team practice who is scrambling to do maintenance on their marker, while the rest of your team is on the field practicing and learning tricks of the layout that you may miss out on in the pits.  The worst is when you're in a great position on the field with a clear shot on an enemy player, when your gun doesn't shoot when you pull the trigger: you just lost a G for your team, you're probably going to get shot out because you can no longer defend yourself, and the lanes you should be covering become open for the other team to make aggressive moves, leading to your team's entire gameplan falls apart due to your lack of preparation.  When your gear doesn't work properly, you are a liability.

Maintenance is key, be prepared.

I suggest for players to always perform basic maintenance on their gear before each time they go to play paintball to ensure that everything works as it should.  Check your gear the night before you play, that way if you find any problems, you can fix them at home so you'll be ready to play when you get to the field. Maintenance doesn't take long, with most modern markers only taking a few minutes to fully clean and lubricate the bolt system.  If you are unsure on how to care for your marker, the first place to look would be the manual, which can usually be found on the manufacturer's website, and there are many videos on YouTube that will show you step by step how to properly maintain your marker.

Game day preparations checklist:

• Your marker setup, maintained, re-lubed and ready to shoot.
• Fresh brand-name batteries for your marker and loader.
• Backup marker setups to swap out in case of any marker problems during games or Xball points.
• Filled up air tanks.
• Pods and paint ready to go for the next game.

Overall, the gear's cost does not make the player, but the player needs the gear to be reliable and functional so they can do their job on the field.  Remember to always be prepared to play, so you can spend your time at practice on the field rather that on the workbench!