Know your gear

In less than two decades paintball players have shown paintball is a serious sport

"Paintball is the third most popular extreme sport in the US," says Brett Heyns of Paintball Africa, a Cape Town paintball distributor, retailer and field operator.

In the US there are several national paintball leagues and some major tournaments are sponsored by large corporates like Budweiser, Pepsi-Cola, and Fuji Film. In the last few years, ESPN, Fox Sports, MTV, VH1, and dozens of regional television networks across the US have aired special television coverage of paintball tournaments and special events, says Heyns.

Viacom Entertainment is a major promotion partner with Hollywood Sports Park, a large extreme park in LA where visitors can participate in four movie-themed Paintball fields constructed from actual movie-sets. Stars like Arnold Schwartzenegger and Tom Cruise frequently make appearances to promote special paintball charity events and the late BeeGee, Maurice Gibb, was a member of the paintball team The Royal Rat Rangers.

Legend has it that the sport started about twenty years ago in the US when foresters, out marking trees to be cut down, missed the trees and shot paint at each other. Hence the name marker and not gun for the air or gas-propelled barrel through which the paintballs are shot.

The Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association (SGMA) in the US recognised paintball as an official sport about ten years ago, when they included it amongst sports whose participation numbers they track on an annual basis (see chart). Five years ago the International Association of Leisure and Entertainment Industry (IALEI) added paintball as an official category for their 6 000-strong professional trade association.

There is no doubt that paintball is a mainstream sport in America.

Locally, it is growing exponentially, says Heyns. But, attempts to form a national association or confederation that meets the criteria for official recognition by Sport & Recreation SA, have so far been unsuccessful. Part of the problem is that the term paintball can refer to two quite different activities.

Bush ball and speed ball

Bush ball, where two teams attack each other’s positions across various barriers on a vast stretch of land, is popular with corporate groups, birthday parties, or groups of friends out to have fun. And it is great fun.

In America, they add further interest by re-creating actual WWII battle scenario’s, complete with battledress and cars with paintball markers mounted on top to resemble tanks, where the outcome is just as subjective as in an actual battle. It is, reportedly, much more enjoyable than battling with toy soldiers.

But, it is not really feasible to have a universal set of rules and specifications in order to set up league tables and point scoring systems when every playing field has different trees and dongas and hills and dales. With so many obstructions — man made or natural — to hide behind, it is also difficult for marshals to see exactly when someone is out (when hit by a paintball), which makes it even more problematic to create a fair competitive environment.

Locally, these forms of paintball generate about 80% of the revenue. Apart from the fee per player (only large groups are catered for), which usually includes equipment rental, the fields also sell paintballs, gas (or compressed air for higher end markers) and often also refreshments for people enjoying a day out.

For the past twenty years, paintball field owners across the country have been content to offer these facilities to people out to have a jolly good time, pretending to be soldiers, giving less credence to paintball as serious sport than they would believe that their bruises are battle scars.

Some paintball fields have upped the game by erecting shelters in the form of pallets or hay stacks on a treeless field, from behind which the teams have to launch attacks. This game is faster because it is easier to spot the opponents, and is referred to as speed ball.

But, because it is difficult to transport haystacks and pallets and erect them according to the same specifications on all fields, it would be difficult to develop a rating system for teams competing in tournaments.

Air ball

Air ball is, however a complete different ball game … although about the only similarity to bush ball is the paintballs used.

Air ball is played on a flat, grassy surface, — ideally cricket or football fields — with specific dimensions where air-filled bunkers are set up in two identical facing formations. Three-, five- or seven-man teams try to eliminate the opposing team by alternatively sheltering behind the bunkers and quickly moving forward to try and hit an opponent.

Every aspect of play — from the dimensions of the field to clothing, protective wear, safety, marker specifications and other equipment used — is specified in the rules of the SA Professional Paintball League.

Affiliated to them is the Marshalling Association of Paintball SA (MAPSA) that trains marshals to ensure that every tournament complies with the rules.

Now, this is a sport, explains Heyns. Although the bunkers are deflated at the end of each day and can therefore be set up differently next time, the basic rules are the same for every tournament and practice session.

Because the playing fields are levelled wherever you go, teams can attain rankings as they compete in tournaments (and there are many) on other fields, even in other towns. But, there are no official regional or national tournaments – as yet.

Next month, there will, however, be a Tri-Nations tournament in Pretoria with teams from New Zealand and Australia competing in a 7-man and perhaps a 3-man tournament in Pretoria. "Selected teams will then compete in Australia later this year in the second leg of the Tri-Nations, and the winner will have the bragging rights as the top guns in the Southern Hemisphere," says Gawie Keyser of Blade Paintball, one of the organisers.

In Germany, air ball is the most common kind of paintball played and this growing sport is generating plenty of revenue there. This shows that air ball is commercially viable and that this is where the growth of paintball as sport lies, believes Heyns.

More and more players, of all ages, are now participating in air ball, as more fields offer the option. And like any other sport, they participate on a regular basis.

It is also interesting for spectators to watch, who can see what is happening and what tactics are employed by the different teams.

It is a very tactical sport, with new moves and team skills constantly being developed, explains 16-year old Johann du Toit, who is a member of a Cape Town team of teenagers who play air ball on a weekly basis. "There are many manoeuvres that a team can develop, and we are constantly learning from watching other teams. It is a sport that requires a lot of tactical skills, like how to run, how to move from behind bunker, how and when to advance, and how to cover your partners."

It is very different to other team sports because of the adrenalin rush you get every time you have to move out, adds Anree Malherbe, who, like the other team members, also plays hockey as sport.

"It is a team sport that depends on a combination of your own skills and the quality of the equipment you use," adds Everhard Louw. And part of the tremendous advances in the sport over recent years is due to the improvement in equipment technologies used, believes Jacques van der Walt. "The markers we use shoot about 15 paintballs per second — but the top end markers that you get nowadays can shoot up to 25 paintballs per second."

These teenage paintballers are just as aware of every new product, brand and range that comes on the market as any youngster hoping to become a Protea cricket player knows his bats. They study the Internet — there are several SA paintball sites, with www.sapaintball.info a national news site — and read paintball magazines just to see what’s new.

Equipment

While most bush ball players would be happy to hire a less expensive marker and use the paintballs supplied in bulk by the field owner, the air ball players do not want to suffer the ignominy of inferior paintballs stuck in markers, or the trigger of a marker miss-firing in a one-on-one situation stand-off watched by a crowd of spectators.

Air ball players therefore buy their own better quality, more reliable equipment that are lighter and more compact so that they can move faster and present a smaller target when dodging between bunkers. They also wear special clothing with strategic padding and styling that facilitates a lot of knee bending, skidding and being hit by paint balls. There are even special paintball shoes with cleats and traction that allows pivoting and accelerating foot movements on mud, grass and gravel.

"It is, however, a misconception that some paintball markers with a higher velocity can shoot further," says Heyns. "All paintball markers worldwide must be set at 280ft/sec and therefore all shoot an equal distance."

Apart from his concern that beginner players might not enjoy the sport if they start off with equipment that lets them down, Heyns is also critical of the way some vendors sell the actual paintballs, the biggest source of income for paintball distributors and vendors.

"The quality of the balls can vary from good, to bad to awesomely bad," says Heyns. "They also have to be stored correctly, because they can become hard and brittle, like pellets from a shotgun, or rubbery and sticky and lose shape, if stored incorrectly."

The way that paintballs are transported, can also affect their quality, says Heyns.

He, and a group of like-minded distributors, have formed an informal countrywide trading group that would supply retailers and fields in all areas, without having to move stock over long distances.

Another concern is that as paintball grows in popularity, more and more people who do not know the sport would want to open fields or sell equipment.

"Paintball is the safest sport in the world — provided you follow the rules," says Heyns. These include strict rules about the wearing of masks on fields and the proper care and use of markers.

He therefore believes that anyone involved in paintball should at least have a chronograph on site — and know how to use it to adjust the valves on a marker to set the correct paintball speed.

"You must also have a facility on site to fill air canisters, and know how to fill the air, you must know how to clean equipment and know how to repair equipment," says Heyns, who is prepared to give information talks to retailers interested in stocking paintball equipment.