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!
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| #letmetakeaselfie |
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.
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| 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.
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| Nailed it. |
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| I got so drunk that I stole someone's belly. |
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| The boys were firmly back in town |
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