Madrid

[duffistuta]

(Nick/Graham/Magued/Duffy/Niall

But sometimes I wonder where this is all going, is it worth it, and I can't believe people will threaten to shut down a major event because the grass is too dry, there is dirt on the field, there is a 6" drop in the ground on one side of the field, it's muddy, or - heaven forbid - there is a 2" tall root that is clearly marked with orange paint in the farthest back corner of the field 20 feet BEHIND the back bunker (BTW - these are all actual protests I've been faced with) I swear I had a guy (someone well in this industry) threaten a lawsuit because he fell and twisted his ankle when he ran over a dip in the field. He literally threatened out loud in front of players, spectators, and Jesus to tell ESPN execs about our disregard for players safety and sue PSP because he hurt himself running on a field.

And yet these are the self-same guys who like to claim they play an extreme sport...whiney, lawsuit happy, jumped up little kids.

Oh, and you forgot poison ivy at Pittsburgh and - everybody's favourite - poisonous snakes at Cup.

 

[Sherman]

To be honest, if I was owner of a state of the art football facility, I would never let paintball tournament to take place there. It will damage the grass and the mess is unbelievable. Im amazed they let paintballers return year after year to Bitburg, they must be desperate for money

 

[Robbo]

(Nick/Graham/Magged/Duffy/Niall -- I am sure you guys, and some others here, can superimpose your own names and events over these and understand my message)

Pete - do you remember - in Sweden maybe or it could have been France - when Adam Gardner told me to go to a bunker that was well over the 50 and on a pretty steep downward run?

The problem of being shot on the run was the least of my concerns. The bunker was about 3 feet wide and less than 5 feet from the tape line. On the other side of the tape was a 25 foot drop onto a slab of rugged rock. We determined the best bet was to just line up directly with the bunker, run as fast as I could (in those days that was pretty fast) and just crash into the bunker. This was a thick wooden log bunker and we felt safe it would stop my forward motion.

Do you know that it never occurred to me that it might not be safe to crash into a bunker made of wooden spikes at 30 miles an hour. Certainly I saw the danger in going over the cliff. But it mattered most that if i made it, I'd get to shoot a lot of people and we would win. I did it. It hurt. I didn't die, and the super glue stopped the bleeding. I shot a lot of people and we won. And then drew the same side of the field in the semis and finals. It hurt again. But we won. We ended up losing the tournament on a fluke play by some silly Swedes, but that's another story.

What about some of the stuff that Bruno and Heavy played through?

Did Chino, Dirk G, Shane, Darryl Trent, LED or Spud ever threaten to not play a game because they thought they might get hurt? If you had heard the Greg Mal wouldn't run to a bunker because he might slip on the wet ground and fall, you would have never believed it were true would you?

Did Marcus Davies ever refuse to play a side of a field because of thorns? I know several times we chose to go through the thorns because we knew some other team would shy away from them.

Those were the days.

I am all for advancing the game. And I've put in the work as opposed to the lip service. I believe I have done my part, and then some, in that regard. But I would really love to see some of these guys play in the conditions that got all this started. I think it would be gut bus tingly funny. But above that I believe it would go a good measure in gaining some appreciation for where things are today.

I certainly don't think we stay in the past. I am a firm believer in the "keep moving forward or you start to back up" saying. And I won't ever stop trying to get farther than we got last year, or last week for that matter.

But sometimes I wonder where this is all going, is it worth it, and I can't believe people will threaten to shut down a major event because the grass is too dry, there is dirt on the field, there is a 6" drop in the ground on one side of the field, it's muddy, or - heaven forbid - there is a 2" tall root that is clearly marked with orange paint in the farthest back corner of the field 20 feet BEHIND the back bunker (BTW - these are all actual protests I've been faced with) I swear I had a guy (someone well in this industry) threaten a lawsuit because he fell and twisted his ankle when he ran over a dip in the field. He literally threatened out loud in front of players, spectators, and Jesus to tell ESPN execs about our disregard for players safety and sue PPS because he hurt himself running on a field.

Guys - push for whats right. Have a voice in going forward. But be willing to do more than just point fingers. And, for the sake of this game and where we have come (AND WE HAVE COME A LONG, LONG WAY) be careful of what you wish for, careful of what your reaction to a moment may cost for a while, and careful of where we may be headed with other running things. 'The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence' is on of the most well known and often used sayings on the planet for a reason.

Lane, the only reason you went on that run was because you were new to the team at the time and the only one silly enough to do what Adam said
I certainly weren't gonna run anywhere when my Automag traveled the length of the field at 200 mph

As for what you suggest, as usual, the vast majority is correct and informed but I think as the game professionalizes and we are asked to pay increasing revenues in the form of entry fees then we should expect a certain level of amenities.

And it's not so much an absolute here as a relative because if other Millennium events have shown they can produce in terms of quality of field, reffing, on site facilities etc then I think it incumbent upon the Millennium Board to uphold that quality.
They certainly uphold the level of entry fee, that at least is consistent

We can all harp back to when things were bad and conveniently use this as contemporary benchmark but those comparisons are more anachronistic than useful.

I think yeh, we need to get a handle on this because we all do tend to overreact as both you and Nick suggest but a lot of us have been around a long time mate and we have seen far too many things to become anything less than cynical.

From the look of it, I will say this much with a fair degree of surety, Madrid don't look like no Toulouse or Marseilles, in fact it looks pretty bad, maybe not as bad as knee jerk reaction suggests, nevertheless, it's not commensurate with the money we pay over and what we expect as customers.
After all, they have already proved on many occasions before, they can run some really great tourneys as Marseilles showed us all, it's just sad they cannot keep this improved initiative alive.

 

[duffistuta]

Lane, the only reason you went on that run was because you were new to the team at the time and the only one silly enough to do what Adam said
I certainly weren't gonna run anywhere when my Automag traveled the length of the field at 200 mph

Yep, but even back then throwing your gun was illegal - and you could only take out one person.Poor tactic IMO.

 

[Tricky]

(Nick/Graham/Magued/Duffy/Niall -- I am sure you guys, and some others here, can superimpose your own names and events over these and understand my message)

Pete - do you remember - in Sweden maybe or it could have been France - when Adam Gardner told me to go to a bunker that was well over the 50 and on a pretty steep downward run?

The problem of being shot on the run was the least of my concerns. The bunker was about 3 feet wide and less than 5 feet from the tape line. On the other side of the tape was a 25 foot drop onto a slab of rugged rock. We determined the best bet was to just line up directly with the bunker, run as fast as I could (in those days that was pretty fast) and just crash into the bunker. This was a thick wooden log bunker and we felt safe it would stop my forward motion.

Do you know that it never occurred to me that it might not be safe to crash into a bunker made of wooden spikes at 30 miles an hour. Certainly I saw the danger in going over the cliff. But it mattered most that if i made it, I'd get to shoot a lot of people and we would win. I did it. It hurt. I didn't die, and the super glue stopped the bleeding. I shot a lot of people and we won. And then drew the same side of the field in the semis and finals. It hurt again. But we won. We ended up losing the tournament on a fluke play by some silly Swedes, but that's another story.

What about some of the stuff that Bruno and Heavy played through?

Did Chino, Dirk G, Shaner, Darryl Trent, LD or Spud ever threaten to not play a game because they thought they might get hurt? If you had heard the Greg Mal wouldn't run to a bunker because he might slip on the wet ground and fall, you would have never believed it were true would you?

Did Marcus Davies ever refuse to play a side of a field because of thorns? I know several times we chose to go through the thorns because we knew some other team would shy away from them.

Those were the days.

I am all for advancing the game. And I've put in the work as opposed to the lip service. I believe I have done my part, and then some, in that regard. But I would really love to see some of these guys play in the conditions that got all this started. I think it would be gut bustingly funny. But above that I believe it would go a good measure in gaining some appreciation for where things are today.

I certainly don't think we stay in the past. I am a firm believer in the "keep moving forward or you start to back up" saying. And I won't ever stop trying to get farther than we got last year, or last week for that matter.

But sometimes I wonder where this is all going, is it worth it, and I can't believe people will threaten to shut down a major event because the grass is too dry, there is dirt on the field, there is a 6" drop in the ground on one side of the field, it's muddy, or - heaven forbid - there is a 2" tall root that is clearly marked with orange paint in the farthest back corner of the field 20 feet BEHIND the back bunker (BTW - these are all actual protests I've been faced with) I swear I had a guy (someone well in this industry) threaten a lawsuit because he fell and twisted his ankle when he ran over a dip in the field. He literally threatened out loud in front of players, spectators, and Jesus to tell ESPN execs about our disregard for players safety and sue PSP because he hurt himself running on a field.

Guys - push for whats right. Have a voice in going forward. But be willing to do more than just point fingers. And, for the sake of this game and where we have come (AND WE HAVE COME A LONG, LONG WAY) be careful of what you wish for, careful of what your reaction to a moment may cost for a while, and careful of where we may be headed with other running things. 'The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence' is on of the most well known and often used sayings on the planet for a reason.

No offence but the reason we pay so much in entry fees, flights, hotels etc is to play a higher standard of tournament, both in opposition and facilities, than we could get at home.
On the face of it this is far worse than our domestic scene, fair enough we'll play better teams but we'll break our legs doing it .
The fact the millenium series has xl turf and isn't using it smacks of cost cutting, if so then lower the entry fee!
And so much for the fact that the whole millenium board are organising every event this year as a team, not just laurent doing france, pedro doing spain etc... seems pedro has been left to his own devices again.

 

[Nexus - Leigh]

I like the grandstand picture.

 

[Rosie]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/59601802@N00/155733230/in/set-72157594148822959/

who knows, they might put some more up at some point

seriously, if this is as bad as it looks then you are fools not to do something about it & get this group together. I'd be pretty pi$$ed off- you're paying the same as you would for Campaign or Bitburgh, but the quality's like 1/2 of that.

 

[Robbo]

I made some phone calls and had a little 'chat' with some people and I think here's the real deal :-

The Real Madrid venue was all but signed up but there was a contingency in that contract for them to test any paint and its consequent effects on the environment.

This was the condition that was used when refusing the Millennium Board permission to use the site when an unknown person (Allegedly Spanish by nationality) made it known to the authorities that Paintball would be detrimental to the Real Madrid event site.

Much as some people suspected (me included) that money was the issue, it actually wasn't because the Real Madrid venue was actually cheaper than Bitburg to hire and so I will put my hands up in guilt as to believing we were just seeing another case of penny pinching gone wrong.
I got no problem in apologising in believeing what I did but it was a bit of a 'boy crying wolf' thingy going on here.

Everybody in the Millennium were obviously working on the principle that all was going well and their back up site was obviously told they were not needed.
When the sh!t hit the fan and the Real Madrid site went tits up, the people who ran the back up site felt a little pissed off when the Millennium Board then had to go back knocking on their door and unfortunately gave the Board a raw deal on what was now offered ....... it was that or nothing basically.
And so, the Board have now to provide a 'functional' tourney as against a 'bells and whistle' one and they are doing all within their power to provide us with a well run event.

Sh!t happens and this time, it's not so much a case of mismanagement as bad luck and the actions of one a$$hole who spiked it all for us.
As to how it all pans out, we shall see when you all get there.
It seems a real shame because Marseilles was brilliant, Bitburg was functionally fantastic and now this.
Still, see how well they do in pulling this outa their ass but I still think we the teams and players need to organise oursleves......and on that note, excuse me while I have to yawn
Good Luck to all Brit teams going out there !!!!!

PS Schmidt, stay away from my team !!!!!

 

[Nick Brockdorff]

All that having been said Pete..... I will like to throw into the mix, that none of this would have been a problem, had they secured a venue for Madrid 4-5 months ago, instead of waiting to the last minute - and for THAT I definitely blame the MS board..... their tardiness is legendary in paintball.

Nick

 

[Robbo]

All that having been said Pete..... I will like to throw into the mix, that none of this would have been a problem, had they secured a venue for Madrid 4-5 months ago, instead of waiting to the last minute - and for THAT I definitely blame the MS board..... their tardiness is legendary in paintball.

Nick

That, they are putting their hands up to......