Just a year ago I moved to Italy to start paintball business and develop the sport paintball. I built new fields, arranged pro-schools, organized tournaments, taught our young players and took care of our team, Empire Venice. After a successful year, when we decided to enter into the SPL in Millennium Series the new question popped up… how to get a team ready for the semi professional league?  We urgently needed the tournament experience and learn how to play under that pressure. At the same time I heard that the Grand Tour wouldn’t exist anymore. So after some short conversations with one of GT organizers – Wolfgang, a new European series was formed!  All of my life I have been waiting to become a champion or to help prepare others to reach that level of success.

So the name of the new series was crystal clear and so we started. We found a young talented designer, which created the most stylish website on the market (www.championspaintballseries.com). We started talking with the teams and just after two months we had around 40 teams that expressed an interest in playing the CPS.

Scandinavian paintball doesn’t start until mid to late May due to the cold weather conditions, so for this event headed south to warmer climates and HOT paintball.

This time we found ourselves on our yearly season kick-off trip with Slagen Bandits, heading to Thessaloniki, Greece and the newly formed Med League.  When we left early on the 18th of April it was -5 c in both Norway and Sweden and as it would be in Scandinavia – snow.  We arrived in the early afternoon in warm (+21c) Greece.  We were met by our host, Konstantinos Papapanagiotou,owner ofAnthrax Custom Paintball Jerseys.  He drove us to our hotel, which was a wonderful place and only fifty meters from the beautiful Greek beach and warm waters!

Once settled in we checked out our environment and the Greek food!  Situated across from our hotel was a wonderful “fast food” restaurant that served authentic Greek Gyros!  I was in heaven!  The hotel that Kostantinos suggested was very nice and very reasonably priced.  We would be joined by the marshaling crew as well as Brussels Crossfire in our hotel the following day. 

Moscow Paintball Summer!

As I hope you know Moscow is not always covered with snow and ice. Yes, we have summer too! And we have summer outdoor tournaments as well. The summer series HotBall started in May and continues through until the end of September. The series is aimed at all levels of professionalism – from Division Four, 5-man paintball to Division One Race2 Four X-Ball along with Russian teams that you often see playing in Europe.

Every event gathers more than 45 teams from different cities of Russia and the Ukraine. It is a good practice for those who play in Europe and good time for those who play for fun or have just started in paintball. The organizers do their best to turn every tournament into paintball festive occasion! Cheerleading girls, non-stop music, swimming pool, Red Bull giveaways, contents and prizes – that is just the beginning of what paintballers get for coming to HotBall!

This year’s paintball season has flown by so quickly.  It was already time for the showdown to see who was the best of the best in Norway.  Once again the hosting field for the Norwegian Masters would be Slagen Paintball, one of Norway’s premiere paintball sites.

The field layout was designed by Paul Richards, Tampa Bay Damage head coach.  The layout was quite interesting and challenging to play.  As in past events the layout was kept a secret until a few days before the event.  Fifty-five teams came to Slagen to see if they could walk away with the bragging rights that they were the best team in Norway, only 12 would walk away with medalions and trophies to prove it. The formats that would be played at this Masters was Xball, traditional 5-man, traditional 3-man and 3-man ball limited.  

What amazing weather we had for this event! Players from Mash Paintball Arena provided the weekend’s marshaling crew and kept the games running smoothly and on time.  Over the period of two days more than 200 matches were played.  Day one would set the pace for the weekend as Xball and traditional 3-man matches were up first.

Winter indoor paintball series. Headshot paintball & life Magazine

Once more the end of the normal paintball season has ended in Russia.  But never fear as just around the corner its time for IceBall.  IceBall is a indoor series in Russia that is held in one of Europes BEST indoor facilities, Arena Paintball Moscow and Arena Paintball Palace Moscow.  The series organizers offer visa support for players from outside Russia.  The prices for entry for the event is very affordable. Some of the ammenties offered by Arena year around are a built in hostel on site that is 500rubles per night per pers in a 6 man room, showers, café, live webcast of the event, excellent media coverage from Russian and international photographers and videographers.  The field itself is a truly modernized Millennium field with lots of sideline room, current Millennium Series layouts, 3 meter high hockey glass around the entire field in addition to full netting.  They have room for lots of spectators and lets not forget CHEERLEADERS!  This series is one not to miss.  So this winter instead of sitting around watching old paintball videos, get off the couch and get to Russia and play in a comfortable climate controlled arena.  Contact pr.headshot@gmail.com for any questions and visa support.

The second stop on the Champions Paintball Series brought us to Vienna, Austria and to the home field of RMG Bratislava.  This event would see the first appearance of Art Chaos Moscow in this series as well as well-known players Oliver Lang, Bobby Aviles and Bear Degidio.  

The CPS is comprised of four events in both Italy and Austria.  According to organizer Jaroslav Ziugzda (Slava), the series was created when the Grand Tour decided to take a break and left a void in the European tournament paintball community.  

The event is divided into two divisions, Super League (pro) and League 1.  For the Vienna event there were 8 Super League teams and 19 League 1 teams.  Going into this event leading the Super League was Empire Venice followed by Consilium Dei and Icon Marseile.  In League 1 it would be CD 2, ACT and Italian Idols.  Vienna would bring upsets to the leaders and new teams would take the podium.

Welcome to Hokksund Norway, home to the second NPL event.  Just like the event in Sweden the week before, Hokksund was plagued with rain before, during and after the event. 

Day one would be the longest day of the event with twelve Division 1 teams and twenty-two Division 2 teams.  One hundred thirty-six matches would be played over nine hours and on only one field! Marshalls for this event and all of the NPL events this year was Drammen Solid. 

Division 2 and Division play traditional 5-man format.  With that said, the matches for Division 2 flew by quickly. Sitting Ducks had a guest player for this event.  The bright pink GT Clone gave away quickly that one of the Fat Ladys Charms would be joining Sitting Ducks. Mette Isaksen, snake player would help the Sitting Ducks to the finals.  Division one and two would play on an older Millennium Series field layout as their secret layout for the event.