Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Fishing

by Mike Paxson
After World Cup, Mr. U and I drove to Tampa to go fishing with Rocky. The weather was cool and the wind was blowin', but we still caught fish. Tomorrow, we catch more fish with Nicky. Next up: Travel to San Diego for the Super 7. See you in SD. I've got pics up at my website of World Cup.

Monday, October 27, 2008

WORLD CHAMPIONS 2008!

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Getting ready for World Cup!

Hey guys, I unfortunatly did not make it out to the Paris event, but i have been at home training for one thing, and that is to Win World Cup. World Cup is the biggest event of the year, it is where all the teams go to fight for one thing, to be crowned World Champions. I know from personal experience how good this feeling is and want to experience it again with my brothers. For the past few weeks I have been putting myself through a hell week type mini training camp. Ill give you the rundown

8:00 am - I get up and make a heart healthy breakfast consisting of scrambled eggs with whole wheat toast. 
9:30 am - I go for a run outdoors, I have many hills by my house so i run sprints as fast as i can up the hill then jog back down, I do this to the point of exhaustion knowing that at World Cup I will be ready for every possible situation. 
4:30 pm - Its time to train again and i kick this off by going to one of my favorite spots, LA Fitness. Depending on what day it is i will either workout my upper or lower body, then follow it up by swimming laps in the pool. Now that i am exhausted it is time to start the real training. 
6:00 pm - I head over to my other favorite spot across the street where i take my Mixed Martial Art's class. This really kicks my but especially after training all day and already being tired but again the only thing in my head is winning world cup. Keep in mind this has only been my routine for the past few weeks and will stop once Cup is over, then i will go back to my one a day workouts which are plently. Anyway we usually start out with the jump rope, anyone who has never used a jump rope and thinks it is easy, think again. We get in a good cardio, then its time to fight. I have much more respect for those guys who fight UFC now, the endurance you need to last a full round is incredible, anyway once i finish the class im ready to pass out. I go home, dream about World Cup, then repeat the next day. 

This is my routine during the week, minus school. On the weekends i have been training out at velocity paintball and was lucky enough to wear the new i4 goggles. Dye has really outdone themselves this year, i have been shooting a DM9 for a while now and have to say it is nothing less than amazing. To be honest im really exited for World Cup for another reason, and that is to wear all the new gear. Ive seen most of it and must say it looks great. 

P.S: Scott tries to copy my workout.. hard. 

Paris

Just got back monday night from my long journey to paris! It was an adventure being in such a well known place like Disneyland Paris, but it was a great event. B-short's Nexus won the pro division, and my team, Offenback Comin' At Ya took 3rd in the semi-pro division. That bumped us into 3rd for the season, and we're hoping to get an invitation to the pro division for next year! I also got to wear the new I4 dye goggles and absolutely loved them! they look great and are very easy to wear. Now I'm just counting down the days until World Cup! Hope to see everyone there!

Greg

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Trip to Paris

Hi everyone, just got back from Paris for the Millennium event. It was pretty cool to be in Paris for paintball, especially since I've never been there before. But It's always good to be home, especially after an 11 hour flight. I was guest staring with a team from Portugal called the Lisbon Titans. Great group of guys. We didn't do to hot this event but it was still a good experience. This event had more American players than any European event I've been to, which made it pretty fun for all of us. Half of the Ironmen roster was out there and a few dye employes from America as well.
I was pretty excited to use my new I4 goglges that I just received last week. I got to use them In our last practice against Dynasty and I felt that these are not just Dyes best goggles made but paintballs best goggles to this day. These goggle are the most comfortable goggles I have ever worn, they are supper light and have a lens that is much larger to give you maximum field vision. But my favorite part is that they look really cool, and we all know that every kid on the field wants to look his best!
In Paris all I could think about was whats to come next week, WORLD CUP!!! The largest tournament of the year. I have been training harder then ever these last couple months to be in tip top shape for this. This last week at home before cup is going to be nothing but exercising twice a day and strict eating regiment of only the healthiest foods. (o ya and a little bit of school) I want to win this tournament more then anything, and until we do its going to be on my mind every minute.

Scott Kemp
Team Ironmen

Monday, October 13, 2008

Hey everyone, Just settling down from a long flight and a hectic last
event in Paris.
We had a great season but let it slip through the cracks during this
last event.
The one up side is I did get to use the new I4 goggles which I love.
They are now my favorite goggle system out on the market, they are
light, comfortable, sleek, and the new lens and vision capability is
unreal. I hope you guys all get a chance to try them on and see why I
like them so much.
One week until World Cup, going to have a serious week of training to
get ready for capturing that NXL title again, but I look forward to
seeing some of you there and using all the rest of the 09 Dye gear.
Take care
Ollie

Just in time for Hurricane Ike

By Mike Paxson
Never in the history of any major paintball event have they ever canceled an event. Initially, I argued that they would never even consider canceling it because of issues like players having to cancel flights, car rentals, and hotel reservations, then refunding entries, on top of the big loss of money that the NPPL would have to suffer without, but seeing what Ike left behind, it was the best decision for them to cancel. What's worse? Having an event that sucks with extra issues like no power, bad traffic (because of no power), no water, low water pressure, or contaminated water, OR just canceling an event and blaming it on extremely bad weather?


The morning after Ike, we were one of the lucky few to still have power. We (Bea and I) stayed with Diego from Thursday, Sept. 11, before Ike came (Saturday night) all the way until Sept 23rd. Over 2.1 million customers of the local electric company were said to have no power out of the total customer base of 2.9 million.


We were also lucky to all have taken showers before the water pressure dropped, but later that same day, the water pressure for us returned. However, water contamination was a concern, so they issued a boil-water warning.


Diego, who came from Brazil four years ago, didn't have his windows covered with board nor did he have any kind of coverage, for that matter. So, Bea kept on asking, "Should we go to Tank's or to John and Matt's since they have their windows boarded up?" Diego was all, "Nah. We'll be fine." Sure enough, Tank, John, and Matt, two different households, were both without power, but not us! We woke up to the air-conditioning, which was blasting at 68 degrees!


Tank, by the way, is that big guy that worked for Archon and then worked for Procaps after the merger? Well, now Tank just got released from Procaps. I have a feeling, though, Tank wasn't surprised. Procaps just let go of Craig Miller, too, someone who's been with the Draxxus side of Procaps for a very long time. As for who John and Matt Jackson are, John helps manage a paintball store in Houston, and Matt aka "Fuzzy" is real close to playing pro. Both the brothers also formed the team Archon Army a few years back, but is no longer in the circuit. They both still actively play, though, and we got a chance to play with them over the weekend when the NPPL Houston event was supposed to take place. (Picture by Matt Nelson: At Tank's Paintball in Katy, TX)


For the next 5 days after Ike, there was at least a 2-hour wait to get gas. Some gas stations were running out of gas, making it more difficult for people to get it. Grocery stores were out of power, too, and some corner gas stations were trying to do their best to at least sell dry goods. Even from the day that I left for San Diego for a DYE photo shoot, Houston still looked like a quasi-ghost town - stores were still closed because of a lack of electricity. The traffic lights, too, were still out at 4-way intersections, making it really difficult to get around.


Most of the hotels were out of electricity, so even if the NPPL event still would have gone on as planned, teams would've had to scramble to find a place to lay and bathe. The driving situation to and from the venue would've been a herendous experience, too, but because FEMA was taking up the parking lots at Reliant Stadium. Most of the restaurants in the area were closed, as well. And anyway, can you imagine us having a paintball event during a time when everything else in the city was basically out of comission? We probably would've had no real local spectators who had money to spend for vendors to sell to, either.


So, even though I thought they never would've done it, I'm in full support of the NPPL canceling the event. I'm sure that no one lost more money on the event canceling than the NPPL and Pacific Paintball. I heard people were complaining about having to pay a change fee of anywhere between $75 to $300 (international travelers). Well, I lost just as much, if not more, but bitching about it does me no good. We stayed an extra weekend to play at Tank's Paintball in Texas (like I mentioned earlier), and held a clinic on Saturday for real cheap and played along side and against Houston locals on Sunday.


I'm glad I went to Houston and even got to meet old friends, and be introduced to new ones, all because of Ike. Sucks we didn't get to compete, but now we can save it for World Cup and San Diego. Oh, and finally, the hurricane winds were similar to what we went through in Florida when Fay came through the Sunshine State. We were west of the City of Houston. The areas to get it the worst were east and south (Galveston) of Houston. Hopefully they'll get back on their feet soon. Just be glad you didn't have to suffer the loss that the people of Galveston did.


See you at Cup. I'm in Florida now until Disney's Wide World of Sports opens its grounds up to us. If you want something to do in December, and feel charitable, it'd be great to see you at the Lauren's Hope event at the Carolina Paintball Park in North Carolina. Fly into Charlotte and play 3-man PUMP X-Ball, a race to 3 - yes, an X-Ball event using pump guns.

Blog quote for Johnny Perchak

New I4 goggles look Rad! Cant wait to get a pair at World Cup!

Johnny Perchak