Paintball Manager Is Trigger Happy, Insuring His Finger For £100,000

26/03/2015

Ronnie Hollington paintballing in the NPPL

The Manager of the Essex-based paintball range, Mayhem Paintball, has recently insured his trigger finger for no less than £100,000, to ensure that he can continue paintballing for the rest of his life. Ronnie Hollington is not the first person to insure their most important body part – celebrities have been doing it left, right, and centre recently, including Daniel Craig, who has insured his whole body for $9.5 million.

The paintball business was started on the Hollington family farm when Ronnie was 7 years old. What started out as a fun side project expanded into one of the largest and most thrilling paintball ranges in the UK.

But it was when he left university and started working at Mayhem Paintball full time that Ronnie’s personal paintball career really took off. He played competitively from the young age of 16, and spent much of his time touring around Europe and America playing with his team. They qualified for the National Professional Paintball League (NPPL) pro bracket in America, and were offered £250,000 in 2005 for their spot in this prestigious group. With his trigger finger being such an important asset for both his favourite hobby and his livelihood, insuring his most essential body part was an important step to take to ensure he can continue both his biggest passion in life and his company.

“The adrenalin rush when people are shooting back at you and paintballs are hitting the woodwork is amazing. I love team sports, and paintball particularly is one where you need to work together, or you will lose,” said Hollington, when asked what he loves most about playing this increasingly popular sport.

Hollington plans to keep playing around the county, for the time being, and is looking out for new, fresh ideas to improve Mayhem Paintball further. At least Hollington can continue playing, assured that his trigger finger is in safe hands.

About the company: Mayhem Paintball is situated in Essex and has a variety of themed courses, including a Call of Duty range.

Dye Rotor 2 Preview

16/03/2015

Dye Rotor 2 - First Look

At the Dye Tech course in Offenburg, Germany, Mayhem was the only site from the UK to get our hands on the new Dye Rotor 2 paintball hopper. Time was short so the video was a bit rushed but the new hopper is set to be the hottest addition to all players set-up. We got our hands on one of the prototypes and has some exciting new features:

Adjustable height/size function
Light on/off settings (ideal for those playing at night or who want to remain incognito)
Low paint sound notification (this can also be turned on/off)
Anti-Jam fin on internals
Super quick change from lid to speedfeed (Really, really quick. Maybe 3 seconds!)
Lighter than previous Rotor
Larger, more ergonomic hole for lid/speedfeed

Price on the Rotor 2 is still yet to be confirmed, but you can reserve yours with just a £50 deposit and be one the first in the UK to get your hands one! To pre-order, please give us a call on 01708 688517 between 9am - 5pm, 7 days a week.

Mayhem Tactical: 2nd of February

02/02/2015

Mag-fed is something that's definitely up and coming in the world of paintball, and with some awesome event organiser's in the UK such as Warfighters, Magfed PBUK, Miltac at NPF and Nextgen, Mayhem's second tactical event was my first ever mag-fed event. Here's my Review:

Mayhem Tactical: 2nd of February by David Hodder

Mayhem Tactical Group Photo

On the 2nd of February 2015, after playing paintball for 14 years I played my first ever mag-fed event, technically it was mag-fed, tac caps and limited loaders, but I only noticed one chap with a small hopper on a luxe, everyone else was running true Mag-Fed. I used one of the Dye DAM rentals from Mayhem, and had 6 x spare magazines so 7 in total. So I was carrying around the 100 paintballs per game mark, compared to the usual loader (160) and 5 x 140 pots, I felt seriously under-armed when I walked out onto the first field, Missile Command.

Missile Command

Dave Hodder at Mayhem Tactical

Missile Command is a big map, probably the size and a half of a football pitch, and has some impressive features including a helicopter, missile lorry, Saracen APC and loads of sheds, brush piles and built up compound style bases. We started down the missile lorry end of the field, and I broke out to the right hand side of the field and bumped up through some of the sheds on the right hand side of the field. I quickly realised that first strike is an absolute game changer. The guys we were playing with and against, was a real mix of players from first-timers to the magfed realm, like myself, all the way through to hardcore Magfed regulars. When you had someone shooting at you with first strike, boy you know about it. The range is unbelievably longer, and the accuracy they were getting at range is also scarily high. Instead of attempting to make a bump up over the kill zone infront of me, I decided to try the other side of the field, which as it turned out was definitely the move to make. I got over the other side of the field pretty easily, it's definitely easier to move on the field. I then made an in-field bumb (thanks to Dave for covering me!) and got a couple of kills before getting mowed down! I later learned in the safe area, the guy who took me out (you know who you are!) had only just moved up, I should have made the move that little bit earlier! Could have been the game changer.

Aeroplane Wood

COD Map: Bog

I then missed the 2nd game on Missile Command as I got pulled onto a group, but I was back for the next games on Aeroplane Wood. Aeroplane Wood is large woodland field, with a big crashed passenger aircraft in the middle of the field, and a huge ridge on one side of the field. I broke to the plane on the first game, and threw the flag back to a team mate. I then continued in my crazy moves up the field, and got shot out on the move. Not before getting a few kills though :-) On the second game, we waited around for 10 minutes so people could get more paint and air, and the game started with the blues (Other team) being down on numbers. We managed to take the ridge and then we just picked off their numbers.

After the woodland games we stopped for lunch, before returning out onto the COD replica map, Bog. This map is something really special, it's a copy of the map Bog from the computer game Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and features a T55 tank, buildings, containers, bus, bulldozer and much, much more! For this game, the marshals introduced respawns for the first 5 or 10 minutes, which allowed me to make some more of my crazy moves. I got straight into the bus from the top end (quite an achievement) and ran in there to come face to face with another player and managed to get the first shot in! I then had probably the most intense 5 minutes of paintball, being surrounded in the bus and being goaded my the opposition who could see me, but not shot me and vice versea. One of their players managed to get behind me through the driver's door of the bus and put a couple in my back so I was off back to my base to respawn. I then switched sides of the field and managed to get to the IBC's next to the buildings, but as I made the move to the buildings, I ran into a wall of paint. I definitely felt that one. Had a very similar game the next one, but we lost one side of the field and got shot in the back :-(

The Urban

Urban Paintball

My last games of the day was in my favourite map, the Urban. First end we started at the top, and rushed up against the barn in the Urban. Got a few kills, but they pushed through the barn and I got blown away once they took the barn. On the second game, we pushed into the barn straight away, and the reverse happened. We played well and managed to get the win by pushing through the barn and shooting their back players in the side :-)

Final Thoughts

I think the Mayhem Tactical days are still in their infancy, and there is still much room for improvement:

Paint: Will definitely be addressed for next month.
First Strike: Sold out before the first game, will definitely get more for next time.
Breaks in-between games: Some sort of paint and air on the field.

We had an impressive 35 players, so a big big thank you to everyone who came and helped to promote the event.

I had a great day, and it was good to get out and play for a change! I think I'm going to have to invest in a magfed marker and get out and play some more of this up and coming format of the game, if you haven't already tried it. DO IT!

The feedback we've had already has been fantastic and we will, as ever, be looking to constantly improve our events.

Sunday 1st of March is our next event, and details will be posted up shortly.

Hope to see you there.

David Hodder

Mayhem Tactical: Mag-Fed, tac-caps and 50 shot hoppers

28/01/2015

Mag Fed Paintballer in Helicopter

Mayhem Tactical: 2nd of February 2015

Mayhem will be holding our 1st Mayhem Tactical event of 2015 on Sunday the 2nd of February.

If you haven't played here at Mayhem Abridge before, it is a fantastic, 1st rate paintballing venue with indoor kitting up areas, dozens of varied army vehicles such as tanks, helicopters, planes, etc, brick built showers and toilets, safe areas on every playing field with drinking water, on-site well stocked shop and much, much more.

Pricing is £40 including 500 paintballs if you pre-pay, or £45 if you pay on the day. Additional paint will be available on the day at competitive prices. First strike will also be available to purchase on the day. If you'd like just first strike instead of the 500 paintballs, 30 FS rounds will be included instead of the 500 paintballs.

Mayhem is a site-only paint venue.

The paint we will be using on the day is a Sterling Claymore ball, specially designed for Mag-Fed paintball, is perfect for the current climate conditions and is made here in the UK.

No pyrotechnics are to be used by players, although we will be using pyrotechnics as part of missions. This will be explained to players on the day.

If you would like to rent equipment, it will be an additional £10 and will include overalls, thermal double glazed goggles and a TPX pistol. Dye DAM's are also available to rent for an extra £10 (£20 in total).

Bookings in advance can be done over the phone on 01708 688517 or booked online by clicking here

Anthony Joshua at Mayhem

03/12/2014

It's always a pleasure to see Anthony Joshua at Mayhem it feels like Anthony, Leon Skinner and the boys from Pure Antics are part of the furniture at Mayhem London, we were chatting away in the mini bus with Leon and he said 'It's been 7 years now that Pure Antics have been coming to Mayhem, 3 times each year and it's always an excellent day'. Pure Antics are a event organiser and ofter bring with them celebs, olympians and a great group of people.

Mayhem Mag Fed

25/11/2014

Our first attempt at a Magfed game (the paintball gun has a magazine rather than a normal big hopper/loader), or really a limited loader game, i am not sure if there is a walk-on market just yet for mafed guns but i think there could be in the future and there definatly is for a limited loader game. Why play limited loaders or Magfed you are proberly thinking, and i kind of agree dont fix what is broken and lots of people over the years have tried limited paint and its not really taken off. But there are a few people really pushing for Magfed games, NPF run miltac which is limited loader (50 shots) and Laurence Coetser from Magfed Paintball Uk and Dave Thatcher from Warfights are starting to change things by running good Mag fed games.

Personally i think its a tricky one as its very niche, and i know Alex Munrow has 30 magfed guns he can take to an event but it limits the amount of people who can play, and to be honest there are not many good magfed guns on the market, there must be a market though appearing as Tippmann are investing heavily with the TRC which looks pretty sexy and also selling conversion kits for the 98.

Back to the game its self in sunny London it was a beautiful day and we had marketed pretty hard and i thought i quite fancy playing so i found a friend and we borrowed a dye dam each from the very kind Ash Chaplin at Dye. There was an air of uncertaintity in the air as we were not quite sure what to expect and having 5-10 shots before you need to reload is a whole new experimnce. I like the idea of the game being more about resource management rather than jsut shooting a lot of paintballs. I think this is one side of magfed which could make stand out, i like the idea of having to go get mags, being able to find first strike to get an advange. We tried to have a mix of ideas in the missions and i think it did work really well.

I was excited because I thought it would be like real life call of duty! With 20 players, it has a great atmosphere and it was quite an intimate affair with a good mix of ages and ability. The first game of the day, was on Missile Command and Bridge Wood as a combination field. The objective of the game was to get some fuel containers from the missile lorry, and get one into the fort complex, and with such a vast area for the amount of players it was great for sneaking around. Playing with only 6-10 shots before you have to reload is a real leveller on the field, as you’re never too sure how many shots you have left in your magazine!

Next field was Bog, the call of duty replica map. In this game, there were crates with mags with first strike and smoke, and other ordance to get i liked Resource management game i like the idea of limiting the amount of paint and you have to go get it.

I had a really good time and playing Bog our call of duty map and the Urban mag fed was a really good laugh i would definately play again but i think although we had 18-20 players we need to be able to attact a consistant 20 players each month so we could make the barriers to entry a bit more flexible so people can use tac caps and 50 ball loaders. We have invested and do have a good 20-25 mag fed guns now so Mayhem is ready for a Mag fed / Limited loader walk on once a month.

Paintfest

25/11/2014

Paintfest

My favourite paintball festival, at one of the UK’s best paintball venues, 3 days of paintball at one of UK's finest paintballing sites.

NPF is one of the best paintball sites in the country, never fails to disappoint and they always put on a great spectacle and for many years it has set the bar for scenario games in the UK. Every year we play there we always take something back to help us improve our site, which I think is a great credit to the guys at NPF and the hard work they put in every year.

I dont think i can stress how much of a festival paintfest is it has a great sense of community and is my favourite of the games we play and it is a 3 day event, it has a free bar and entertainment on the Saturday night which is really unique and the NPF guys really know how to party.

Sunday, which i made only slightly late, and my first job was to wake up the lads who had been camping and drinking the night before, and what a challenge that proved to be David Hodder, as he does like to party and drink! We just about were ready for the game to start and my gun decides to not work. Well what a dissapointment! A great game, and i missed the start due to gun problems. This year the militia was not as strong as previous years, we had a younger crowd and lacked the hardcore eliment of ex-pro players like Paul Cain and Thomas Holilngton (who is insane by the way) and does the kind of things which you wonder how the hell did he do that and survive.

National Paintball Games is fast and has a huge venue with lorries, land rovers, roll and rock, an awesome western and the Hannoy Hilton which is a Vietnam themed film-set type area which looks like something from a bushtucker trial and by that I mean scarily good.

This year the game seemed really organised and everything is nice and close, so even with 1000 players it feels right with not too much walking when you are coming off the field, and you can find people in the base camp.

A big thank you to Ged Green, Fraser, Kerry and Stuart for a great event and we will be back in force next year, but i am definitely bringing Thomas Hollington, as we missed his insane paintbalilng moves.

Ronnie

Clash of Clans

25/11/2014

Campaign Paintballing in London's annual big game: Clash of Clans

The Mayhem Militia took 14 hardcore players to Campaign paintball’s scenario game in Surrey, now we didnt edit any of our own footage, so i have put on a video I found on the internet.

I’ve played down at Campaign numerous times over the years and is a great site, with good fields, great toilets (which is always a surprise to see at a paintball site), excellent staff and the owners Lawrence and Jim are very hands on, and you always see them on the field which is a good sign for a paintball event, as when the people who are running the event are on the field, they know exactly how the game is running, keeping a good handle on things.

Clash of Clans was a 4 team game, personally I’m not a fan of multiple teams as it can go a bit crazy, but in this case, it worked very well, and I may have to reconsider my opinion of multi games, as we had so much fun.

The weather was beautiful, and when we turned up there it was a really nice relaxed atmosphere. The game was divided into 4 parts, which I think were an hour and a half each. The format worked well, and it was set over the whole site, and it felt like there was 150 players, maybe more. As there was 4 teams, the teams were smaller, and I think having the breaks was a very good idea, as it would give everyone a chance to pot up, get air and get ready to go out as a team for the next stint as a group so you weren’t at a big disadvantage due to all your players sitting in the safe area or having lunch!

I was really excited about playing Clash of Clans at Campaign and it certainly didn’t disappoint, I enjoy a really good one day game especially in the winter, and the 4 team format worked very well.

Campaign has always had a great reputation with really good fields, which are set out really well. As it was over the whole site, the bases were rotated in each section of the game, so we rotated around the site however it felt like we were always in the thick woodland part, and I know they’ve got some awesome paintballing maps at the other side that I would have liked to play more on. We did have a really good battle in the town but i was over too quickly. I think the reason we ended up in the top thick woods was probably down to my own tactical ineptness!!!

The main objective was to get gold from other clans bases, which was worth big points, but you could also hold checkpoints to score points. We had some great gun fights but we were pretty poor at completing the objectives apart from the second game where we scored really big points.

Well done to the white team I think that they were the overall winners and we came 3^rd overall, but even so we had a fantastic time. It will be interesting to see how it plays next year, with more players.

All in all, very well organised and we will definitely be back next year!

I dont think Clash of clans could be better, value for money was excellent and was only £50 including a case of paint.

North Vs South

25/11/2014

North vs South

When the Northern Monkeys get to take on the Southern Fairies in the UK's biggest Paintballing battle, each calander year.

Warped’s North Vs South is the biggest game in the country, and being north vs south has big pulling power for bragging rights for the next year! Held at an army base that is not designed for paintball, the logistics and organisation that go into this game must be huge, with 1800 players and set over a vast army base, this is one game that always gets a good pull of players. The Mayhem Militia always has a strong following at this epic encounter and we had 37 players in attendance, with some great characters in the mix at a 3-day paintball festival, this was always going to be pretty special.

There was games on during the Friday and Saturday, and the big North Vs South game happening on the Sunday. Being a 3-day game really adds to the atmosphere of the event with a HUGE campsite! Everyone gets into the whole festival atmosphere, and the trade presence is excellent, with pretty much every major trader in attendance, and a fully stocked bar selling cold beer is always a great touch for the evenings.

On the Sunday, the game kicked off at 10am, and this time Hostile Intentions were generalling for the South and they were absolutely excellent, they were super organised and really had the south team getting on the right buses (yes, real buses that drop you off into live areas) at the right times. The game is so vast, without using the buses all you seem to end up doing is walking, so I think this is a perfect addition to the last couple of years of this event, well done Jim and Tim!

Getting shot in the arse by Stuart from NPF (playing for the North), which was worse than any pain a paintball could ever give me. Will I ever live it down?

We had some super intense gunfights, and with so many players on each team when you found a gunfight, boy was it immense. The only downsides for me this year was walking, if you miss a bus it’s a long walk, I think the bottle testing should be more obvious, and I didn’t like the chronographing system with the raffle tickets, I would have preferred to have just been chronoed as I was walking on the field.

All in all, a fantastic event that should be on every UK paintballer’s calender. Oh, and top things off the South won, which is normally a rarety! Get in!

Cannot wait for 2015!

Thank you very much to Jim, Tim and Matt for hosting this amazing event.

Mayhem Mag Fed

24/11/2014

Mayhem hosted our first Mag-Fed game in November, and we had a good turn out of 21 players, making the event a huge success and intimate affair where some great action took place and a great day was had by everyone. We will be running more mag-fed and limited loader games in January, so watch this space! In the meantime, check out the video: