Paintball teams splattered in Northland Open

There was nothing wrong with the attention span of Auckland paintball team ADHD as they were the last team standing - or the least paint splattered - to win the Northland Open Super-Air title.
They beat another Auckland side, Disposal Unit, in the final at Mangapai's Strategy Tag Paintball centre to end a frenetic day of action with over 130,000 paintballs fired to find the winner.
The eventual selection of the finalists wasn't a big surprise as they both were in the finals of the recent Auckland Super Air competition but neither team had an easy path to the final with the other six teams all aiming to bring the top-rated teams down.
The Whangarei-based team Paranoia weren't too euphoric about their sixth place in the eight-team competition but they had a couple of morale-boosting wins over more highly regarded teams - including an early win over another Auckland entry, Tempest, to give them something to remember from the competition.
The other wholly Northland side, Kaikohe's 13th Division, were once again the big improvers in the competition.
The team turned up last year with outdated weapons and were defeated in all of their games but this year they raised a few eyebrows and dented a few reputations - beating teams like Disposal Unit to take seventh place.
"We did really well in the second round of round robin of competition, we only lost three (out of seven games), so that was a big improvement on last year and our first round so we're slowly working our way up there," team spokesman Grant "Warzone" Dickenson said.
The volunteer fireman from Kaikohe had attended the stations' 75th Jubilee the previous evening limiting himself to pineapple juice so he could be ready for Sunday's assault on the title.
"This is not a game where you want to be playing on a hangover," he grinned.
The team was encouraged by their continued improvement and said they had arranged to train with the Whangarei Paintball club, at their club day on the first Saturday of the month to give themselves the competition they need to start a competition more strongly.
"We got invited to a competition, the NZPPL, that's coming up in the middle of the year by the guys who're organising it so we might be going to that - it all depends on finances, cos things are pretty tough at the moment and it's not a cheap sport," he said.
Defending champions from Tauranga, TPC Blast and Auckland's Gary Locks were third equal after deciding not to playoff for third and fourth.
Organiser Brent Matthews spent the day dashing around the Air-field as one of the four referees trying to spot paint splatters on combatants' clothing or gear and was nursing a few welts on his body from getting too close to the action.
"It hurts more when you're a marshall because you're not involved," he joked.
He said it was a successful day.