2015 Paintball Goals....It's a great new year for paintball!!

Hey all.  I'm back with another post!  I know my first post didn't get any views yet, but this is a new blog, and I don't really expect any hits from this thing just yet.  Heck, if this thing actually receives any outside attention from the public, I would be extremely happy.  The purpose of this blog is really just for me to share my thoughts and experiences about the sport.  It's not something that I get to play very often due to budget constraints, and discussing it really helps me to vent some of the excitement so that I'm not driving my wife crazy all of the time.  

Anyway, my topic for today's post is my personal goals for playing this upcoming season.  When I started playing a year ago, I had expected to play much more, or to at least get some more use out of the equipment that I purchased.  This year, things will be more organized, and I will rely much less on others to coordinate time to play, and to provide the space needed to play on.  With that in mind, here is a list of items/goals that I will be looking into to get the most enjoyment out of this hobby in 2015.

1. Find a nearby commercial field to play on

One of the biggest obstacle that I faced last year was that we lost access to the property that we played on, and nobody in our regular group was able to find an alternate place to play.  We all got busy, and life happened.  Paintball fell by the wayside.  Even when we were playing, there were really only two people who could get permission to use the space, and not everyone could play by their schedules.  It was no fault of their own, but it made things less accessible for those of us who wanted to play more regularly.  To make things worse, there are no commercial fields in the immediate area to play on in the part of Iowa that I live in.  

However, there is a park in Madison, Wisconsin that I have been checking out online called Apocalypse Paintball.  Madison is only an hour and a half drive from our home, and I have family in that area to boot (family makes for a good excuse to convince my wife to travel).  Since I'm new to the sport I have never experienced a commercial field, and I don't really know what to expect.  My plan is to wait until the regular season begins, and to organize a weekend trip with some of my friends to go and play.  Pricing is fair at that field, so budgeting shouldn't be to much of an issue either.  I'll drop a link here for anyone who wants to check out more information about this park, but the information that I have gleaned so far seems promising.  

2.  Get into shape

I've gotten pretty soft in the middle over the past year, and I'm not in the ideal condition to be running around a paintball field for an entire day.  In fact, I really don't have an excuse for being as unfit as I have become at this point.  So, one of my goals is to lose at least 15 pounds by March or I won't be able to go to the field at all.  I'll talk about this more in future posts, but I'll take any excuse I can get to put myself back into fighting shape.  If anything, my gear will fit better.

3.  Continue building my kit

I've slowly been building a fairly respectable beginner's paintball gear collection that should keep me up to pace with other players on the field.  As such I will be devoting many future posts to my pursuit of new and better equipment to round out my arsenal.  I will post my opinions on popular equipment along the way, but I will always take the approach of a beginner out of my respect for those veteran players who have been doing this for much longer than I have.  The purpose of this blog is to chronicle of my journey as a newcomer to this sport, and not to step on the toes of more experienced players.

As such, I always welcome the opinions of those of you who might have some insight into the subjects that I am discussing. Just remember to share your thoughts in a manner that is respectful and family friendly, and I will return that courtesy.

4. Become more active in the PB community

I haven't had too much experience in the forums of popular paintball enthusiast websites yet, but I plan to explore this more in the future.  There is a wealth of knowledge available to new players like me that I would love to share with anyone willing  to read this page.  My plan is to post links to articles and videos that I find interesting on this blog.  Not only will it help me to generate content regularly, but it will also help me to expand my knowledge of the sport that I can share.

That pretty much wraps up what I had planned to share for today's post.  I tend to get long winded with these posts, and the more I limit myself the better.  Next time I will share my thoughts on what gear I think is essentially vital to the newbie paintballer like me who is looking to build his/her first gear kit.  I've done a lot of research on paintball gear over the last year, and I feel like my purchases have put me in line with the style of play that best suits my desires.  

Anyway, here's to the next post!!

~Krimmit