Entries are displayed in reverse chronological order.
Medway Halloween had yet another fierce weekend to face. It was the weekend of Campaign Cup, the second event of the Millennium Series.
The team arrived early in Basildon to be ready for their first game against Samurai. Although it was 8 o'clock in the morning Bryan and I had filled the pots ready for the first game (a majority of this was done by Bryan) to let the team think about the game ahead of them not stupid things like paint. The team walked on the field with smiles on their faces and walked off the field with even bigger smiles, first victory of the day.
Next game was against the UK Redskins. Medway Halloween had adrenaline racing through their veins as they waited to play the redskins. They savaged the field with a 25 Second game. The team went on to play and win against JT Elite and Jesters. The team also played but lost to shoots factory. 4 Wins out of 5
It was sunday and the team had their usual smiles on their faces. They went on and played to beat Outrage UK. Today they focused that extra bit harder and beat Shoots Factory. Medway Halloween had yet another game with Stambeck (Last played in Malaga) and also beat them.
The day went on as usual and Medway were against Smokin' Aces. Smokin' Aces were at the advantage of being 3 players up with us only having Deano on the field. Deano wasn't about to let that get the better of him though and pulled himself together to put another win on the scoreboards. Medway Halloween also lost one game against Enigma.
This put Medway Halloween 4th place on sunday missing out on a podium spot by one Elimination Difference. This also puts the team first in the M5 Division rankings.
Dean also would like to thank the HPG Army for the sideline support and Bryan and myself for our Pit Crew help.
I would also like to thank Bryan for working especially hard in the pits all weekend and congratulate the team on earning 1st place in the M5s.
The team was as follows:
Deano (Captain)
Jack
Mikey
Andy
Terry
Big Al
Playing.. Saturday: Darren
Sunday : Gareth
The team went to the Ukraine for the second leg of the EPL. Our journey started on Wednesday at 4am to catch our flight to Krakow in Poland.
There we got picked up by a shuttle bus sent by the Centurio League. After 7 hours we reached the Polish-Ukrainian boarder. There we had a chance to see how the new "free economy" in the east works! You pay your "fee" and you get into the country...if not, well you would not believe how many parts can come of your vehicle WITHOUT tools.
Finally after 15 hours of travel we reached L'Viv. Only energy left to check in the hotel...grab something to eat and collapse in bed!
The next morning we ventured out to walk the fields and have a look around.
Having to spend out huge amounts of money to get food and drinks (bottle of beer 20p or a 2 litre bottle of coke for 40p) we settle for an early night to be ready in the morning.
Our first game was against team Joker and they took the first two points from us. Shocked and stunned the team pulled themselves together in the pit. Back on the field we won the next 4 points and ending the match in our favour.
After Joker it was time to play Mortifieurs from France. The game went to us in four quick points. Only moment of "OOOOOH Bleeeeeeep!" was when I shot an Mortifieur out on the dorito side and he put his hand on his had...walked off...put his hand down...re-entered the field and started to play again. I did brake my marker in the game and was not really able to shoot much paint and had to result to some close range shooting!
The snake side of the field really picked up when Andy and Andrew got used to the field and Andy coached Drew to many fast kills!
Our last prelim game went totally wrong for us and we had to take a 4-0 beating. Our own fault for not having walked the field as much and not being able to change our play to tackle the other team.
In the semi-finals we played Warsaw United. Having coached them all weekend and they having helped us out, both teams knew what the other did. It went to a 2-2 and over time. In the overtime we took three quick Gs and leave us 2 guns up. With a quick unexpected move into a key bunker Warsaw had the chance to lock the field. After receiving the call from our pit crew, I went to bunker the player who shot back after he had been shot out. I kept shooting him and we received a 1-4-1 for it. Leaving the field on a 2vs1 in our favour. Our guys cleared the field...pressed the buzzer and we were in the finals.
In the finals we met SK Moscow with the Russian Legion Coach. Mad respect to their game in the finals...we did not know what hit us and they took a well deserved 1st place!
The weekend was just amazing and so much fun!
We did miss our friends and brothers Tony, Jason and Brandon at the event.
I would like to say Thank you to my team:
Andy Walmsley
Andrew Battersby
Richard Battersby
Jonathan Edwards
and the two players who played their first big event ever:
Jason Cahill
Lewis Rae
Also thanks to our sponsor for their support!
The scene was set for the clash of Titans in the Marmara University Anadoluhisari Campus with 16 of Europe's top teams competing for the win.
The Factory Team fielding a line up out of UK and USA based players fought it's way through the preliminaries without losing a single game.
Facing the Supreme Athens in the quarter finals beating them 3-0 in points. In the semi finals it was time to play 2Easy from Poland and after a quick few first points 2Easy managed to score a point against the Factory Team who sealed the win with the final fourth point and made their way into the finals.
In the finals the French team TonTons was waiting to play the UK based team.
The French managed to beat the Factory Team in four quick points and took first place.
Happy with a second place in the first international pro event HPG Factory was awarded medals and trophies and took the prize money home to the UK!
This was Medway Halloween's first European event together, the team for Malaga consisting of Dean Apcar, Andy Freedman, Darren Apcar, Michael Measures, Bryan Leaver and Jack Darling. On the Sunday they had cheerleading support from Will Leighton. Gareth Buckley and Myself were at home in England warming up the podium stand as Medway took the 3rd place! Well done from everyone!
This new team has been formed over the off season from; Dean Apcar, Darren Apcar, Jack Darling, Gareth Buckley, Andy Freedman and Terry Williams from Stealers Am. Along with Joe Degiorgio and Will Leighton who are new to the sport and Bryan leaver and Michael Measures joining them from Maidenhead Trauma.
Under the watchful eyes of Oliver Huppertz as team owner, Dean Apcar as captain and Andy Freeman as coach the new team set to training at Bricket Wood paintball site. Learning everything again from running and gunning to super man slides it was paintball 101. No matter what the weather was like we were training, getting ready for our first millennium event.
With tournament Paintball now in the off-season, Freekz Paintball are running a 4-event mini-series between November and February. The Halloween Family decided to put teams into the second event in December to keep our hands in before the NSPL and Eastern European series in 2008.
Halloween fielded two teams, the pro squad HPG Factory, and the newly formed NSPL Division Four squad Chelmsford Halloween. This was a first tournament outing for the Chelmsford squad, and a good opportunity to see how the new guys played together as a team.
The Freekz tournament is an open event, so all levels of teams compete against each other. There was a guest appearance from Dye Paintball, who fielded a team including players from Nexus, one of the UKs leading paintball teams. This gave everyone a great opportunity to play against a truly fantastic team.
It was a disappointing day for HPG Factory, as key players Lewis Rae and Oliver Huppertz had endless problems with paint consistency, which led them to shoot spray for most games. The lack of cover from the back players meant Team Captain Flint just could not get into the snake and lock the field down. Despite the problems, HPG managed to win two of their eight games, despite some questionable playing ethics from some of their opponents. Special mention should go to Oli Huppertz for some awesome defensive play, holding off three attacking players on two sides before getting hit.
Chelmsford Halloween was a completely different story, the new guys exploded into the tournament, beating their own colleagues HPG Factory in the first game, and going on to win a further 2 games. Chelmsford won three games (flag hangs by Claire Huppertz, Mike Wheeler and Mike Gardner), but unsurprisingly the team lost games to the more experienced Dye VIP team, and Heaven VIP teams. Special credit should go to 15 year old Mike Gardner for succeeding in getting into the snake in every game, and to Adam Hart for managing to take out two Dye VIP players with the rest of Chelmsford in the dead box.
The whole tournament was a great day, and a good opportunity to get some more paintball in before we all succumbed to Turkey over Christmas, bring on the next one!
The BBC will follow the teams throughout the season 2008.
To read more please follow this link:
BBC NEWS ARTICLE
Our debut as a team was at the TPC in London beating London Tigers Pro in the finals and finishing 2nd on the day behind Shockwave!
The team went on to win the NSPL Div 1 and got promoted into the DYE ProTour.
On the International Circuit HPG Factory Team played the Semi-Pro League in Div1, which is now the SPL in the Millennium Series.
After a good start to the season with getting into the finals at the Dutch Masters the team had to suffer some major set backs by losing core players.
Trying to regain momentum for 2006 with out their usual core and unable to fill those spots with the right players the team decided to take 2007 to regroup and return to the circuit in strength for 2008.
Some of the Pro-Players took the season to support the Millennium Series as Pro Referees and Euro Refs in the Centurio League. Which is the Eastern European Paintball League.
The team would like to thank all the people in the background who make it possible for us to return to play top level paintball!
Lars Herzig, Ledz, Mr U and Oli Lang, Nicky T, all our sponsors, pit crews and especially all our friends in the Paintball World who have been supporting us for years!
Cheers to all of you!
We are holding our ground on the score board and are currently 10th, but we are all confident that for these last events we can pull something special out of the bag and get some points behind us to help push our way up the rankings.
He have been training hard, and thanks to some expert coaching from Andy Walmsley we have all improved our game over this season. With some key players coming back after jet setting holidays the team will hopefully be at full strength for these final events and can show the other teams what it is really like to have their arses handed to them on a plate.
Joe Degiorgio - 03/06/2008
Medway Halloween just missed the 3rd spot at Campain Cup 2008, walking away with 4th.Medway Halloween had yet another fierce weekend to face. It was the weekend of Campaign Cup, the second event of the Millennium Series.
The team arrived early in Basildon to be ready for their first game against Samurai. Although it was 8 o'clock in the morning Bryan and I had filled the pots ready for the first game (a majority of this was done by Bryan) to let the team think about the game ahead of them not stupid things like paint. The team walked on the field with smiles on their faces and walked off the field with even bigger smiles, first victory of the day.
Next game was against the UK Redskins. Medway Halloween had adrenaline racing through their veins as they waited to play the redskins. They savaged the field with a 25 Second game. The team went on to play and win against JT Elite and Jesters. The team also played but lost to shoots factory. 4 Wins out of 5
It was sunday and the team had their usual smiles on their faces. They went on and played to beat Outrage UK. Today they focused that extra bit harder and beat Shoots Factory. Medway Halloween had yet another game with Stambeck (Last played in Malaga) and also beat them.
The day went on as usual and Medway were against Smokin' Aces. Smokin' Aces were at the advantage of being 3 players up with us only having Deano on the field. Deano wasn't about to let that get the better of him though and pulled himself together to put another win on the scoreboards. Medway Halloween also lost one game against Enigma.
This put Medway Halloween 4th place on sunday missing out on a podium spot by one Elimination Difference. This also puts the team first in the M5 Division rankings.
Dean also would like to thank the HPG Army for the sideline support and Bryan and myself for our Pit Crew help.
I would also like to thank Bryan for working especially hard in the pits all weekend and congratulate the team on earning 1st place in the M5s.
The team was as follows:
Deano (Captain)
Jack
Mikey
Andy
Terry
Big Al
Playing.. Saturday: Darren
Sunday : Gareth
Oliver Huppertz - 12/05/2008
HPG Factory Team have kept it consistent and came home from the second EPL event with more silverware.The team went to the Ukraine for the second leg of the EPL. Our journey started on Wednesday at 4am to catch our flight to Krakow in Poland.
There we got picked up by a shuttle bus sent by the Centurio League. After 7 hours we reached the Polish-Ukrainian boarder. There we had a chance to see how the new "free economy" in the east works! You pay your "fee" and you get into the country...if not, well you would not believe how many parts can come of your vehicle WITHOUT tools.
Finally after 15 hours of travel we reached L'Viv. Only energy left to check in the hotel...grab something to eat and collapse in bed!
The next morning we ventured out to walk the fields and have a look around.
Having to spend out huge amounts of money to get food and drinks (bottle of beer 20p or a 2 litre bottle of coke for 40p) we settle for an early night to be ready in the morning.
Our first game was against team Joker and they took the first two points from us. Shocked and stunned the team pulled themselves together in the pit. Back on the field we won the next 4 points and ending the match in our favour.
After Joker it was time to play Mortifieurs from France. The game went to us in four quick points. Only moment of "OOOOOH Bleeeeeeep!" was when I shot an Mortifieur out on the dorito side and he put his hand on his had...walked off...put his hand down...re-entered the field and started to play again. I did brake my marker in the game and was not really able to shoot much paint and had to result to some close range shooting!
The snake side of the field really picked up when Andy and Andrew got used to the field and Andy coached Drew to many fast kills!
Our last prelim game went totally wrong for us and we had to take a 4-0 beating. Our own fault for not having walked the field as much and not being able to change our play to tackle the other team.
In the semi-finals we played Warsaw United. Having coached them all weekend and they having helped us out, both teams knew what the other did. It went to a 2-2 and over time. In the overtime we took three quick Gs and leave us 2 guns up. With a quick unexpected move into a key bunker Warsaw had the chance to lock the field. After receiving the call from our pit crew, I went to bunker the player who shot back after he had been shot out. I kept shooting him and we received a 1-4-1 for it. Leaving the field on a 2vs1 in our favour. Our guys cleared the field...pressed the buzzer and we were in the finals.
In the finals we met SK Moscow with the Russian Legion Coach. Mad respect to their game in the finals...we did not know what hit us and they took a well deserved 1st place!
The weekend was just amazing and so much fun!
We did miss our friends and brothers Tony, Jason and Brandon at the event.
I would like to say Thank you to my team:
Andy Walmsley
Andrew Battersby
Richard Battersby
Jonathan Edwards
and the two players who played their first big event ever:
Jason Cahill
Lewis Rae
Also thanks to our sponsor for their support!
Oliver Huppertz - 16/04/2008
HPG Factory Team, the pro side of the Halloween Paintball Team, ventured to the Bosporus for the first outing of the year in the EUROPEAN PROFESSIONAL LEAGUE. (www.centurio-eepl.com)The scene was set for the clash of Titans in the Marmara University Anadoluhisari Campus with 16 of Europe's top teams competing for the win.
The Factory Team fielding a line up out of UK and USA based players fought it's way through the preliminaries without losing a single game.
Facing the Supreme Athens in the quarter finals beating them 3-0 in points. In the semi finals it was time to play 2Easy from Poland and after a quick few first points 2Easy managed to score a point against the Factory Team who sealed the win with the final fourth point and made their way into the finals.
In the finals the French team TonTons was waiting to play the UK based team.
The French managed to beat the Factory Team in four quick points and took first place.
Happy with a second place in the first international pro event HPG Factory was awarded medals and trophies and took the prize money home to the UK!
Joe Degiorgio - 07/04/2008
It was an anxious wait sitting in England with only the internet updates to watch. We could only see what was happening around 10 minutes later from www.pblivescores.com, which made it even more nail biting. Medway Halloween were in Malaga playing M5 Milleniums. I had the occasional update from Dean Apcar (Captain of Medway Halloween) telling me how they were doing but that wasn't as often as I would have liked! Day one must have been hardest for the guys after flying over from England on the Friday. They did exceptionally well Winning three games, drawing in one game and losing just one game! It just got better. They were through to Sunday's games which made the nail biting longer, everyone was very proud of them at this point. They won all their games in the Semi-Finals being top of their group with 15 points (5 game wins). As the day continued I'm sure the team were tired, they lost two games, one against Dodo Flingueurs and one against Dogs D Amour, in the Finals. All looked up to be bright towards of the end of the day.This was Medway Halloween's first European event together, the team for Malaga consisting of Dean Apcar, Andy Freedman, Darren Apcar, Michael Measures, Bryan Leaver and Jack Darling. On the Sunday they had cheerleading support from Will Leighton. Gareth Buckley and Myself were at home in England warming up the podium stand as Medway took the 3rd place! Well done from everyone!
Bryan Leaver - 19/03/2008
Medway Halloween is one of the latest teams to be taken under the wing of Oliver Huppertz. Medway has chosen to represent the HPG family at the millennium events in 2008 playing the M5 division. Medway is a new team formed for the 2008 season with a roster full of young, hearty players mixed in with a couple of experienced players to help keep the peace.This new team has been formed over the off season from; Dean Apcar, Darren Apcar, Jack Darling, Gareth Buckley, Andy Freedman and Terry Williams from Stealers Am. Along with Joe Degiorgio and Will Leighton who are new to the sport and Bryan leaver and Michael Measures joining them from Maidenhead Trauma.
Under the watchful eyes of Oliver Huppertz as team owner, Dean Apcar as captain and Andy Freeman as coach the new team set to training at Bricket Wood paintball site. Learning everything again from running and gunning to super man slides it was paintball 101. No matter what the weather was like we were training, getting ready for our first millennium event.
Mike Wheeler - 11/01/2008
Freekz 5-Man Round 2 Tournament ReportWith tournament Paintball now in the off-season, Freekz Paintball are running a 4-event mini-series between November and February. The Halloween Family decided to put teams into the second event in December to keep our hands in before the NSPL and Eastern European series in 2008.
Halloween fielded two teams, the pro squad HPG Factory, and the newly formed NSPL Division Four squad Chelmsford Halloween. This was a first tournament outing for the Chelmsford squad, and a good opportunity to see how the new guys played together as a team.
The Freekz tournament is an open event, so all levels of teams compete against each other. There was a guest appearance from Dye Paintball, who fielded a team including players from Nexus, one of the UKs leading paintball teams. This gave everyone a great opportunity to play against a truly fantastic team.
It was a disappointing day for HPG Factory, as key players Lewis Rae and Oliver Huppertz had endless problems with paint consistency, which led them to shoot spray for most games. The lack of cover from the back players meant Team Captain Flint just could not get into the snake and lock the field down. Despite the problems, HPG managed to win two of their eight games, despite some questionable playing ethics from some of their opponents. Special mention should go to Oli Huppertz for some awesome defensive play, holding off three attacking players on two sides before getting hit.
Chelmsford Halloween was a completely different story, the new guys exploded into the tournament, beating their own colleagues HPG Factory in the first game, and going on to win a further 2 games. Chelmsford won three games (flag hangs by Claire Huppertz, Mike Wheeler and Mike Gardner), but unsurprisingly the team lost games to the more experienced Dye VIP team, and Heaven VIP teams. Special credit should go to 15 year old Mike Gardner for succeeding in getting into the snake in every game, and to Adam Hart for managing to take out two Dye VIP players with the rest of Chelmsford in the dead box.
The whole tournament was a great day, and a good opportunity to get some more paintball in before we all succumbed to Turkey over Christmas, bring on the next one!
Oliver Huppertz - 12/12/2007
HPG and Halloween have been featured on the BBC Essex website.The BBC will follow the teams throughout the season 2008.
To read more please follow this link:
BBC NEWS ARTICLE
Oliver Huppertz - 20/11/2007
HPG Factory Team was formed in 2005 out of Pro and Div 1 players!Our debut as a team was at the TPC in London beating London Tigers Pro in the finals and finishing 2nd on the day behind Shockwave!
The team went on to win the NSPL Div 1 and got promoted into the DYE ProTour.
On the International Circuit HPG Factory Team played the Semi-Pro League in Div1, which is now the SPL in the Millennium Series.
After a good start to the season with getting into the finals at the Dutch Masters the team had to suffer some major set backs by losing core players.
Trying to regain momentum for 2006 with out their usual core and unable to fill those spots with the right players the team decided to take 2007 to regroup and return to the circuit in strength for 2008.
Some of the Pro-Players took the season to support the Millennium Series as Pro Referees and Euro Refs in the Centurio League. Which is the Eastern European Paintball League.
The team would like to thank all the people in the background who make it possible for us to return to play top level paintball!
Lars Herzig, Ledz, Mr U and Oli Lang, Nicky T, all our sponsors, pit crews and especially all our friends in the Paintball World who have been supporting us for years!
Cheers to all of you!
Oliver Huppertz - 20/11/2007
BBC Essex will do an interview with me about the team!Andrew - 13/09/2007
There are just 2 events to go in this season that we will be making an apperance at - one this weekend (16th September) in reading and one at D7s in Dartford (28th October).We are holding our ground on the score board and are currently 10th, but we are all confident that for these last events we can pull something special out of the bag and get some points behind us to help push our way up the rankings.
He have been training hard, and thanks to some expert coaching from Andy Walmsley we have all improved our game over this season. With some key players coming back after jet setting holidays the team will hopefully be at full strength for these final events and can show the other teams what it is really like to have their arses handed to them on a plate.
