Starving College Student Paintball Players (CONTEST) WINNER ANNOUNCED!!!!

[bsolomon]

Any more posts?

Only a few days left...

[mithin]

[cphilip]

The Judges are now deliberating... Votes are coming in... Stay tuned...Entries are closed from this point I believe.

[AutoMaggot]

Up! Just because!

[bsolomon]

AND THE WINNER IS:!!!!!

Before announcing the winner I would like to thank all of the people who took time to enter my contest and to wish you all good luck with you college careers. I would also like to thank the moderators who acted as assistant judges for taking the time and effort to help me out with a tough decsion. Although the voting was close, I decided to take the advice of my judges who unanimously selected one essay as their winner.

For one person to be so in love with the sport of paintball is admirable, and yet to be responsible enough to know when paintball is interfering with his goals and aspirations takes tremendous character. Finally, my winner hopes to keep this tradition of AO charity alive in the future!

Without further ado, I announce my winner as:


T.J. Albrecht
Currently enrolled at the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, MN
Computer Science degree will be completed in May 2004
Mathematics Degree will be completed in Dec 2004

First off, I would like to say that what you are doing deserves a lot of credit. I have both given and accepted donations in the past, but for someone to be able to do that in the sport of paintball is probably unrivaled, until now. That said...

The summer of 2000 was one of the best times of my life. Not only did I meet my fiance, but I played paintball. I started out with a Spyder but that summer I was able to afford an Impulse. I put together a team and we had two Impulses and one Super Nova. Our first tournament went amazing.

The organization of a paintball tournament is great. We had only played recball before. We ended up taking 2nd place and even beat a novice team in :28 one round! But then I had to leave paintball. I ran into money trouble with it, and also started college after that summer.

I vowed that I would play paintball again someday, and I recently purchased a mag. After owning it for 2 months I fell in love with it and played only once. Again, I needed the money for college and sold the mag, just like I sold my Impulse 2 years before.

The school I go to isn't cheap, but don't let that make you think I'm rich. My family is made up of my mother, father, and 4 younger brothers. My dad works his butt off installing signs year round and my family makes a total of less than 45k a year. When my college tuition is 20k a year the math just isn't there.

I turned to the government and received a lot of help, and I even got a scholarship of 7k/year from a 3.6 GPA and 28 ACT score. That all really helped, but I was still a little short.

Since I'm first generation college-bound, it was important for my family to put me through college, so they helped pay for everything they could, but their secret would kill me in the end. Last year I found out that they had driven up over 20k in credit card debt by paying for their expenses with cards and mine with their hard earned money.

I am now working 20+ hours a week and still going to college. My fiance helps me out when she can, but that is a huge burden on her. My parents have worked their debt down to under 15k and I'm practically on my own for money. I can usually scrounge up the money to play when I can, but I haven't had a marker in a while.

I traded my computer away for a stock cocker and I realized that being a computer major I need a computer more. I cannot get past that initial investment of purchasing a gun, without putting myself into money trouble. So the cocker is no longer mine.

I would give this gun a good home, take care of it, and hopefully be able to repay you or keep the chain going someday. Thank you for your time!

T.J. Albrecht

[ShooterJM]

Congrats TJ! And once again, huge admiration for ya bsoloman! If you come to the next colorado AO day, your beers are on me!

[cphilip]

HOOORA FOR TJ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sticky and changing title!!!

[raehl]

Lots of ways.

Mainly based off of having college clubs.

For starters, college kids tend to pay less to play in the first place. College clubs are easy, repeat business for fields, and as such tend to get discounts over regular pricing. They don't call your field sasking for durections, they fix their own equipment, can referee themselves, pick up their own garbage, and essentially provide free advertising on campus.

Clubs generally give you access to free money from the school. Some places it's just per-mile travel reimbursement, others it can be multiple thousands of dollars in entry fees, paint, or even cash to start an on-campus field.

College tournaments are much less expensive than pretty much any other tournaments out there - never more than $20/player registration and air, and paint as low as $35/case or BYOP. (West Point's tournament two weekends ago was $10/player BYOP. Nationals is $20/player + $35/cases. Even indoor events are only $20/player + $70/case.)

The NCPA also has some nifty discounts on various products for NCPA club players.

Some clubs even have their own fields and/or wholesale accounts.

There are even some college teams out there with a full ride - which is pretty impressive when you consider there are probably less than 50 teams on the planet who have everything paid for.


Going to college can be a very good thing as far as paintball is concerned - I think it cut my playing costs in half over what it cost me to play pre-college.


- Chris

[shartley]

[bsolomon]

Good info Chris!

If you haven't done so already, I would suggest making a separate posting of the info you just supplied. I am sure many of the potential college student players are not aware that it may be so cost-effective to play with their local college clubs as opposed to playing occasional rec-ball games.

[synreal]

Originally posted by shartley

tucked safely away in my closet, in the bottom of the case that contains the world's smallest violin that plays just for you

in other news, congrats

[shartley]

Originally posted by synreal
tucked safely away in my closet, in the bottom of the case that contains the world's smallest violin that plays just for you

Oh, don't let it get worn out... you will have kids too some day.

[Shawn at suny oswego]

congrats!!!

[Bubonic Plauge]

Congrats TJ! Have fun....

One case of paint = one kill (at least for me anyway) =)

[tobz]

Thank you.

I personally thanked bsolomon via email, but I would like to take the time to say a few things.

First off, thanks to the judges. It sounds like they put a lot of time and effort into this, and they should not go unnoticed.

I would also like to thank my old teammate who got me interested in mags in the first place. Without him I would have never even made it to this forum.

Not too mention all of the fellow AO'ers. Thanks! I have to say this is one forum that I can generally rely on for almost any answer. I could come in here and ask about literally anything, and I'll get a great combination of honest opinions, hype free facts, and quick responses at that!

Lastly, TOM, AGD is a great company. I hope that situations like this show that the followers of your company and product, reflect on the business that's being run. You have some loyal followers, and you can add one more to that list

A few more words before I go. I am so far successfully completing college. When I become financially stable, which will most likely be after I graduate, this tradition WILL be kept alive. It is an honor for me to accept this, but in all honesty, the greatest honor goes to bsolomon for donating this peice of equipment. I can only hope that someday soon I will be able to keep this tradition going. I just have one question for all of you out there.

Should this gun be kept exactly as she is? Or should we all slowly upgrade it on down the line? Maybe in 10 years we could be passing an X-Mag down, who knows? I would just like the input of fellow AO'ers out there. Thanks again to everyone, especially bsolomon. You will not be let down!

T.J. Albrecht

p.s. For you college students out there, I am very lucky to receive this, but education should be kept slightly higher than paintball on the priority list, get decent grades, have fun while you're at school, take part in clubs, etc. College is only 4 short years, enjoy them while you can, and paintball can stay with you the rest of your life!