Date posted: 4-5-01

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Stress relief, military style

By Gary Schaefer

DeKalb News Service

MILLINGTON -- While crawling through the long grass you snag your camouflaged leg on a stick. Your mouth is dry and your heavy breathing under the protective face-mask produces moisture around your mouth. You pull loose from the snag and sneak up behind your enemy 100 yards away and take aim.

You close one eye and put him in your sights. You squeeze the trigger and smack! Your opponent now has a giant red paint spot on his shirt.

This heart racing experience is found on a paintball field. Tom Glavin is the owner of Fox Paintball in Aurora and has a steady supply of heart racing game-play. To find this natural high you can travel to Glavin's paintball field in Millington on Fox River Road, 22 miles southwest of Aurora. Fox Paintball's office is located at 1891 Farnsworth Ave., Aurora.

Being a college student can drain the pocketbook. Fox Paintball sponsors the NIU Paintball Club and gives the club a discount that includes free admission and a discount on paintballs. Tim Robertson, 20, is the president of the NIU Paintball Club and has been a member since he first came to school. Robertson said that everywhere the paintball club plays, it is given some sort of discount.

Fox Paintball also offers dozens of packages and deals. So whether you are in the club or are wet behind the ears, you can still get some shots off at a low rate. If you are a first time player with nobody to go with you, there are open games on the weekends. The all day pass costs $15 and a gun rental will run between $5 and $10 more. Paintballs range in price. You can get the average 300 rounds for $20. So look to spend $50 for a day of shoot-em-up.

You pick up the gear at the field in Millington and you meet up with about a dozen other players and get assigned to a team. Then you kick back and pop off a few rounds.

In Millington there are 14 different fields to play on with bunkers made from commercial drainage pipes and tubing, plenty of room to be a sneaky sniper.

"Theirs is the best because they have this hill that is 100 feet high and one team is at the top and the other is at the bottom and it completely changes the face of the game," Robertson said. "I don't know of any other paintball field having this."

If you had wanted to plan a large group outing you can organize a private paintball party for any occasion or group. Private packages vary in prices according to which day and how many people are playing, but the average package for a dozen of your co-workers or friends is $250.

Glavin and his paintball friends opened Fox Paintball in February 1990, as he said, out of necessity.

"I started playing on the field I own today," said Glavin. "The guy who ran the one we played at went out of business, so me and my buddies decided to keep it going. We were addicted to playing so we needed to keep it open."

Glavin said the business was simple and fun in the beginning, but with an average of a 1,000 participants a year the business is starting to become more work than play. Yet Glavin's office balances filing cabinets and paper work with paintball guns and safety masks.

Fox Paintball has a great safety record with its clients.

"Statistics in the past show that paint ball is safer than fishing and bowling per 1,000 participants," Glavin said. "The reason it is safer is that we have equipment to protect any possible injuries."

Glavin said most paintball injuries come from unsupervised games where kids are involved.
And what about the dangers of eye injuries?

"Out of an average of 10,000 participants per year we have about five injuries and they're mostly twisted ankles," said Glavin. "As for eye injuries, we have had only one in 11 years. We require, monitor and enforce all our safety rules."

Fox Paintball is the catalyst to your survival instincts. Once a week you can leave behind your school work, bills and other responsibilities and lie in a bunker and take out enemy intruders. The 14 fields of combat to play on allow you to have a new paintball experience each time you head out.

"You can be Rambo if you want to," Glavin said. He added that this past year was the first year paintball participants outnumbered snowboarding participants. Paintball gives you a sense of satisfaction few nightlife activities can give you.

"Fox Paintball is one of the best in Illinois because the people you play with are so friendly," Robertson said. "And there are so many different ways to play. It beats just playing in the woods."

Paintball leaves you telling stories about it days later.

"Each time you eliminate someone there is a huge sense of accomplishment from it," Glavin said. "And even if you lose the war it feels good to win your individual battles."

Critics and fans of paintball argue that playing paintball games provide a negative influence on kids while others say it provides education. Over the past month there have been two school shootings to add to the rash of shootings over the past five years. Fox Paintball allows children to play at the age of 10. Any kid between ages 10 and 17 must either be accompanied by a parent or have a signed waiver by a parent to play and they are supervised by an adult at all times.

"I think kids need to be educated about everything, including guns," Glavin said. "Paintball teaches a respect for guns and it is up the parents to teach their kids that paintball is a sport. Everyone has played cowboys and Indians and cops and robbers when they were younger and now they play paintball. It's just a game."

See www.foxpaintball.com for prices, packages and general information. Office hours are from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday and 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday. For field reservations or information requests call (630) 585-5651.

The NIU Paintball Club is working on forming a tournament team to travel and enter competitions. Students who would like to become a member of the NIU Paintball Club should contact Tim Robertson via email at niupaintball@hotmail.com. You just fill out a membership and go to one field outing a year. The best part is that it's free.

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Source list:
· (Tim Robertson, NIU Paintball Club President)
· (Tim Glavin, Owner of fox paintball,www.foxpaintball.com)