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8
Guns of Navarone: There’s
something to be said about being first. Navarone was that
trend-setting team that was the
first ever to secure a paintball company
sponsorship (in 1987, Line SI Bushmaster markers and JT Racing, later
changed to JT Paintball). Navarone’s
roster featured captain Andy Greenwell, Bob Schryver, Paul Grimmy, Mike
Gibbons, Bill Homa, Lucas Foster and
about 20 other Riverside, California
area early paintball players. Navarone
was broken up into two large squads:
Apocalypse (second squad), Armageddon (top squad). Navarone began playing tournament paintball as
a team in 1986 and won nearly every
event they entered until 1988. In 1987
they won the Air Pistol Open National Championships and the Pittsburgh
June 2014
February 2014
Skirmish Pursuit Tournament, as well
as the other three events they entered
that year (there were only a handful
of yearly paintball tournaments in the
mid-1980s). So when you consider that
they were almost unbeatable in their
day, putting Navarone on this list is a
no-brainer.
Other Navarone notes of interest:
Navarone’s motto was, “We will take on
anyone, anywhere, anytime with 12gram.” And clearly in the pump-gun,
12-gram C02 days they were the best.
“Constant air” C02 and the eventual
industry-wide conversion to semiautomatic markers led many of Navarone’s
players to leave the game, weakening their roster and quickly rendering
the team non-competitive by the early
1990s.