Paintball helped elsewhere?

[Tinybear]

I played paintball from my teens into my 30s (been away now a few years but hope to get out at least once this year).

Fast forward to today and I now shoot alot of positional rimfire precision rifle competitions (ORPS similar to NRL22 in states). I manage to score maybe slightly better than average. Mostly I just really enjoy it. But I find the stages I score higher than average are the ones many struggle with. Like shooting from your weak side and standing unsupported or even some of the more awkward barricades. And I got to thinking I wonder if some of that’s just 20+years doing it with paintball guns. Which begs the question what else have we learned from paintball that we put to use else where in our lives?

[nak81783]

Similar to your example, shotgun clays. I shoot just as well or better than most local competitors (but certainly not the ones that move on to advanced competitions). I do so starting from a “ready” position (I always thought it was called double-ready hand; some tell me it’s European style), not with the gun already shouldered and pointing down range, which just seems like cheating to me.

I don’t use the bead. I just pull up, aim down the side of the barrel, and shoot. Sometimes I’ll try a round left-handed, just doing OK, about 3-5 clays less than right-handed. I’ve also shot kneeling and sitting if they allow it. It’s just more fun to mix it up.

[Jordan]

I had a broken plastic vacuum barb on a truck a few weeks ago... it had broken flush with the intake tube so I didn't have anything to really work with, and the space I had to work with on the was pretty small, so I couldn't go oversize to use any of the brass barbs we had on hand.

I grabbed a section of 3/16" brake line, threaded one end for 10-32 (perfect size for it) and drilled/tapped the intake tube, then red loctited my "barb" in place. Worked perfect. 🙂

[Olsson]

Live fire training exercises in the Swedish Armed Forces has always been a whole lot more liberal with what's allowed. For example, for a lot of other nations' armed forces you aren't allowed to move from your position once you have loaded your weapon. As for the Swedish Armed Forces,not only do we run during our live fire exercises, but routinely assault into the very firing lanes of our supporting units, fully expecting them to cease fire at the right moment.

However, although we were allowed to run, assault, etc during live fire exercises, we were expected to stop before firing our weapon, since it was not allowed to fire while actually moving.

This changed around 2010, I believe it was, and we were all trained in how to fire on the run as well. This was the first time I saw any obvious advantage of having played paintball, since I was already quite familiar - comfortable even - with firing on the run. I was noticeably faster at every single exercise than all of my collegues.

On a side note - while I am able to fire left handedly with paintball guns, I do not feel comfortable doing it. With the army assault rifle though - it feels completely natural. I would have guessed it would be the other way around.

[nerdcore]

I learned the importance of proper knee care.

[Surealpaintballer]

Similar to your example, shotgun clays. I shoot just as well or better than most local competitors (but certainly not the ones that move on to advanced competitions). I do so starting from a “ready” position (I always thought it was called double-ready hand; some tell me it’s European style), not with the gun already shouldered and pointing down range, which just seems like cheating to me.

I don’t use the bead. I just pull up, aim down the side of the barrel, and shoot. Sometimes I’ll try a round left-handed, just doing OK, about 3-5 clays less than right-handed. I’ve also shot kneeling and sitting if they allow it. It’s just more fun to mix it up.

Yes! I work with a long time friend - and we meet playing paintball. Played together damn near 20 years. Our employer took the company out shooting clays as some sort of team building thing. We had the same experience you had. We excelled. My buddy called it, said our experience with paintball...being able to quickly turn and look down a barrel on target will help but I wasn't so sure till we got out there.

[Ecapnation]

Years of tinkering with paintball projects from the mid 90's to 2008 ended up pushing me to go back to school for engineering and abandon my graphic designing degree.

Here we are now lead engineer for a company that has nothing to do with paintball for 10 years

[Jonnydread]

I learned that therapy doesn't always come in the form of sitting on a couch and talking to some dingus about your feelings.

[Psycho91]

Having learned to shoot a PB marker with both hands I can now use tools with both hands and use my left hand for a lot of things when I can't use my right where most would struggle cause they are only right hand dominate, my reflexes and spotting things out the side of my eye are spot on and no one can sneak up on me 😂

I was also into PB 3 years before I got my first truck and working on PB guns thought me a lot before working on cars

And here later in life getting back into is keeping me away from hard drugs and drinking myself to death, still got some work to do on the drinking but I'll get there, most of my extra money goes to PB now

[flyweightnate]

At my last job, there was an automated pneumatic drill spindle for a repetitive process. It started malfunctioning and I dug in, 3 months into the job when nobody knew I could do anything but CAD. They looked at me pretty funny when I said "but I might have some compatible solenoid valves at home".

Parts came in, and within an hour the timing, feed rate, and limits were set. Easier than timing any autococker.

[Number six]

I was at an undisclosed location when a guide roller on our refueling truck hose fell off. We were setting up to fuel 2 vehicles, and were just unhooking the first. I picked up the retaining pin for the roller, and drove to the second. I was waiting to power it on, and thought that if I had a Spyder mainspring, I could cut it to length and have a spring loaded retaining pin. Like a ton of bricks, I remembered the fuel control units of the vehicles have a similar spring under the engine filter. I logged one out of the parts bin and fixed the truck.

[Grendel]

....how to handle asshats and not it affect my whole day. Beneficial skill at work or in public in general.