Dye Is Cast as Surf City Hosts Paintball Fights

The chatter of air pistols and the “thwap” of bursting paintballs echoed up and down Huntington Beach Pier on Saturday during the National Professional Paintball League’s next-to-last day of paint-stained competition. But to some spectators the clamor sounded more like class warfare than sport.

As Huntington Beach struggles to polish its image and market itself as an upscale vacation destination a la Malibu or Newport Beach, some residents and merchants wondered if it was in the city’s best interest to host games that they believed attracted a young and not-so-monied following.

“Look at these guys: They look like hippies with guns,” one spectator said as he gestured to a combatant in paint-stained dreadlocks.

Others were more diplomatic.

“The city’s hoping to attract affluent families and vacationers, and let me tell you, this ain’t it,” said Dave Shenkman, who owns a kite shop on the pier overlooking the paintball competition. “I’m pro event, but hey, I don’t see a lot of families here.”

City officials acknowledged that the redevelopment wave has made great strides in ridding the former oil town of its seedy bars and older downtown buildings in favor of a more tony melange of fresh-stuccoed structures with Spanish-tile roofs. Recently, the city celebrated the opening of the Hyatt Regency Resort & Spa, a luxury hotel across Pacific Coast Highway from the beach.

However, officials said redevelopment in no way clashed with the paintball competition.

“Having paintball contests is no different than us having surfers surfing and having an equestrian event down Goldenwest at the park on the same day. Or having soccer matches at the baseball diamond. In fact, this week we also had the groundbreaking for a large affordable-housing project,” said Richard Barnard, who oversees special projects for the city.

Organizers said the paintball event attracts more than 1,000 people to Huntington Beach’s Main Street and pier area during a typically slow period of the winter.

They defended the event as a wholesome extreme sport that appeals to such high-income and upstanding participants as doctors, lawyers and government workers.

“To be honest, our target market are 24-year-olds with an average income of $70,000,” said Chuck Hendsch, president of the National Professional Paintball League. “The equipment they use is expensive. Each guy out here today is probably wearing $3,000 worth of equipment. It’s kind of like golf that way.”

The league is now headquartered in Huntington Beach, and Hendsch said he would like Surf City to become synonymous with the sport of paintball.

Saturday’s competition was confined to a number of mesh-enclosed playing fields. Enormous inflatable cylinders were scattered about each competition field and stained with hot-pink paint.

Throngs of spectators leaned over the pier railing and along the competition fields to watch as uniformed combatants shouted, dashed and sprayed each other with hundreds of paintballs.

Spectator Sandy Coulter, 55, of Sacramento said she wished she could participate: “It’s good clean competition and I think it keeps folks out of trouble, big time.”

Of course there were those who refused to weigh in on either side and shrugged off the event as just another Saturday diversion in one of the world’s most famous beachfronts.

Stockbroker Sean Waters, 41, of Pacific Palisades had traveled to Huntington Beach so that his son Ryan, 14, could surf, and his daughter, Christine, 12, could watch the spirited volleyball games just south of the pier.

“This is the most famous beach in the world,” Waters said. “It’s the place where some little guy from Akron, Ohio, dreams of visiting after he’s seen pictures of the waves. To me, this paintball competition is sort of an accidental happening. When people think of Huntington Beach, they think of volleyball, surfing, beer and women. It’ll always be like that.”