A slight change to the planned fun tournament at epic.NINE, meant that Boxing was off the cards and Volleyball was in! With 8 competitors donning their best beachwear they took it in turns to battle it out on the sand (as well as shaking some moves!) to make it into the quarter finals!

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The Overclockers UK team have dropped off the goodies at for epic.NINE with even more stuff for you guys here at the event. So the full prize lineup for the Counter-Strike Source Tournament is:

1st Place

£750

5x NZXT Switch 810 Cases (on display in Hall 2)
5x CS:GO T-Shirts
5x Borderlands 2 PC Game

2nd Place

£250

5x Dirt Showdown Game
5x 16GB USB Pen

3rd Place

5x Nexuiz Game

The opening Ceremony at epic.NINE was a bit of a giggle, We had our very own JoeShow reading an excerpt from a very popular novel which when read in his three voices (Sexy, Duke Nukem and DJ) was hilarious.

Next up we had a group of would-be conductors attempting to conduct the Wii orchestra playing the Zelda Theme. With a chance to win a pint from Winbar and a discount off of epic.TEN, competition was tough and in the end with a score of 76 the winner was ddanblack! So well done to him and all the competitors for providing some entertainment at the opening to epic.NINE.

With a countdown from 10 the lights were soon out and it was go go go on what is set to be a great LAN weekend.

It's a little warm here in Staffordshire as we get ready for epic.NINE. As it's pretty much impossible to air condition a LAN party, the best we can do is try to force plenty of air through the room.

To help that, as we're under-capacity for the event, we're going to allow you to bring small, low-powered desk fans once again. However, we need to limit this to one per table, so you'll need to share with the people next to you.

Obviously we'll monitor the power situation and always reserve the right to say no if they draw too much power.

The temperature levels will also mean that we'll need to keep the main doors open at key times, if you're sitting near to the doors, please be patient with us as while your temperature may be OK, the centres of the rooms may not be!

When we started discussing this event with the caterers, we were hoping it would be all summery, so we were looking for something appropriate on the catering menu!

Despite the rain, we're going to do it anyway, so on Friday night, as a change from the usual burgers, you'll also have the opportunity to grab some chicken fajitas, with the usually trimmings (obviously the burgers will still be there if you want!).

To help the catering guys out, you'll need to pre-order with them any time from Thursday up until Friday afternoon and it will be on a first-come-first-served basis.

Please help us to speed up the check-in process and keep the queues down by doing the following:

• Ensure any voucher codes have been allocated to the correct participant
• Select your seat 
• Print your barcode booking pass (yes it's fine to bring it on a phone/tablet device etc.)
• If you are in the CSS or COD4 tournaments, ensure that your team has signed up in full to the tournament system by 8pm Thursday.

If you are planning on spectating the event, paying for a participant place on the door (if there are spaces remaining) or you have visitors coming to see you, please create a spectator booking on the system in advance, it's still fine to pay on the door, but will save time on the day.

Remember, the doors open at 4pm, if you arrive any earlier we'll have to ask you to wait outside or in the Railway Bar sleeping area.

On another note, please make sure you update your games before you attend to help us save bandwidth at the event.

See you in a few days! And don't forget to go through our handy checklist while you're packing to make sure you don't forget anything!

A very familiar face in the hardware market has joined the epic.NINE sponsorship lineup. Staffordshire-based Overclockers UK have just confirmed that they will be sponsoring the epic.NINE Counter-Strike Source Tournament!

So in addition to the cash prizes for the tournament, the winning team will take home 5x NZXT Switch 810 Gun Metal Cases, worth a total of £800 added to their winnings! They'll also have a few "LAN bags" to give away throughout the weekend for various other activities.

In addition, epic.NINE participants can get free shipping from Overclockers UK for 2 weeks beginning 19/7/12, simply use the code 'epic9' at the checkout!

Thanks to the Overclockers UK team!

It's taken a little while longer for the teams to emerge, but the team signups for the epic.NINE Counter-Strike: Source Tournament (sponsored by Overclockers UK) have now hit the 2nd prize trigger, guaranteeing a £1000 prize for the event.

With over 250 people now confirmed for epic.NINE, it's looking to be a great event for the competitive and casual communities.

Make sure you grab your seat now!

Great news! The fifth prize trigger for the epic.NINE Tt eSports Call of Duty 4 tournament has been reached giving the next guaranteed prize of a whopping £2000!

With 22 paid or part-paid teams for COD4 and still a few more interested, and confirmed QuadV coverage it looks like we'll be hosting one of the biggest UK COD4 tournaments of 2012 at epic.NINE!

What are you waiting for? Go and, get your ticket now!

Fresh from our own trip to the Silverstone mudbath, we just need to make you aware of a possible change to camping arrangements, nothing serious...don't worry!

The racecourse has been hit by quite a lot of rain recently, and thankfully we've had a few nice days in Staffordshire to dry things out, but certainly last week, the centre-course area that we use for camping was extremely wet.

We continue to monitor the situation with the venue and will make our final assessment on Thursday morning, but it may be necessary to move the camping location if the centre-course is still waterlogged. If that is the case, the camping area will move to the grass bank behind the Railway Bar (indoor sleeping hall, far end of the main car park).

We also need to remind you all not to drive across to the centre course area, please park on the main car park and carry your camping gear across the track to the camping area.