Las Vegas, Nevada - Mark Tays, a Pressroom Manager for the Webco Printing Company in Omaha, Nebraska, took top honors in a Web Press Skills Contest that took place earlier this month at the Web Offset Association's Annual Meeting here. Sponsored by MAN Roland and GATF, the competition was conducted on a pair of Web Offset Training Simulators provided by Sinapse Graphic International. Surviving a series of round-robin face-offs. Tays came out on top of a field of 15 entrants, which included CEOs, COOs, supervisors, presidents and vice presidents from some of the nation's leading web printing companies. The tournament put the contestants' trouble-shooting skills to the test. Assisted by a simulator operator who manned the controls, each competitor was faced with a computer-screen image of a press sheet that had considerable flaws. They each had 30 minutes to make the job ready to run by adjusting dozens of factors including web tension, ink/water balance and register. Meanwhile, the projected cost of the simulated makeready was tracked in dollar amounts. The contestant who solved all the problems in the least amount of time for the least amount of money was declared the winner in each head-to-head face-off. The championship match took place in the general assembly hall of the WOA conference, so all meeting attendees could observe the battle. The contestants' press sheets were projected on two giant projector screens, providing a real time reflection of the action. In the final round of the competition, Tays faced off against Jeff McCullar, Production Manager at WebPlus, Inc. in Villa Rica, Georgia. Warmed to the task after the intense preliminary round, Tays had his simulated press ready to roll in just under 14 minutes at the makeready cost of $210, edging out McCullar in a superb display of pressmanship.