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Loading...Last month, I provided a glimpse at what I did and thought prior to and during the team event of the ABC National Tournament. With the exception of a couple frames, I made good choices and good adjustments and shot a score well above what I believed possible for me, given how little I had been bowling.
As you might imagine, I was pumped up since I was out of the box with a 700-plus series in a tournament where the scores were not all that high. Since the doubles and singles were the next day, and characteristically lanes do not break down as much on those squads, I had dreams of a top 10 finish in all events.
What follows this month is a description of the thought processes that went into my final six games. Does my path lead to glory, or will it be a tale of unrealized potential? This is what we all face going into the second day of a tournament after bowling well the first day. How do I keep it going?
Mindset
My doubles partner is Fred Borden—The Coach. Although most bowlers today recognize Fred as just a coach, in his more competitive earlier years, he was quite a bowler himself, doubling often with now-senior PBA player Allie Clarke with much success, and as a singles bowler, the holder of a 300 game shot in an ABC tournament a few years ago. He can play, and he wants to win.
I was really looking forward to going down there to bowl with Fred. I was still on a high from the day before. I didn’t believe that I could shoot two more 715s. If it happened, that would be great. If I scored better, that would be great too. The odds were, though, that I would shoot less than in the team event, and if that happened, I would be dissatisfied, but what I wasn’t going to be dissatisfied with was my effort.
I was going to go down there and give it my best shot, go through the process. The night before, I was using a medium rotation shot, something in the 40 to 45 degree range with a medium wrist. If it takes more rotation, I have the ability to do that. If it takes less, that’s what I will use. I think it is important that I don’t go out on the lanes today with any preconceived ideas based on yesterday. Of course, I will start out where I found the shot the day before, but I can’t allow myself to live in the past so that I make moves too slow. It may be the same tournament and it may be the same condition, but these will be different lanes, and the condition may set up and break down differently. I can’t be hardheaded.
Competition
Even though I knew where I would start, I had no idea how the lanes would be today. As I mentioned above, lane conditions develop differently even though we are in the same center and the same type of lane machine is running the same pattern. I really don’t know what to expect, but I did make one change. I didn’t bring my spare ball out this time. Instead, I added the AMForce 1 to my arsenal. This is a ball that has less track flare and I have it shined. Along with it, I have my Pulse, which is dull, with not very much track flare. I kept the Speed Zone since I bowled good with it, and rounded it out with a Boss Titanium. Three of the four balls are lower flaring for control, with only the Speed Zone in the high-flaring, boomer category. My goal was to keep the ball in play, to hit the pocket consistently.
Of my four core balls, I have one ball that rolls early with hook (Speed Zone), a couple balls that go longer that are controllable (Boss and Pulse), and one for drier lanes (AMForce 1). The Speed Zone is the biggest hooking ball, then the Boss is just a little tamer than that. The Pulse lets me back off a little more. If the lanes started to break, I knew I could go to the AMForce. I felt confident that I had equipment that would let me do whatever I needed to do to score.
When you bowl with Fred Borden, you always start off by talking. Whether he is teaching or bowling, he believes that you have to have a plan. It’s always a pleasure to bowl with Fred because he can help anybody out at any time. With my equipment choices and The Coach with me, I was certainly looking forward to going down there and shooting some scores.
If you bowl the ABC Tournament, you know that you only get one practice ball on each lane before you start. That is fairly new for doubles and singles since in prior years, you didn’t get any. You had to start cold.
We threw our first ball. I watched the others throw their practice ball, and I noticed that the lanes were hooking more than I expected. I decided to stand on 28, which was a board left of where I finished the night before. I threw my ball down there and it curved a lot. I wasn’t really warmed up, but it looked like the lanes were starting out much drier, at least in that section of the lane. With only one practice ball, it can get pretty confusing. The only thing that saves us is that it is confusing for everyone.
With my two shots completed, now it’s decision time. I decided to just go with what worked. I started out with my Speed Zone from the night before, moved in about a board from my practice ball, and really got up to speed on the next ball. The first ball I threw down there, I left a weak 10. The next frame, I unconsciously let up a little on the speed (trying to get more finish), and I leave a 4 pin. When I come back over to the lane where I left the 10 pin, I hit the pocket again, this time I leave a 4/10. It was a little bit high, but it could have tripped the 4. So far, I’ve hit the pocket three times, and I have nothing to show for it.
I was still in a positive frame of mind. Things weren’t going so badly. I was hitting the pocket, so I just had to make the right moves. I go back to the right lane and now I make a little bit of a bad shot—leave a 4/6. I really didn’t throw it as bad as the result. Later, I’ll tell you about it, because when I switched balls at the start of the next game, I had some room to get away with some things.
I struggled through the first game. I hit the pocket the rest of the way, caught one double, and shot 190. I still stayed with my line, maybe because I was hitting the pocket. The next game, I was playing about the same spot, throwing my Speed Zone down there, but it was a little sensitive, and in fact, in the very first frame, I didn’t throw it that bad again, and got the same result as the first game: a 4/6. I went over to the next lane and got another pocket shot that didn’t carry.
By this time, I was fairly frustrated. I looked up at the board. I shoot 190 and I’ve hit the pocket every time. I can’t carry. All around me are people who are carrying everything. That made me realize that if I had been a little sharper, I would have known it was time to change balls earlier. I let myself get stuck in that mode. I shot 190 and thought it was me.
Kent Wagner was bowling to my left, and I said, “Kent, I gotta change balls.” I went up and threw my Speed Zone again. I think I got a strike, then a spare, and finally I said to him, “Which one do you think I oughta go to? I’m thinking about going to this AMForce 1 and see if that ball will go down the lane and react on the oil line a little bit or react to the skid and maybe hold the pocket.” He says, “I think you oughta go with the Boss.” That was the decision I was trying to make. I knew I had to do something, but what?
So Kent Wagner helped me out a little bit. Sometimes you get lost as you try to make a decision and sometimes the decision you finally make is not perfect. For me, the Boss I ended up using had a snugger feel to it than the Speed Zone. I told Kent that I had better take a piece of tape out because I’d probably hang up on the first ball and leave a solid 10. I took the piece of tape out, walked up, and hung up in it anyway. That’s the problem with ball changes sometimes—there’s a little bit different feel which causes you to throw it differently.
I had to work this ball out a little on the bevel. It was pretty close, and I got lucky on the ball I hung up in, and it struck. With a little work, it would be okay. In fact, it was so okay that I made some good shots, got some area to play, and caught a couple breaks and struck out for 255. I was feeling great all of a sudden—715, 190, 255. I was beginning to see possibilities of shooting a 2000 in all events.
I should never get excited. Always bowl one frame at a time. The next game I tried to play the same angle. The ball went high a few times, so I made my natural move to the left, and then it hooked more. It hooked through the nose. I moved again and it hooked through the nose. Now, when I throw it really good, I’m starting to leave 4s and 10s, and if I don’t throw it really good, I’m in the nose.
My first reaction felt pretty good because I was throwing the ball pretty good. I kept moving left. I thought the lanes must be breaking down diagonally, so move left, move left. I struggled that whole game. I shot 179 for 634.
Singles
I had 1349 going into the final set. On the upside, a 651 would give me 2000, but on the downside, I was coming off a 179 game where I was really lost. Now we had to move pairs.
I had been watching Kent and the others on this pair, and from that and what they told me, this pair should play a little tighter. I moved to the right and threw a strike. Have you ever done your homework and then made a correct educated guess? You feel like a bowling god. Frame two: ball hooks a little hard, and I leave a 4. Two shots. Two balls in the pocket. I’m feeling pretty good.
Then, all of a sudden, the same thing happened to me again that happened in game three earlier. I never really got the matchup correct. Again, I shoot 170, and I stayed around the pocket every shot. I just never got anything going. Through the nose, through the nose, high. I’m moving around and nothing is working, and I’m beginning to confuse myself. I move to the left, then to the right. My rotation looks like it’s matching up pretty good, however I’m not striking.
With back-to-back 170s, 2000 is looking bleak. It would now take 481 for the last two. I think, “Well, you had a good outside shot. You know these lanes can play from the outside. Move out to the right.”
The first four frames of the next game were tough. I leave a split through the nose—the ball hooked a lot—hooked again in the second, hooked again in the third, and then in the fourth, I leave the pro washout—the 1/2/4/6/10. I’ve got 54 in the fourth. Some of it was me and some of it the lane. Fred Borden mentioned, “Boy, I think you’re getting that ball back into your swing too early, and you get up there ahead of it. Your shoulders close and you’re trying to go straight down the lane and it won’t work. As soon as you open up, it goes too long.” That’s exactly what happened in the fourth frame. I left that washout with the 6 pin. I’ve just shot 170, punched three through the nose, and then washed out. I’m totally confused—again.
Some sound advice
I decided to take the tip from Coach Borden. I delay the ball into my swing, and I switched back to my Speed Zone because that’s the ball that worked so well outside the night before. It worked, and I get the next five in a row. Now I feel pretty solid from outside. In the tenth frame, it hooked through the nose. That was probably the only ball out of the last six that I really threw good off my hand. The other ones I threw straight, but it was hooking so much from the outside that it was carrying every time. I ended up with 228. That gave me 398 for the first two, and with a 250, I could still get out with a 2000 set. I had struck five out of the last six, so it was possible.
I tried the same strategy the first couple frames of the last game. It didn’t work. That is what is so frustrating about trying to read lanes. You throw five strikes, then you throw one bad shot. Which do you believe, the string or the one error? We believe the string, of course, but this time, the bad shot in the tenth was my sign that the lanes had changed—or at least that my shot wouldn’t play there unless I could really flatten it out.
Through the early part of game, the ball kept going through the nose. I stayed there too long and finally decided it was probably time to move back in. I shoot 228, and just these few frames later, again, I’m pretty confused. I decided to change back to my Columbia ball and move back in. I throw a strike. Then I went to the right lane, and the ball went right through the nose for a 4/6 again. No panic here. I just gotta adjust to it.
Just like before, I never really got anything going. A strike, then through the nose, then back and forth until the tenth when I nailed three in a row. The total: 182 for a 580.
Another view
I spent the whole day shopping for a shot, while down at the other end, Chris Barnes, John Gaines, Bob Goike, Brad Kaslewski, and Pat Healey were lighting them up playing the same line that I had used when I shot my 255.
They were setting records: Gaines 814, Goike 770-something, Barnes, Healey, and Kaslewski all shot big. They ended up with a five-man score of 3740 in the singles. John Gaines took the lead for singles, and Gaines and his partner Barnes took the lead in doubles.
What seemed to give them their advantage was that they were using more speed than I had used. Their ball held the line, while mine ducked on the end and kept hitting the nose. I hadn’t really tried that, so while they were setting their records, I was shooting 634 and 580 for the day.
Looking back on it—looking back at myself—the adjustments I made were over-adjustments. I overthought. I had not been bowling in a lot of these tournaments, and when you are not seeing what’s going on, that can happen to you. I think the name of this article should be, “You’re not alone.” We all go through this. It’s a matter of knowing your ball arsenal, but also having enough experience on enough lanes to recognize what is going on as the lanes make their transitions.
I can tell you that the ABC Tournament and that lane condition really made a lot of sense out of these bowling balls. The different balls with the different surfaces and different pin positions had distinctly different reactions. It was not a typical house condition where you throw a lot of the balls that you’ve drilled different and they all react the same.
For me, I was satisfied overall. I had shot 1929 all events, which was respectable, and I managed to do it even though I had not been bowling much. I also learned a lot about my game, where it was strong and where it needed work. It was a positive experience.
Conclusions
Hopefully, this two-part article will help you learn more about some of the things that you can do to bowl better in tournaments. As you can see, I bowled very well the first day. Like so many others, this may have hurt me, since although I promised myself that I would not stick with a shot too long, I ended up doing just that. I failed to change balls and change lines early enough, failed to try different rotation patterns the second day when mine was obviously not working, and I even failed to go to my strength—more speed.
If there is a lesson here that should be valuable, it is that close doesn’t count. I stayed with my ball choices and lines too long because I was “close.” I was around the pocket, so I stayed with a line that was not scoring. Remember that on today’s conditions, a one-to-one lateral move or a two-to-one lateral move may not be what you need to make—even when it appears that you are living in the pocket. If your initial moves aren’t working and a different ball is doing anything for you, you should assume that you are playing the wrong part of the lane. Make a big move, toward the area that the higher-scoring bowlers are playing. Frames go by too quick in a tournament, so the longer you tread water, the sooner you shut yourself out.
