IF YOU CAN’T HIT WHERE YOU’RE LOOKING, LOOK AT WHAT YOU’RE HITTING
Keeping in mind that we all like to do what is comfortable. Comfort is whatever you are used to doing. It is not necessarily right (or wrong), it’s just comfortable. When you are working on changing something it may feel uncomfortable. We really need to think in terms of differences. It is different, not wrong. It will feel differently before it feels better. If it didn’t feel any differently, nothing is changing and no improvement will be made.
There is a part of your game that is your most common error. Everyone has one (maybe more) of these. This is usually something that was ‘comfortable’, you changed it, and under pressure you revert to it.
It could be that when you are tired, you slow down. Another could be that when you have to play deep, you tend to sail the ball to the outside. A third might be that you are inclined to have a tight armswing when you need to convert the bucket. (What you would hope is that you don’t leave the bucket when playing deep and you’re tired!) Once these areas have been identified, experiment and try different things until you find a fix. It could be drinking more water when you are tired (which is one of the most invigorating things you can do), working on different body alignments until you discover what allows you to play deep but prevents you from throwing the ball out into the weeds, and shooting the bucket from every dot and every arrow until it is a no-brainer for you.
For us mortals, repair kits are available during our lessons with our coach, not in the heat of the battle with the lane condition and pins. Let’s say you are pulling the ball frequently, for instance. So what? If you have a place you store the fix for that error, go get it out of that mental file drawer and happily proceed to ‘no pull’ heaven. If you don’t have the key to that drawer or you suspect it’s empty, you don’t have time to analyze and dissect why it’s happening. Move to where you’re pulling it! If you can’t hit what you’re looking at, look at what you’re hitting!
This means that I think you should move so that your body alignment is with the area of the lane with which you are struggling. That should, first of all, get you more comfortable. Then one of three things will happen:
The move will fix whatever was off in your physical game and you can move back;
You can just stay there if the move worked;
You can keep moving if you keep pulling it.
Whatever. The point is that you not continue to stand there and pull it thinking, “On this next shot, I am going to throw it better.
I urge you to go to a Tour event anytime you can. Get there early enough for the practice session (you miss a lot of interesting information if you don’t watch this part). You will see that for the first shot of the day, the athletes put their hand in the ball and just start walking to the line. They throw the ball at a reduced speed and watch it down the lane. They don’t get set and don’t aim; they just roll the ball and observe.
Well, now let’s think through this. These people make their living bowling. If they do not knock pins down, they don’t get to eat. They, probably better than anyone, understand the ‘whoever finds it first, wins’ axiom. Therefore, it seems to me that what works for them in that regard is perhaps something us mortals might try.
Therefore, I urge you to make this part of your warm-up routine. After you have checked approaches and the fit of all your equipment, put your hand in the ball and just start walking toward the line, just like the pros. Just let the ball go. You don’t pause or get set or throw full speed. You don’t know whether you took 16 steps or 6. The ball knows when to get into the swing. Put your hand in the ball, walk toward the foul line, let the ball go, and watch it all the way down the lane. This is your routine for practice or competition.
When you do this, you will notice that your timing is its most exquisite. For some people this is very difficult. They are so programmed that they cannot be free enough to just start walking and let go of the ball. If you are one of these people, I urge you to work on loosening up the formality of your stance and approach. It can really free up a swing which affects carry which affects scoring.
Sometimes we get so caught up in all the myriad adjustments we have tried, we allow the lane condition to take our game away from us. If this has ever happened to you and you are feeling desperate and lost, this warm-up routine is an excellent quick fix. If you feel your timing or your stroke is gone, just go. That’s right.
Just go. Pick the ball up off the ball return (that’s ‘lift’ in the modern game), look left and right to be sure you have the right-of-way, and just start walking to the foul line as if it were your first shot of the day.
Some people think that when you do this you are bowling like you don’t care because you aren’t getting set and doing your pre-shot routine, etc. When those folks start paying your entry fees and carrying your bags, you can be concerned about what they think. In the meantime you are doing whatever is necessary to get your feel back.
Another method for restoring lost timing is to shoot your favorite spare shot, the one you seldom miss. When you leave this spare, you don’t get that sinking feeling in your stomach. You are quite confident you will make it. You have this confidence because there is no fear. It can be a 2 pin or 3 pin or even the corner spares. Its degree of difficulty for you is infinitesimal. You throw on automatic pilot. The FEEL of this shot can sometimes jar your muscle memory. “Oh yeah, following through, that’s the difference” or “Speed! That’s it. I’m being tentative.”
When your flow goes away in competition, try one of these methods. Don’t get set and think too long or stare fiercely at your target determined to really nail it this time - just go. Doing this will usually help you get the feel back. Your bowling angels and your body know how to bowl. Get out of their way!
Maybe today is the day it feels like you are pushing every shot outside. Actually, that was in the first two games. Now it feels like you couldn’t get the ball to the outside unless you faced six lanes away. Whose ball is in your bag anyhow?
Stuff happens. Again, you usually can’t fix things in the heat of the battle. You’ll just have to go with what you brought today. It is no different than bringing your bag into the center and opening it only to discover you’ve brought the wrong bag. As soon as the panic subsides (are we equipment-dependent or what?) you just move around until you find a place where the equipment you brought will work. In fact, sometimes you discover you didn’t bring the wrong bag at all. What you had been bringing was the wrong idea.
What we usually do in this situation is stand there and determinedly keep throwing where we WERE effective, thinking the magic will be back in just a second. We are sure the shot WAS there which means it IS there. Maybe not. Maybe you are throwing the same shot that you were throwing and maybe you are not. The reality it that what you are doing isn’t working.
The greatest lesson here is about staying in the moment. We usually think that past behavior of the ball predicts future behavior. Not so. Don’t judge. Observe. This moment says that in order to get the ball to the outside you need to face six lanes away. Okay, so do it. Facing six lanes away cannot possible be any more embarrassing than the last few shots you’ve attempted.
Anyway, the point is that you fix what you can fix during competition and when you or your stuff can’t be repaired right then, you go with the flow and try something different. You’ll always learn something, even if it is to mark your bags more carefully. Learning what not to do is just as important as learning what to do.