After more than 90 years, the Women’s Championships moves out of the traditional
bowling center and into an arena setting similar to the Open Championships.
With El Paso,Texas, serving as the host city in 2010, the world’s largest participatory
sporting event for women will be staged at the El Paso Covention and
Performing Arts Center.
This will be the first trip to El Paso for the Women’s Championships, and the
“Sun City” area has a lot to offer those planning to spend a few extra days in town.
Besides the local attractions and shopping, just across the border ic Ciudad Juarez,
Mexico, El Paso’s sister city.
But the main reason to head to El Paso is the Women’s Championships.
The annual event, which started in 1916, will again have bowlers of all ages
and skills competing in team, doubles and singles.
Bowling today is far more advanced then days of the past. The technology and equipment have well surpassed the days of old. New core designs, new cover stocks, new oils, not to mention lane surfaces. So why do so many people still think the sciences of years ago apply to today’s bowling environment? I still hear this everyday when I encounter bowlers from all across the country. I tell them all the same thing: Static weights don’t adversely affect ball reaction!!!
I know I can hear it now: side weight makes my ball hook more in the back end. Thumb weight makes my ball roll earlier. Finger weight makes my bowling ball go further down the lane. Don’t get me wrong, back in the days of Rubber and Plastic bowling balls, this was the norm. But let’s realize that today we have far more technology then we did then. I am not saying they were wrong with their statements; they just didn’t have the technical knowledge we have today.
Let’s first start out by defining what I mean by static weight. When the person drilling the ball positions it for drilling and they shift the weight block to one quadrant of the bowling ball this causes an imbalance to the ball. These imbalances make the ball wobble, therefore creating a different ball reaction. If they shift the core to the side of the gripping holes it creates side weight. Shifting the core towards the fingers creates finger weight, and so on. The ruling bodies created parameters for this. You aren’t allowed to have more then one ounce of finger, side, or thumb weight. You are not allowed to have more then three ounces of top, or bottom weight. This rule applies still today.
Now let’s get back to the tip of the week. Ball motion. If you are looking for your ball to go longer, you should pick a weaker core design or a weaker cover stock bowling ball. If you want a more aggressive bowling ball for oil, then you should pick a stronger core design and stronger cover stock bowling ball. First you have to understand your bowling center and your bowling style. Everyone will see the lanes differently based on their bowling style. Some bowlers will think the lanes are oily while others might think they are dry. That’s O.K. Bowlers are all different. You need to pick the right ball for your bowling style.
Placing locator pins further from your P.A.P. or positive axis point, will make your ball go further down the lane. Pins closer to your P.A.P. will start to hook sooner. Pins positioned in between these will create stronger overall ball motion.
While drilling techniques still play an important role in ball motion; core, cover stock and pin placement can be just as important given today’s technology. You need to first figure out what kind of lane condition you are bowling on, and then talk to your local pro shop to find the correct ball for your needs.
Next week I will go over the other question I get asked all the time: Why do you have so many bowling balls in your bag? Until then, have fun, and let’s shoot some big scores!!!
In case you hadn’t heard, four of the five standard Limber Liquidators PBA Tour oil
patterns were lengthened by one foot each for the 2008-2009 season.
The new pattern lengths are:
Chameleon, 40 feet; Cheetah, 36 feet: Scorpion, 42 feet; And Viper, 38 feet. The
44-foot Shark pattern was not changed.
EATING A HEAVY meal or foods loaded with fat before or during bowling will
slow down your digestive sustem and put extra stress on your body. Drinking
high sugar or caffeinated beverages before or during bowling will give you
an immediate burst of energy, but then you will have a letdown when that
has worked through your system. It would be better, especially in a longer
format tournament, to plan and not have to use that quick fix strategy.
So what should you do? First identify what times and the duration you will
be competing. Second, plan how you will eat beforehand and try not to eat
during competition.
Carbohydrates, which get stored in the muscles as glycogen, are later used
for energy. Pasta and other foods with complex carbohydrates are valuable
before competition. These are just some ideas of foods that will give you
energy throughout the event.
An often overlooked and very important component in everyone’s game is eye dominance. Your dominant eye can affect what you see and how you see it. You must know your dominant eye and understand its impact and why it is important. It will help you communicate about targeting and visualization techniques as well as understand that when your coach says “Hit 10″, you translate that into “Okay, that means look at 8.”
If you don’t know your dominant eye, here’s how to determine it. You are about to perform some magic by making the pins move without ever touching them. They are going to move behind one of your hands!
Hold your arms out in front of you with the palm of the hands facing away from you. Touch the index fingers together and overlap the thumbs so that a triangle is created between the two parts of the hands that are touching. Keep the hands at arms’ length and, with both eyes open, put something 10 or 12 feet or even farther away from you in that triangle. Don’t cheat and look at whatever you have chosen with one eye or the other. Do it with both eyes open.
Close the left eye and then open it. Then close the right eye and open it. When one of your eyes was closed, whatever you were looking at disappeared from the triangle. That is your dominant eye. Some people think that if what they are looking at doesn’t move, that is the dominant eye. Not. Think of it this way: if you close the eye that is dominant, its dominance will be negated. That’s why it’s dominant! (As an interesting aside, a right eye dominant right-hander will perceive the object as having disappeared behind the left hand and a left eye dominant right-hander will perceive the pins as having disappeared behind the right hand!)
Most right-handers are right eye dominant. The necessity of the triangulation of the target, the eye, and the shoulder (the ball) can cause a miss of the target of about two boards left. It is not uncommon and is not an error. For some people it has no effect. The important thing is that you know whether it affects your accuracy or not. If it does, merely change your targeting. If you want to hit 10, you merely look at 8.
Some right-handers are left eye dominant. This is also not a problem as long as it is known. Left eye dominance in a right-hander usually causes a miss left of three or four boards (sometimes more). No big deal. Want to hit 10? Look at 6. The variance in the miss is caused by how far the eye is from the target. What a left eye dominant right-hander sees with is pretty far from the bowling shoulder!
Eye dominance is common to most of the population. Regardless of which eye is dominant, it is possible you will be able to look directly at what you want to hit. However, if you are missing left, this simple, non-threatening explanation can be a lifesaver. It is possible but rare that your eye dominance doesn’t cause you to miss to the inside but rather to the outside. Don’t worry about it. If this happens to you, just look left of what you intend to hit.
NOW THAT YOU’VE DONE ALL THAT, YOU SHOULD KNOW IT’S NOT ALWAYS TRUE
Keep in mind that it is not only possible but also likely that you may miss what you are looking at in different amounts in different parts of the lane. For instance, you may need to look two to the right when playing 10 or out, look at what you want to hit when playing 11 to 16, and go back to looking to the right to play inside of 17. This is not a problem unless you don’t know it.
It’s up to you and your coach to discover what your tendencies are. You can use tape or ‘clickers’ to mark the lane for this exercise. Some people put coins on the lane. I personally don’t advise this as sometimes when you hit the coins, they put a dent in the lane. Not a good thing for your relationship with the proprietor and laneman.
Clickers are the tabs purchased in the office supply store that affix to files. They will attach to the lanes well (if you remove the oil in that one little spot), cause no damage, come in different colors, and make a clicking sound if hit by the ball. Place one each on the 6th and 9th boards for instance. If you look between them and hit the one on the 9th board, you likely will need to look to the right of what you intend to hit when playing this area of the lane.
Continue to move the clickers across the lane until you have defined your tendencies in all the areas of the lane. This will be invaluable in helping you hit what you intend to hit regardless of where you need to look to do so.
Accuracy plays a critical role in our sport and how to properly choose a target is important. This is also important to the mental game. Let’s say you’re just cruising along, pounding the pocket and getting rewarded, and someone asks you what you are playing. You tell them you are playing 8. They look at you incredulously and shake their head while their eyes roll back in their head. The entire league that is watching your performance from the concourse begins to snicker when your ‘friend’ tells them what you have said. They can all plainly see you’re hitting 12.
“I am too hitting 8. Just watch this,” you think as you squint, bear down, purse your lips, clench your teeth, and really, really try hard to hit 8 all of which will have no affect except to make your facial muscles tired. Understanding eye dominance can go a long way toward teaching you to forgive yourself and understanding where to look in order to hit what you intend to hit. A better answer for your friend’s question is “I don’t have a clue. I just roll the ball and it seems to work.” Or you could ask a clarifying question, “Do you mean what is my target or where do I intend the ball to go?”
This exercise will help you learn how to line up, how to deal with the reality of the lane vs. the perception of the lane, and point out the importance of a precise stance to eliminate misalignment as a cause for inaccuracy. This should help you make sure that if, by some miracle, you miss, it won’t be because you didn’t line up right!
