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Practice is a time to focus on
the individual components of your game, experimenting with different
hand positions or target lines, shooting the corner spares ten times
in a row, creating early roll or late roll, working on your speed
control. Your practice strategy should be to discover how the little
things affect your game. Some great suggestions and experiments
are mentioned in 'The P Word' article which appeared in this magazine
in October of 1998. In competition, however, these individual components
can be a welcome mat for Mildred.
Competitive strategies are very different than practice strategies.
When you are competing, sometimes you'll see the whole lane as well
as your target and break point. Other times your ball path through
the target area to the pins is all you see. It's as though nothing
else is visible to you. It is, of course, quite visible. It just
doesn't matter. There is no appreciable imprint of the surrounding
data on your brain. Your execution is a smooth, free-flowing approach
and delivery. You don't focus on how it happened; you focus on the
overall FEEL of the shot, not its parts - sort of like seeing the
whole tree, not each leaf that makes it up. That's the Zone and
if we were there all the time, we would take up a sport more challenging.
Its elusiveness is what makes it worth pursuing.
Unless you are Carolyn Dorin-Ballard or Norm Duke, who always know
if it is them or the lane, in competition assume you're throwing
the ball well. What???? What did she say? No, I am not nuts. Unless
you fell down on the way to the line or missed your target by an
arrow, you don't blame yourself. You don't make excuses about pulling
the ball or missing by a board. You move. And therein lies the secret
of lining up faster and staying lined up. If your move doesn't work,
move back. In one shot you have truly determined if it was you or
the lane. Let me repeat that. In one shot you have determined if
it was you or the lane.
Look at it this way. In a game, you get five shots on a lane. You
are in league where you don't move off the pair. The first game
is over and you did okay and there is a little difference as you
start the second game but it's been a while since you've thrown
so let's not move and make sure we really saw what we think we saw.
Your next shot on that lane (3rd frame) comes up a little high but
the result is good. On your next chance on that lane (5th frame)
the ball comes up high again and the result is not good. Did you
slow your speed down? Pull it? Send it too wide and it came back
too hard? Well, you're not sure so you don't move. Big Four and
welcome to the 7th frame. Okay, you got the message so you'll move
a board this time. (9th frame). Only the 6-7 stands. No problem,
you got it this time, except for this pesky detail of the game being
over.
Whoever finds it first, wins. If you are in the observation-not-judgment
mode, the lesson is much less painful that what I just described.
In the first frame your observation that 'there is a little difference'
in ball reaction, is a message to you. MOVE. Whether you think it
is you or not, MOVE. Instead of taking the whole game to figure
"Well, by golly it was the lane", you can know in one shot if it
was you or the lane. Today's game is perhaps not about waiting for
ball reaction but anticipating it and moving BEFORE the ball misbehaves
or surprises you.
THE STANDING PIN'S TRANSMITTER AND YOUR RECEIVER
Moving a board in today's game is seldom enough to stay ahead of
changes on the lane. It is my opinion that the study of pinfall
is extremely important. Sometimes the pins can give you as much,
if not more, information about lane behavior as your ball. There
are times when as soon as you let the ball go, you know it's probably
going to be a 10 pin. (There are also those wonderful times when
it surprises you and falls down. They just don't happen often enough!)
If you pay attention, you will notice how very often you know what
is going to be standing by how you let the ball go or how it reacted
on the lane. Deep down, we are seldom surprised by what is standing.
We may not be happy with it, but it is not the fault of the pin
that it is upright.
There are many things that influence pinfall. You should check every
rack very carefully. The pins need to be lined up properly to give
you the best opportunity to strike. The pin deck must be secure
and at the proper angle east and west and north and south. Its surface
must be properly maintained. It would be nice if the pins were not
too old or too new. The flat gutters must be from 3 3/8" to 3 5/8"
deep. The kickback plates should be lively and resilient; the lane
surface smooth and level. The ball needs to have the angle, speed,
and rotation the lane requires. Other than that, you can just slop
it up there any old way and strike…
The only part of all this that you can control is that you comply
with the angle, speed, and rotation requirements of the lane. The
other is not in your control but should be in your awareness. That's
why you must understand how pins fall and why they sometimes don't.
It would be great if the adjustments you make were more often for
carry than for hitting the pocket!
Keep in mind that textbook pinfall for a right-hander is that the
ball hits the headpin and the headpin deflects the ball into the
3. The 3 deflects the ball into the 5. The 5 deflects the ball into
the 9. The headpin hits the 2, the 2 hits the 4, and the 4 hits
the 7. After the ball hits the 3, it hits the 6. The 6 hits the
10. The 5 takes the 8. (When you look at it this way, you can understand
why deflection used to be considered the enemy and is a friend in
today's game.) Here's an exercise for learning to watch how the
pins fall and how they are influenced by the ball, the ball roll,
and each other.
› Get lined up to hit the pocket. Watch the ball roll
over your target and follow its path all the way down the lane and
THROUGH THE DECK. Where did the ball leave the deck? What was its
path through the pins? What pins did you see it hit? Don't worry
at this stage about where the pins went after the ball hit them.
We'll look at that soon enough. If you are right-handed, the ball
should leave the deck just to the left of the 9 pin after hitting
the 1, 3, and 5 pins. This is the 'textbook' path for a strike,
but there are many, many more ways to carry than having the ball
hit the 1, 3, 5, and 9 pins, as you know.
› Your second view is as follows: This is the only time
in your bowling life that you have permission not to watch the ball's
path down the lane. Watch the ball roll over your target (preferably
targeting in the area of the arrows) and then look at the headpin.
Watch what happens to it after the ball hits it. After doing this
enough times that you are really confident you see and understand
the movement of the headpin, miss it a hair on purpose. Be a little
light. Hit it a little heavy. Be flush. See all the different ways
the headpin moves.
Then change hand positions and do the same thing. Does it move in
a different way when your release axis is 90º than it does when
it is 45º or 20º? This exercise will really give you the information
you need to begin to manipulate carry.
› For the next few frames, repeat the above physical
executions while watching the 3 pin. This is the pin that will help
right-handers understand the 10 pin leave. Although it is true that
the 6 pin is the one that should hit the 10 pin, it usually happens
too fast for us to really comprehend. Watching the 3 pin you can
see what part of it the ball hit, where it went after the ball hit
it, how it impacted the 6 pin and therefore how the 6 pin hit or
missed the 10. If you really study this, you will begin to see a
difference in all 10 pin leaves. The weak or half 10 leave is a
different adjustment than that 'ringing' 10 shot. You will also
become adept at discerning not just how the 10 stands but how it
falls - enabling you to stay ahead of changes.
A weak or half 10 is a shot where the 6 pin moves to the side and
either doesn't rebound off the kickback with a) enough juice to
knock the 10 down or b) the proper angle to hit the 10. That 'b'
is sometimes the 6 that you clearly see go in front of the 10, hit
the kickback plate, and then go in back of it, never touching it
or worse yet, touching it but not hard enough to knock it down.
Weak 10's are caused by a ball hitting more of the 3 pin than it
should, commonly known as coming in behind the headpin. This causes
the 3 to go more straight back so that when it impacts the 6 pin,
it does so in such a way that it clips the left side of the 6 causing
the 6 pin to go more in front of the 10 than at a diagonal and into
the body of the 10.
There are different types of ringing 10's. When you thought the
wind should have knocked it over, that's a ringing 10. Whether the
6 went around the bottom of the 10 pin or the neck of the 10 pin
is an observation you should learn to make. The adjustment for each
can be different because different things cause them. A 6 pin that
flies around the neck of the 10 is a pin that is too high. Keeping
the pins low so that they have a better chance of knocking one another
down is a duh of a really good idea. The pin is 4¾ of an inch thick
at its belly and it's 15 inches tall. I would rather have a 15-inch
broom than an upright 4¾ of an inch chance.
A 6 which goes around the base of the 10 with great vigor can be
caused by numerous things. Some of them are a bad break, for instance.
Perhaps it was speed (too much), might have been entry angle, or
could have been rotation. If it's speed, slow it down. If it's angle,
move you or move your eyes or change your north-south laydown point.
If it's rotation, change your hand position. If it's a bad break,
it's not your first and won't be your last.
All 10 pins are a matter of deflection - too much or too little.
Sometimes deflection can be a matter of speed -too much or too little.
Are you beginning to see there are many things that can affect carry
and luck is not one of them? Pins don't have karma.
› Now watch the 2 pin. This is the pin that affects
that pesky 7 pin for left-handers. For right-handers, this pin is
much influenced by the headpin. Here's the conversation between
you and Mildred:
"How do you leave a 4 pin?" Mildred says.
"Well," you reply, "the 2 is supposed to hit it."
"Why didn't the 2 pin hit it?"
"The 2 went around the 4, hit the kickback and rebounded to hit
the 7 but not the 4." (If you leave the 4-7, you can see how this
answer would change.)
"What caused it to go there?"
"Well, the ball hit the headpin too straight on. That sent the headpin
more straight back than to the left causing it to impact the 2 pin
on the extreme right side sending the 2 pin in front of and then
around the 4 pin."
"What did you do that for? Don't do that again. Bear down. Try harder…"
This conversation brought to you by self-doubt.
In this exercise, please just observe. It is all about the learning.
When you watch the 2 pin, you'll learn how it is affected by the
angle the headpin hits it which is affected by the way the ball
hits the headpin which is affected by YOU.
› Finally, watch the 5 pin. Does it hit the 8? Does
it sometimes take out the 7, other times lay in front of it, and
still others not quite get to it? Does it go straight back and miss
the 8 to the right? What would have to happen for it to miss the
8 pin to the left or to go over the top of the 8? Does it occasionally
stand and then fall to the right as the headpin or the 2 pin rebound
from the side and hit it? Have you ever rolled the bucket? Which
way did the pins fall that caused to happen?
Can you see everything that happens to every pin is a result of
how the ball was rolling, how fast it was going, where it hit what
pin, where the ball went, where the pin it hit went, whether the
pin was upright or laying down or almost laying down or spinning
as a result of the ball's impact? And all of that is a result of
how you threw it, what your timing was on that shot, your hand position,
a high board, an oil spill, the temperature, and where the moon
was. My, it is all so inter-related, isn't it? No pin or ball has
an independent thought. Maybe there really is no such thing as a
tap…
READING RACKS
Speaking of racks (which I was several paragraphs ago)…We all know
to check and make sure the pins are not off left-to-right. If they
are, it is fairly easy to see. There are some people who believe
that you should shoot an open rack. An open rack is one in which
the 3 pin for right-handers or the 2 pin for left-handers is a little
farther from the headpin than normal. Since this pin and the headpin
are what the ball must get past in order to get to the kingpin (the
5), having them farther apart can be perceived as making this task
easier.
Remember that the 5 takes the 8 (the 9 for a left-hander). If you
shoot an open rack, the possibility is that you will impact the
5 differently. That will cause it to move differently around the
deck. Perhaps it misses that 8…Uh oh! I got robbed, a stone 8! Not
exactly. I can remember reading an Ernie Schlegel comment. He said
the reason Randy Pederson left the 8 pin on that infamous arena
shot was that Randy shot an open rack. I have no idea if Randy did
or did not shoot an open rack. I just know that if the rack is open,
it is easier to leave an 8 pin.
If your entry angle into the pocket must be flat or close to flat
because of the oiling pattern and where the lane wants to be played,
an open rack is a good thing. If the house carries light and you
can get there from outside, you will be able to play an open rack
with some success.
There is also a closed rack. In this rack the 3 (or the 2 for a
lefty) is closer to the headpin than normal. This would obviously
make it difficult to get to the 5. People nearly always rerack closed
racks for that reason. (Remember a closed rack for one-hander is
usually an open rack for the other-hander). Just for your information,
if a reset rack still is closed and you must shoot it, a high hit
has a chance to carry. It is rare that you would want to be half-pocket
as you are likely to leave a weak 10.
I don't know of a study that has been done concerning the carry
percentage of open racks vs. normal racks or closed racks vs. normal
racks or closed racks vs. open racks for that matter. Figuring out
the advantages and disadvantages and angles is tiring and probably
won't work out like you'd like anyway. It just seems simpler to
get the rack as right as possible and throw the best shot you can.
ABOUOUOUOUT FACE!
How do you play a rack which faces to the right or faces to the
left? Actually how do you tell if a rack is facing right or left?
This cannot be done from your lane. The way to practice seeing this
is to study full racks of pins that are three or four lanes away
from you, looking at the racks at an angle. You will quickly be
able to tell when one is different than what you normally see.
This is difficult to describe so hang with me. Think of a rack of
pins as all being attached to one another. A rack that is facing
to the right (better known as a conservative rack?) would have this
set of pins, as a unit, rotated slightly left from the fulcrum of
the headpin. A rack that is facing left is rotated to the right.
The table being turned usually causes a rack that is facing right.
(Without getting too technical, the table is the metal triangle
that forms the shape of the pin triangle.) This rack acts like a
closed rack. A rack that is facing left acts like an open rack.
Pins may be off ¼" and still be legal. This is not about legality,
however. This is about shooting a rack that is less than perfect
because that's what the bowling gods have given you.
This is obviously not all there is to learn about racks and pinfall
and their interaction. The more you watch, the more you will learn.
It is really quite interesting. You can also watch the pinfall of
other folks. Just be careful here, as different axis rotation and
tilt will cause the pins to behave differently on hits that look
quite similar. Knowing these things about how pins fall and what
causes them to do so is a great competitive strategy since it will
allow you to make better moves faster. |
