Some Pre-Tournament Practice

As I mentioned in my last post, my wife and I are going to be in an eight team 100% handicap tournament on March 31st. She had bowled one game since August and thought it might be a good idea to go out and shake the rust off before this weekend. My goal for the outing was to gain some confidence and pick up some momentum. I didn't have anything specific I wanted to work on or try out, I just wanted to throw a few good games.

When we got to the alley our 9 month old daughter decided to scream like a maniac every time my wife went up to bowl, so concentration was a bit difficult. On top of that, the approach was very tacky at the foul line, so I was doing my best not to fall on my face. The first game was a warm up, basically practice for practice. It took a few frames, but I found a good line and was pretty comfortable heading into the second game. I began to have problems kicking out the 10-pin again, which I realized should be my focus for the session. I had a 142 the first game, but wasn't overly concerned about it. luckily our daughter calmed down and let us bowl two more games.

At the beginning of the second game I slowed my approach to avoid falling and was able to get a bit more slide on my last step to the foul line. The lanes were pretty similar to Thursday night, with the exception that if you missed your mark to the right the ball would still come back to the pocket. I started with a strike and 6-pin spare. Then I threw four in a row and picked up a few 10-pins. High hits were carrying, but just a hair to the right and the 10-pin would remain. I stayed clean up to the tenth frame when I missed a 10-pin. I had a respectable 225, but it could have been in the 230s without the tenth frame miss. The next game saw a few more spares, but I stayed clean throughout this time. I shot a few more 10-pins and a 7-pin, finishing the game with a 205.

It was a good outing overall. I think that slowing my approach should give me that extra board needed to carry the 10-pin, but the extra hook in the backend and near the gutters was nice to have. I am guessing that the lanes for Saturday's tournament will react a bit more like these and less like the lanes on Thursday night, which definitely works in my favor.  Hopefully I can ride this session into a quality outing on Thursday night and keep the momentum going into the weekend. My wife averaged nine pins under her last book average from a year ago, which is not bad considering she had only thrown one game in the interim. Saturday should be a good experience.