So I was messing around online and somehow I'm now in a PBA experience league

[zdawg]

The local Brunswick lanes down here have a PBA experience doubles league (handicap) that started 3 weeks ago. I signed up on the site for more info on their PBA experience leagues, and within 5 minutes a lady called me back and asked if I would like to start tomorrow, as apparently they had a guy who wanted to join but had no partner.

Other than the fact that I know it will be nothing like the THS league I bowled in the fall/winter and being prepared to be frustrated, any pointers? The description mentioned that they change the oil patterns around, so I don't know what tomorrow night will be, I'm guessing maybe its a surprise every week?

I still need to buy a new bag that will allow me to bring multiple balls, for tomorrow night I will stick with just my regular ball and hopefully get some idea of what's going on, pretty excited just for the experience of it all and while I have no expectations I hope my bowling gets better as a result and I don't get too confused bowling sport patterns Wed night and my regular THS patterns on Friday.

[Amyers]

I'm not a bowling guru so take this with a grain of salt and I'm sure some people with more experience than me will come along but here are some things it have picked up on in this and other bowling forums.

1. A solid ball with 1500 to 2000 finish is listed a lot as needed
2. A lot of these leagues tell you the pattern for next week before you bowl find someone with a similar style and ask how they throw on it
3. Be flexible on your shot lines
4. And most important have a spare ball and practice them. These patterns tend to give you less strikes and more multi pin spares be prepared.

[RobLV1]

zdawg: Congratulations! You are about to find out just how good the pros really are. Amyers advice is spot on. I'm sure they will tell you what the pattern is going to be the following week. Since the patterns are, for the most part, flat, the rule of 31 is a good place to start. How this works is that you take the length of the pattern, and subtract 31 to calculate where your ball theoretically should exit the pattern. For example, on a 44 foot pattern, your ball should be at 13 board at 44 feet (44-31=13), whereas on a 35 foot pattern, the ball should be at 4 board at 35 feet (35-31=4). The key word here is "theoretically." Often times, the general characteristics of the bowling center will greatly influence how the patterns are played.

One thing that you can count on is that some of your preconceptions need to go out the window very quickly. For instance, we have historically been taught that when the lanes aren't hooking, we move right to get more angle. This doesn't work on a sport shot, longer patterns require moves in, while shorter patterns require moves out. Also, don't be fooled by preconceptions about bowling balls. Just because a pattern is long, doesn't mean that it is necessarily high volume, conversely, just because a pattern is short, does not mean it is light in terms of volume; it is often very heavy oil for a shorter distance.

As to your confusion on your regular THS on Friday, the only thing that you may be initially confused about is how bowlers with such high averages on a house shot can actually believe that they are as good as the pros.

Above all, have fun and learn a ton!

[rv driver]

zdawg: Congratulations! You are about to find out just how good the pros really are. Amyers advice is spot on. I'm sure they will tell you what the pattern is going to be the following week. Since the patterns are, for the most part, flat, the rule of 31 is a good place to start. How this works is that you take the length of the pattern, and subtract 31 to calculate where your ball theoretically should exit the pattern. For example, on a 44 foot pattern, your ball should be at 13 board at 44 feet (44-31=13), whereas on a 35 foot pattern, the ball should be at 4 board at 35 feet (35-31=4). The key word here is "theoretically." Often times, the general characteristics of the bowling center will greatly influence how the patterns are played.

One thing that you can count on is that some of your preconceptions need to go out the window very quickly. For instance, we have historically been taught that when the lanes aren't hooking, we move right to get more angle. This doesn't work on a sport shot, longer patterns require moves in, while shorter patterns require moves out. Also, don't be fooled by preconceptions about bowling balls. Just because a pattern is long, doesn't mean that it is necessarily high volume, conversely, just because a pattern is short, does not mean it is light in terms of volume; it is often very heavy oil for a shorter distance.

As to your confusion on your regular THS on Friday, the only thing that you may be initially confused about is how bowlers with such high averages on a house shot can actually believe that they are as good as the pros.

Above all, have fun and learn a ton!
Some good nuggets here that I hadn't heard before!

[bowl1820]

One thing to remember about the Exit Point formula, It only shows the exit point of the pattern! Not the break point.

And the shorter the pattern the more the formula breaks down and doesn't work.


In regards to the exit point formula (Pattern length - 31= Exit point), there's a opposing view (from Mo) to "Take the length of the pattern minus 31 rule and shove it. Not accurate."

Which I believe is mainly because the formula goes wonky on short patterns and it's possible to have a breakpoint back in the oil before the exit point.

So knowing where to find a starting place for the breakpoint would be more helpful. So we have to look at the forward oil, because forward oil controls the breakpoint location.

Now a way has been put forth on how to find the board the breakpoint is on. By looking at the composite graph of the oil pattern. (you can also find it by looking at the Lane Machine Settings chart)

What you do is look for the highest corners of the red bars on the bar graph and subtract 3. That's the place to start looking for the breakpoint. (But this doesn't tell you how far down the lane it is)

Remember that the loads are applied to the buffer brush, so ALL the forward loads affect the breakpoint.

Here's a example: using Kegel's DEAD MAN’S CURVE 3043 Pattern
Direct Download the pdf for the pattern here http://www.kegel.net/V3/PatternLibraryFunctions.aspx?OPCODE=DOSYAINDIRT&ID=607&Type=2

or see the webpage here and click on composite view http://www.kegel.net/V3/PatternLibraryPattern.aspx?ID=607

http://s11.postimage.org/90j2ipsdv/comp.jpg
In this example the highest red bar is on board 14, so 14-3= 11. That's where you start looking for your breakpoint.

http://s10.postimage.org/8f1g8i8l5/comp2.jpg
from the Lane Machine Settings chart

Now my thought is not so much to shove the exit point formula, but to look at the situation and see if it would be beneficial if used. Like use the end of pattern minus 31 to give you a starting place, when the only info you have avalible is the length of the pattern.

And also look at how it might be combined with the breakpoint formula.

[zdawg]

Ok, thanks everybody I will definitely use all the advice given here as best I can. And that's good to know that in the future I should know the pattern prior to bowling, gives me time to research the specifications prior to getting there, all part of the learning process.

That said, I'm pretty stoked and can't wait to get out there :D

[zdawg]

So it wasn't a total trainwreck tonight, but what was interesting is that we bowled 4 games instead of 3, and we changed to a different pair of lanes for games 3 and 4 (maybe this is just the way this league does it?). Needless to say, games 3 and 4 required lots of adjustments because of the changing in the lanes and the fact that four other people had bowled on them just prior, which I need to learn to incorporate quicker in the future - I also only had my one ball tonight, and I now realize the importance of having multiple balls especially on challenging and ever changing lane conditions.

That said, I bowled a: 185, 168, 151, and 157 and we were on the USBC Nationals Single/Doubles pattern (you can see how my scores dropped on the second pair of lanes I struggled with those quite a bit).

Apparently you bowl on the same pattern for four weeks then it changes, since this week was technically week 4 next week we will bowling on the Badger pattern. All in all I was fairly happy with the way I bowled given the fact that this is all new to me.

[Mike White]

So it wasn't a total trainwreck tonight, but what was interesting is that we bowled 4 games instead of 3, and we changed to a different pair of lanes for games 3 and 4 (maybe this is just the way this league does it?). Needless to say, games 3 and 4 required lots of adjustments because of the changing in the lanes and the fact that four other people had bowled on them just prior, which I need to learn to incorporate quicker in the future - I also only had my one ball tonight, and I now realize the importance of having multiple balls especially on challenging and ever changing lane conditions.

That said, I bowled a: 185, 168, 151, and 157 and we were on the USBC Nationals Single/Doubles pattern (you can see how my scores dropped on the second pair of lanes I struggled with those quite a bit).

Apparently you bowl on the same pattern for four weeks then it changes, since this week was technically week 4 next week we will bowling on the Badger pattern. All in all I was fairly happy with the way I bowled given the fact that this is all new to me.

Supposedly Badger plays like Temecula but without ANY dry area.

So expect to play near the center of the lane and pretty much throw the ball at the head pin.

[zdawg]

Supposedly Badger plays like Temecula but without ANY dry area.

So expect to play near the center of the lane and pretty much throw the ball at the head pin.

Yeah I just looked it up it, 52 ft oil pattern which is longer than I've played on before

[Mike White]

Yeah I just looked it up it, 52 ft oil pattern which is longer than I've played on before

PBA experience leagues might use the same name as a PBA pattern, but might not use the actual specs on the pattern.

I've seen some PBA Experience patterns listed as a few feet shorter than the equivalent PBA pattern.

[zdawg]

PBA experience leagues might use the same name as a PBA pattern, but might not use the actual specs on the pattern.

I've seen some PBA Experience patterns listed as a few feet shorter than the equivalent PBA pattern.

Ah, well that's good to know, since we play each pattern for four weeks I'll ask around next week and see if anybody knows. Unfortunately, unlike my home alley, I don't know anybody that works there so I may get mixed answers

[Aslan]

That said, I bowled a: 185, 168, 151, and 157 and we were on the USBC Nationals Single/Doubles pattern

So in other words...it isn't that tough and the pros aren't as good as Rob thinks.


Supposedly Badger plays like Temecula but without ANY dry area.

So expect to play near the center of the lane and pretty much throw the ball at the head pin.

I forgot to mention, MWhite called and said "as long as they don't oil a reverse block zdawg should be fine".

That mythical "reverse block"...it's like the Loch Ness Monster of bowling! :cool:

[zdawg]

So in other words...it isn't that tough and the pros aren't as good as Rob thinks.

LOL, I certainly wouldn't go that far, and of the patterns we're going to play on this was the closest in length to a regular THS pattern.

That said, now I KNOW what a flat oil pattern feels like without the nice dry zones, I don't miss right very often, I'm more of a pulling to the left kinda guy when I throw a crap shot - however, the 3 or so shots that I missed right had NO/ZERO/ZIPPY chance of coming back, in fact I think I clipped the 10 pin and that's about it on those shots :p

All in all, I enjoyed the experience, and if you find a handicap sports league I highly recommend it. Oh, and we smoked the pair we were playing, my partner threw the high series and I think I had the second highest (within our pairing there are some really good bowlers that we didn't have to face last night) although it was close between me and the better of the 2 bowlers on the other team.

[zdawg]

So tonight was the first night of Badger and my second night of my sports league.

I shot a: 155, 180, 154...ANNND then the wheels completely fell off...129

Learned a couple of things:

1) My worst game my first time out on a challenging 52 foot oil pattern tonight was higher than my average was just six months ago (in my first league ever)

2) A 52 foot oil pattern might as well be 60 feet when there is no dry area and the only ball you have is an entry level ball designed for low oil - still waiting to start work so I can justify spending money on building an arsenal, and my Brunswick Aura was drilled by someone incompetent so it has to be completely plugged and redrilled by somebody who isn't.

3) When you're used to bowling on a 5 person team/3 games per night, and switch to doubles/4 games per night the pace speeds up and so does the potential for wrist/arm/mental/etc fatigue

4) Sometimes slower ball speed is helpful

We get this pattern again for the next three weeks, so I'm gonna take some of the lessons I learned tonight and try to put them to use next week. The sucky thing is that the alley that the league is at really doesn't provide league bowlers with any significant discount, and I don't even think its worth wasting my breath asking them to set down a special pattern for me to practice on. Maybe I'm just biased because everybody at my home lane are so friendly, but the Brunswick experience so far leaves a WHOLE lot to be desired from a customer service standpoint.