I'm 46, and I'm probably switching to 2-handed bowling.

[JessN16]

First of all, thanks for having me here. A BallReviews user pointed me here, and somehow I had not found this site yet.

The following are a couple of posts I've put on the other site, and I'm going to sort of blog this for awhile to help people considering the same thing I am to know what the experience is like.

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There comes a point when you're either going to get better, or you're not. And then you have to decide whether you're even going to continue at all.

The last five years have been rough for me. I moved to a much harder house than I'd been accustomed to over the previous 10 years, and when I did my average dropped about 35 pins. I've still been able to bowl at a higher average in out-of-town tournaments, so I know my basic abilities are still there, but there's a laundry list of things that have changed for me recently as a function of getting older.

There was the heart attack, the sudden onset of come-and-go gout (lots of things happen after heart attacks, some that don't seem related but really are), a flare-up of tendonitis in my right Achilles. There's the arthritic right wrist, made worse by years of bowling with the wrong span and pitches. Weight gain. A degenerative right knee caused by a baseball injury from way back in 1988.

Last year, I made some equipment changes and bought myself a 10-pin jump in average from the year before, but that still only put me in the mid-170s (at this new house, we have fewer than 5 people averaging deuce). Regardless, that made me feel good, because I saw progress. But when the 2018-2019 season began, I lost most of that modest gain and am back to thinking 510 is a "good" series.

Sure, I can still have a good game (or get lucky) and roll a 230. But I usually frame it with a 150 on one side and a 160 on the other. We don't get a lot of help from the lanes here, but my bigger problem is myself -- my inconsistency, my aches and pains, my lack of time to practice.

Given that it's hard to get excited about watching yourself and your game disintegrate, I kind of hit a fork in the road a month ago: Either I would get better, or I would get gone. The one thing I will not do, especially at such a young age, is fall back to where I was when I was a beginner. I can already tell I'm not going to be happy in my senior years playing out the string.

The single biggest issue to overcome is definitely the wrist pain. No combination of pitches or spans seems to fix it anymore. My absolute, upper limit is 6 games bowled at a time. Sometimes I don't even get three. I'm worthless as a tournament bowler even though my last tournament, I finished second in handicap and eighth in scratch scores for all events. I just happened to get very lucky with my body that day.

I'm not sure going two-handed is going to solve that, but at least it takes the thumb out of the equation. Switching over gives me something to look forward to, at any rate. Maybe I'll find something I didn't know was there in the first place.

I've considered blogging the change, but I don't really have a place to blog. I don't want to bore everyone else here by posting banal league details every week. But I do want to see if it's possible to do, and if it is, I want to share that with other middle-age/older guys who are at a similar crossroads.

Or I'm going to give it all up. There's really no in-between anymore.

Jess

[JessN16]

Week One...

Practice scores: 32, 104
League scores (one-handed, immediately following practice): 185, 200, 201 (Dyno-Thane Threshold)

So tonight marked the first time I went into a bowling center and bowled two-handed for more than a shot or two. I bowled two practice games prior to league.

My first game, I bowled 32. Not 132. Not 232. Thirty...two. After three frames, I had a score of 1.

The second game went much better: 104, with four spares. Oddly enough, I found the thing a two handed delivery made easy was shooting straight at the 10-pin: you just don't turn the ball. Come straight up the back of it and it goes right down the target line.

My struggles in the first game were mainly due to me having to get used to two things, the change in angles and the fact I couldn't get any speed. I usually roll around the 16-17 mph range. I doubt I was doing more than 10 throwing two-handed. Coupled with the increase in revs, and all of a sudden everything was in the ditch by the 50-foot mark if not sooner.

For the second game, I finally moved as far left as I could (limited by the ball return, as I had been assigned Lane #2), and committed to moving my target to the right and further down the lane. I finally started to get the ball (sort of) where I wanted it to go.

I had found a pair of 14-pound balls to test this with, a Storm Dark Thunder and a Visionary Slate Blue Gargoyle. The DT was far too much ball. The SBG, which is urethane pearl, was the only thing I could keep on the correct pocket side, and even then it was a chore. I'm sitting here now sore on my right side at the beltline, and my left chest is sore from the pulling action of opening my shoulders at delivery. Also my right forearm was mildly sore for awhile. I can tell if I keep doing this that I'm going to have to figure out a way to open and clear the shoulders at delivery, or it's just not going to work. I have no idea what to do yet about the speed issue.

The other thing I realized is that, one- or two-handed, we are what we are to a large degree. The wrist position changes that work for a traditional approach have the same effects on a two-handed approach. If you're good at straightening the ball out as a one-hander, you can probably do it two-handed as well. There is no miracle cure here for flaws, but also your strengths don't automatically disappear.

Strangely enough, I had my best set of the season after I switched back to one-handed for league. My wrist release felt a little snappier. But I have tendon-related pain in my right wrist as I type this, which I usually do after league.

I'll keep working on this in practice. It's not going to be an overnight change.

Jess

[JessN16]

Week Two...

Practice scores: 132, 136
League scores (one-handed, immediately following practice): 180, 195, 246 (Dyno-Thane Threshold)

Summary: I bowled the first practice game with polished urethane (Visionary Slate Blue Gargoyle) and the second with a polished solid reactive (Storm Dark Thunder). I incorporated the skip-step into the delivery this week after practicing it "dry" in my driveway (i.e., without a ball in my hand). Whereas last week I had lost 6-7 mph from my one-handed delivery, I picked back up probably 3 mph and was throwing around 13 mph this week. That's not optimal, but it's progress.

The biggest contributor to those mediocre scores were seven different occurrences of this: 1/. That would be picking off the 7-pin on the first ball, and then clearing the rack for the spare. Of course, when you do that three times in a row, you've scored a whopping 33 or so over three frames. With both balls, I found myself gradually taking hand out of the ball by weakening my wrist position, or simply not rotating out of the ball at delivery, in an effort to keep the ball pocket-side. That helped, but again, that's not an optimal play. It did, however, tell me that I'm going to be able to make small changes in the delivery and adjust.

One thing I was not expecting tonight was a fair bit of pain in the middle finger after I was done with two-handed practice. This was the result of a pitch issue, and I'm not sure how to fix it. The SBG has forward pitch in the fingers (my old measurements), while the DT is reverse-pitched in the fingers. I was much more comfortable throwing the DT. Where the pain was coming from, though, was from the side of the fingers if I tried to come around the ball strongly. I'm wondering if I'm going to have to have extreme right pitch in those two fingers eventually. If so, that's not optimal, because now I would have to plug all my equipment. However, I'm sitting here typing this still with soreness in my finger, and since going two-handed is mostly about getting rid of pain, I'm not going to just tolerate it. I guess the middle finger is hanging up in the insert and getting jerked sideways at release.

On the flip side, I could have bowled as much as I wanted to tonight and had no wrist pain, forearm pain or shoulder pain. I haven't had that kind of experience in years.

Going from this into league and switching back to one-handed bowling, I found I was able, for the second straight week, to be very consistent and make better adjustments in the wrist. I still got a little wrist and hand pain afterward, though.

Hopefully I'll get a chance to do this again next week. It all depends, week to week, on my work schedule.

Jess

[JasonNJ]

Two handed bowling is not easy, guys like Belmo, Simonsen and Troup make it look easy but that's just how skilled they are. As you notice, the hardest thing about two handed bowling is generating enough speed and of course accuracy. What I would suggest is doing a one step drill until you get comfortable with the release and then you start incorporating a full delivery to add speed.

[grumpter]

Having tried the 2-handed technique due to an injured finger I found I was able to get a lot of hook out of a house ball at a very light weight (9 to 11 Lbs). However, that was on lanes that are pretty dry. Have you considered giving a plastic spare ball a try?

Your 1-hand scores seem to be go up nicely maybe that trend will continue. I found my spare shots suffered with the 2-hand technique so I started going back to a 1-handed spare shot which helped in my case.

[RobLV1]

I'd really like you to think about this. You say that your body is falling apart (join the club). Two-handed bowling is much more physically demanding than one-handed bowling. Looking at this logically, do you really think this is a good idea? From my own experience with degenerative bone disease the entire length of my spine, bad hips, and bad knees, I've been able to come back to about 90% of my former bowling self just by picking the right equipment, and learning to play different parts of the lane.

[JessN16]

I'd really like you to think about this. You say that your body is falling apart (join the club). Two-handed bowling is much more physically demanding than one-handed bowling. Looking at this logically, do you really think this is a good idea? From my own experience with degenerative bone disease the entire length of my spine, bad hips, and bad knees, I've been able to come back to about 90% of my former bowling self just by picking the right equipment, and learning to play different parts of the lane.

It isn't necessarily that everything is degenerating but that certain key components to a traditional style are. Biggest is the wrist. I have tried so many different grips, pitches and whatnot trying to alleviate thumb, hand and wrist pain that I've nearly lost count. What I have determined in a couple of weeks of practicing two-handed is that I have zero pain in those areas once I'm done. Meanwhile I hit a wall of sorts bowling one-handed around the game 3-4 mark. This makes any kind of tournament bowling a real issue since I have a hard time finishing a block.

Because of the negative pressure that puts on my game scores, I'm at a crossroads: Do something drastic, or accept that I'm pretty much at the end of my ability to compete at a modestly high level. I'm not one that can tolerate just sort of sliding into irrelevancy. I'm either going to fight and take risks, or I'm not going to be able to stay interested.

Jess

[classygranny]

If your wrist issues are related to any type of tendonitis, believe me, it won't go away on its own. Left to its own demise tendonitis turns into tendonosis. Tendonitis is an acute condition in which inflammation is caused by a direct injury to a tendon. Tendonosis is a chronic or recurring condition caused by repetitive trauma or an injury that hasn't healed.

Healing a tendon injury is a long process. Rest with mild exercise (not bowling) and lots of stretching is about the only way to recovery. Other things help the symptoms, but don't actually lend any healing - sports creams, pain relievers, heat, ice, compression sleeves, etc.

Whether you bowl two handed and take the wrist out of the equation, if there is any tendonitis or tendonosis - it will still be there if you don't address it now.

Physical therapy might help, but when I had surgery on my elbow to remove the dead tendons, to allow the healthy tendons to take over and eliminate the tendonosis, the doctor stressed the best thing I could do (for the rest of my life) was to stretch, stretch, stretch and then stretch those muscles again. But not over-stretching to the point of injury.

You may want to consider finding out what the issue is and addressing those, rather than changing your bowling and thinking that might be a cure-all. Not saying changing may help and might be needed in the long run, but I still think the wrist will flare up at some time. Also, acupuncture helps in some cases of tendonitis for some people.

Keep on blogging about 2 handed. I know I couldn't have changed as it would be too hard on the rest of my body. I went left-handed for nine months, boy was that interesting. Good Luck!

[JessN16]

If your wrist issues are related to any type of tendonitis, believe me, it won't go away on its own. Left to its own demise tendonitis turns into tendonosis. Tendonitis is an acute condition in which inflammation is caused by a direct injury to a tendon. Tendonosis is a chronic or recurring condition caused by repetitive trauma or an injury that hasn't healed.

Healing a tendon injury is a long process. Rest with mild exercise (not bowling) and lots of stretching is about the only way to recovery. Other things help the symptoms, but don't actually lend any healing - sports creams, pain relievers, heat, ice, compression sleeves, etc.

Whether you bowl two handed and take the wrist out of the equation, if there is any tendonitis or tendonosis - it will still be there if you don't address it now.

Physical therapy might help, but when I had surgery on my elbow to remove the dead tendons, to allow the healthy tendons to take over and eliminate the tendonosis, the doctor stressed the best thing I could do (for the rest of my life) was to stretch, stretch, stretch and then stretch those muscles again. But not over-stretching to the point of injury.

You may want to consider finding out what the issue is and addressing those, rather than changing your bowling and thinking that might be a cure-all. Not saying changing may help and might be needed in the long run, but I still think the wrist will flare up at some time. Also, acupuncture helps in some cases of tendonitis for some people.

Keep on blogging about 2 handed. I know I couldn't have changed as it would be too hard on the rest of my body. I went left-handed for nine months, boy was that interesting. Good Luck!

I appreciate the feedback. I might have mentioned it up top but there are a couple of issues in play here: old playground injury from when I was 12 years old, and then I probably spent a good 10-12 years of bowling, when I first really started throwing a hook, using equipment with spans that were stretched way out and mis-pitched. I had a couple of drillers who were very old school in the way they approached rev creation and equipment and I ended up paying the price for it. Pretty sure I have some arthritis in the right wrist now, as there is a swollen knot on the outside of the wrist that I've now had 20+ years.

When you add that to my borderline wrist strength, it's a bad mix. The stretching advice is good; what I can't figure out are the exercises to stretch some of the particular tendons/ligaments that are hurting. The hand pain manifests more as a type of CTS, but it isn't CTS because I can type on a computer all day with no issues (I pay very close attention to workplace ergonomics). I also play piano and keyboards, with no issues. The only time I have issues is bowling.

I can cut about half of my problems by using a complex wrist brace like a Robbys, but that creates other issues for my game. Chief among those is my wrist is so locked into one position that I lose the majority of my ability to make small adjustments. Spare shooting goes off the rails. What I have found helping is to warm up with the Robbys brace, then ditch it once the game starts. That probably buys me 1-2 additional games before the wrist pain reappears.

The other issue is the right knee; I have cartilage damage and possible ligament damage there from a teenage baseball injury. That's my push-off leg, and when it locks up mid-delivery, well, that's a problem. I have solved probably 90 percent of it using a Robbys Kneed-It brace, which has been nothing short of miraculous for me. However, there are nights when the knee is stubborn. The two-handed delivery seems to go easier on that knee simply because it's different and is probably using different areas of that leg to generate power.

Jess

[fordman1]

Have you ever gave any thought about bowling with the other hand? If you are a righty bowling left handed would be even better. One other thing what are you going to do when you get older? You are already a mess.

[JessN16]

Have you ever gave any thought about bowling with the other hand? If you are a righty bowling left handed would be even better. One other thing what are you going to do when you get older? You are already a mess.

lol, I am indeed.

I would say the hesitance to switch hands comes mostly from a guy I used to bowl with who did just that. He had torn his right shoulder up pretty badly by bowling, switched hands, and then did the same thing to his left shoulder and had to quit outright. I don't want a similar fate I fortunately have never had any shoulder issues through the years. It is very, very rare that I ever have shoulder pain, or elbow pain for that matter. It's mostly wrist, hand and knee pain that get me.

Jess

[JessN16]

Week 3:
Practice scores: 140, 92
League scores (one-handed): 180, 163, 209

The first practice game was the first time I've really thought "I've got something to work with here." I hit the pocket 9 times out of 11 balls, and left a bunch of single pins I couldn't pick up. This is the first time I've had spare-shooting trouble on the right side.

The focus this week was continuing to improve ballspeed, and after a good first game, I tried to go too quickly and ended up destroying my timing. A friend later told me I was closing up too much at the foul line and shoving the ball with my shoulder in an attempt to generate speed, which was pulling everything left of target.

Once in league, I bowled better than my score the first game, lost my look in game two and then de-shelled in game three, opening up with a spare and five-bagger. I was on a 230-ish pace headed into the final game but finished with two ugly opens (5-4, 6-1) to really kill my score.

Weekly pain check: Didn't stretch my hand and fingers enough and ended up with mild pain in the middle finger again, which is confirming the need to change pitches. I was hoping to avoid doing anything other than plugging a bunch of thumbholes but I might not get that lucky.

Four weeks left until summer league and then I'm going to bowl the summer two-handed. So I've basically got a maximum of eight practice games to figure out how I want to attack this. Gulp.

Jess

[mx1alex]

I bowled two-handed for the first time last week. My wrist was hurting pretty bad and I couldn't use my thumb to grip the ball. I didn't want to try lefty so I went two handed. Bowled the best game I ever have at 241 the very first game. And the next two games were both 20 pins over my average. My teammates are telling me to stick with it.

[JessN16]

Week 4...
Practice scores: 118, 99, 90, 114
League scores (one-handed): 189, 152
League scores (two-handed): 175

Practice was completely unfruitful this week. In a quest to pick up speed, I found myself getting my timing all out of whack. Once that happened, I would spray the ball all around until I would either suddenly regain my timing, or not.

After my fourth practice game this week -- which ended in three straight marks as I switched from resin back to pearl urethane and went back to the basics -- I didn't intend to actually bowl two-handed in league until my original plan, which was first week of summer league.

And then my wrist decided it had other ideas.

Toward the middle of Game 2 tonight, I began to have the familiar old wrist pain coming from the right side of my wrist (as viewed from above). I described it to a friend tonight as feeling like I had karate-chopped a doorframe. My entire wrist hurt from basically the fat of my hand, through the entire wrist joint and about six inches up forearm. This is "normal" for me.

By the time the game ended, I could no longer abide the pain. It was either switch or quit, and I chose to switch.

I don't know what made this game different from all my practice games. Maybe I just focused more intently, knowing that if I botched this up it was going to cost three teammates and not just myself. I pulled out my Visionary Slate Blue Gargoyle (urethane pearl), made my approach slower, more deliberate and straighter, and ... shot 175.

I had one open frame -- the first, which went -7. After that, I rolled off seven consecutive spares, including two 3-10 conversions, then went X/X in the ninth and 10th for 175.

This was probably the happiest I've been while bowling in a long, long time. I actually committed to something difficult and pulled it off. And, my wrist stopped hurting. It's sore now (as it always is for a day or two after bowling) but I bet that changes next week if I decide to shoot all three games two-handed.

That's now a possibility, because despite winning all games tonight, our team was eliminated from contention with three weeks left. Any damage I do to the team these last three weeks will be minimal.

Jess

[Tampabaybob]

Hi Jess.... Was reading about your dilemma with pain and I'm very familiar with what you're going through. After 61 years of bowling (started at age 11) my body seems to be telling me to slow down. Unfortunately, the damn brain keeps telling the body otherwise. Have had the heart attack, colon resection, and a couple of other maladys, but I keep fighting them off. I also do private coaching and have many seniors that I've coached that have the bad knees, back, etc, but we all have one thing in common. And that's the love of the sport and the thrill of kicking some of the young guy's butts.
My remedy is when things start acting up I take two extra strength Tylenol before I leave the house and head to the lanes. An hour after bowling is when the body starts telling me I'm getting old. Stll averaging in the low to mid 200's, but the stamina is really weighing hard. I've had to learn to pace myself and relax more when I'm bowling and that does go a long way in helping.

I'm a bit bewildered at your practice scores being so low and your league scores being in the 170 - 190 range. Is it because you're practicing on burnt oiled lanes? If they are fried from leagues the night before, try to find a house that does oil in the morning and also before the leagues. Always practicing on burnt lanes won't help you. It's bad enough it happens during a league night.

As far as the two handed option goes, I understand the reasoning for trying it, less pain, but I also agree with Rob, whom I've had the pleasure of knowing for some time, that using a two handed style puts a lot of stress on your body if done correctly. If you've never had a personal coach, I'd suggest looking for one, as he or she may be able to help you make a couple of changes to your approach and release that might help. As I mentioned earlier, I do private coaching. I also have a web site with hundreds of articles that might strike home with you. I have a separate section "Just for Seniors". Look me up at Brandonbowlingcoach.com.

Good luck and check back to let everyone know how you're doing.

Bob

[bubba809]

I'm a bit bewildered at your practice scores being so low and your league scores being in the 170 - 190 range. Is it because you're practicing on burnt oiled lanes? If they are fried from leagues the night before, try to find a house that does oil in the morning and also before the leagues. Always practicing on burnt lanes won't help you. It's bad enough it happens during a league night.

I'm also confused by your practice scores being SO low compared to your league scores. I would think you are attempting to bowl two handed only during practice but you give us two handed league averages. Are you just not trying as hard in practice? Just seems odd you're bowling 50-70 pins lower almost every game practice vs. league. Something is happening here with the huge disparity.

[JessN16]

I'm also confused by your practice scores being SO low compared to your league scores. I would think you are attempting to bowl two handed only during practice but you give us two handed league averages. Are you just not trying as hard in practice? Just seems odd you're bowling 50-70 pins lower almost every game practice vs. league. Something is happening here with the huge disparity.

Yes, sorry about that -- practice scores are two-handed ONLY.

And I just have one two-handed league game for now, the 175 that is in bold/red type above.

If I practice one-handed bowling these days, I can't bowl league in the same week due to the needed recovery time.

Jess

[poem58]

Very interested in your trials and tribulations. I switched to two handed bowling when I was 57 yo. I had arm pain up to my right elbow which after all sorts of exercising, physio, acupuncture it turned out that by removing the thumb from the ball, the pain stopped.
I am 60 yo today and have seen modest improvement in not only my scores but my technique. I also dropped weight to 14 lbs. Like you I noticed that ball speed is an issue but I really wasn't much faster using one arm since I didn't have a big back swing. Our lanes tend to be on the dry side so I have had a little more success with urethane than reactive stuff. Everyone is different but I find two handed to be not all that stressful on the body. The fact that I can bowl any number of games without pain is great. I have a Storm Mix ball that I use for right hand side spares. Making the 6-10, 10 pin spares way more often will only increase my average which is 165. I have bought new equipment this year so much of my experiments should be done for next year. No reason I can't expect my league average to improve 15-20 pins. Just on missed spares alone I can see that happening. To help increase ball speed, step back on the approach. So many things to practice but you seem to love bowling like I do and I too cannot stand to be just mediocre and playing for fun. Even at my age I have a bit of room to grow, at least to a point of enjoying the game again. Continued good luck.