How many of you use your plastic ball for ALL spares?

[bowl1820]

Being right handed

For the most part I use my plastic spare ball for 10 pins and other right side spares. Though I will use it for left side spares depending on the situation/conditions, But mainly my strike ball for left side spares and double wood.

The system I use is what I call the "Walter Ray" system, A guy was asking WRW about shooting spares one time on his site. Walter told him what he did, so I gave it a try.

Basically it was you pick one spot on the left to shoot all right side spares from, one on the right to shoot all left side spares. Then just adjust your target based on what spare it is.

Now I've made some minor changes over time, adding in some of Rob's Shadow pin spare system.

Heres what WRW said

Walter Ray-
"I have my own method for shooting spares. I like to shoot my right side spares from the same starting spot on the left side of the lane and adjusting my target depending on the spare. Likewise I shoot my left side spares from the same starting spot on the right side of the lane and adjust my target accordingly. I will adjust my target for 10 pins depending on the approaches."

[RobLV1]

Learning to use your plastic spare ball for all non-double-wood spares is one of the easiest ways to raise your average. The reason for this is two-fold. First, you are throwing the ball straight, so chopping off a pin or two for the two-four-five or the dinner bucket is less likely, and you are not having to gauge the amount of hook as you cross the puddle in the middle like you do when you use your spare ball at the seven or the four. Secondly, the more comfortable you get throwing that spare ball at everything, the less intimidating ten pins become.

One word of advice: for best results put some surface on your spare ball to keep it from hydroplaning as you go cross lane. 2000 abralon works prettey well for me.

[Amyers]

Learning to use your plastic spare ball for all non-double-wood spares is one of the easiest ways to raise your average. The reason for this is two-fold. First, you are throwing the ball straight, so chopping off a pin or two for the two-four-five or the dinner bucket is less likely, and you are not having to gauge the amount of hook as you cross the puddle in the middle like you do when you use your spare ball at the seven or the four. Secondly, the more comfortable you get throwing that spare ball at everything, the less intimidating ten pins become.

One word of advice: for best results put some surface on your spare ball to keep it from hydroplaning as you go cross lane. 2000 abralon works prettey well for me.

If I surfaced my plastic ball at 2k I could hook the lane. what's the point of using plastic at all at that point. I regularly polish my plastic to keep it from hooking although that's a problem mostly on wood which you don't see a lot of in Vegas lol

[Amyers]

I use my plastic for all my right side spares. I will use it for my left side ones if I'm bowling on a difficult pattern but I'm better at them with my strike ball so I use it on THS. I target my left side spares across the second arrow and just move my feet to adjust for the pin I want to hit.

[bowl1820]

About sanding a spare ball This is a excerpt from a Bill Spigner article:
http://www.billspigner.com/pdf/1001_Bill_BD.pdf

"Also with the amount of oil in the middle of the lane, a hard, shiny, plastic ball can have a tendency to over skid and actually hydroplane out. If you miss a little right for righthanders (or left for lefthanders), the ball has a little turn and will push to the right even more. Today, many players will actually take the polish off the plastic ball so it has a chance to roll, which helps control the direction of the ball in the oil."

[Hot_pocket]

Never learned to use my spare ball for all spares even though now I can see the benefit of being able to. The pattern I bowl on now it would come in handy, but unfortunately I don't have enough time to practice spare shooting and won't try during league play. I do find it interesting that people sand spare balls, I don't think I need to because I just flatten my hand out and barely put any fingers into when I throw.

[RobLV1]

Never learned to use my spare ball for all spares even though now I can see the benefit of being able to. The pattern I bowl on now it would come in handy, but unfortunately I don't have enough time to practice spare shooting and won't try during league play. I do find it interesting that people sand spare balls, I don't think I need to because I just flatten my hand out and barely put any fingers into when I throw.

I realize that I'm going for the record of saying the same thing in more posts than ever before, but the reason that 99.9% of the top bowlers in the world use plastic or urethane spare balls is NOT because it makes spare shooting harder!

[jab5325]

Thanks guys.

I'm going to keep practicing--finally found a coach willing to help me. He's not USBC certified, but has done a lot of good with bowlers young and old in our area.

Last night, I had a rough, rough night in a sport shot league (Chameleon pattern last night) that I subbed in. Shot a 136 in game 1. Games 2-3 I had a lot of terrible, terrible leaves.

But as the night went on and I was using my plastic for all spares, I got closer and closer. I missed 1 7-pin where I dropped the ball, and made a 6 and 10.

For the 7, I was standing on 35 and throwing 2 boards left of the middle arrow.

For the 6 and 10, I was standing on 15 and throwing over the third arrow from the right.

I missed a lot of multi-pin spares and had my share of splits. The Chameleon is an interesting pattern.

Being a lefty, I started standing 2 boards right of the middle dot. My outside game sucks, but the only way I could get to the pocket was playing straight up the second arrow, with speed, using a Storm Rocket. As that broke down, playing further outside with the Rocket was useless because it couldn't get back to the pocket. Moving inside almost got there, but had a lot of light hits.

So, I switched to the Bad Intentions by the start of the second game. Started out with 3 near perfect strikes with it, standing by now 3 boards right of middle dot and throwing over second arrow with some speed. I then tugged two shots in a row and had two opens.

By the end of the second game, the BI was hooking too early, so I went to the Saw Blade. I'm not used to that ball, and honestly, I think the PSO screwed up the drilling. The span seems off. About 3 frames into the third game, I gave up and went back to the Rocket....standing on the last dot on the right trying to throw out to 2nd arrow. I couldn't do it consistently and had a lot of problems. I had 2 washouts that game from leaving the ball out too far.

All in all, a frustrating night. I need to get more consistent.

[BrianG]

I do not use a plastic ball for spares but I use an old ball that has seen better days and won't get more then a board of movement and I just break my wrist and throw straight at the pins.

[Perrin]

Thanks for the links guys.

I have a team member that is in process of switching off of the system she was taught for spare shooting... one where you have a spot for each corner pin but for other spares you work off your strike line.... just adjusting your target without moving your foot position.
anyway I'll send these two systems and let her decide which she likes better. although I do like the Triax systems chart you could print and laminate then use it as a pocket guide on the lanes