Everyone Seems to Use a Different Ball

[HughScot]

In reading tons of these forum posts, especially the new scores, it seems as if no one ball is prevalent. This is rather amazing compared to other sports (golf and tennis). No one manufacturer is that strong. I wonder if this is because everyone just likes to try different balls to improve one's score. Any comments?

[75lockwood]

It's all about personal Preference, compared to golf where a driver is a driver, bowling balls very immensely, sure the are all round, tend to hook and hit pins, depending on your style and the lane conditions, the ball(s) you use are all different!

a 600 rev 13 mph cranker that only bowls on a dry ths probably shouldn't be using a nightmare... where as a 250 rev 21mph stoker that bowls on extremely heavy oil would make a slingshot look like plastic

[Cuda K5]

every ball works in different conditions. I can start out a game with 1 ball and switch a few different times before the 1oth frame. the lanes dry up very fast in my league

[MisterSinister]

It's also because there ate so many new released balls each year. Each company puts out 10 or more new balls a year. Someone shopping for a high end Storm ball last year would have ended up with a Virtual Gravity Nano, of Nano pearl. If your shopping for the same thing this year, your looking at the Lucid, or IQ. Not everyone buys a new ball constantly, so you end up with different equipment. My buddy has a Storm Invasion, that's 3 years old and he loves it. I bowled with a guy last night who had an 8 year old Columbia that he refuses to stop using, even if his friends (me included) think his average would go up 10 pins if he bought a ball made some time after president Bush was in office.

[GoodGorilla]

I started out with a Brunswick because I won an auction on ebay just to start me out. The ball sucked, so I did some reading and watched some videos of pros using different equipment. I ended up buying 4 storm balls, for some reason I felt I should stick with one brand to get the feel of it before moving to another. The only beef I have with storm was tricking me into buying a Polar Ice ball which was advertised as a spare ball. It's so bad as a spare ball, horrible. It's a dry lane ball.

[MisterSinister]

The Polar Ice is not advertised as a spare ball. The Storm ad says the Ice lineup includes a polyester ball for spares (currently the Black Ice is the spare ball.) It then goes on to say that the Polar Ice is an expansion of that line, and has a urathane coverstock. If you want a true spare ball, then you don't want urathane. You want plastic, or polyester. While it is not the clearest ad in the world, they didn't lie to you.

[Cochese]

I actually play a lot of golf and I think the bowling balls are a lot like golf equipment. They are all similar in design from a general view, but also each manufacture has proprietary technology (coverstock, core design, etc) that they advertise as setting themselves apart. Same with golf equipment. Each manufacturer says their driver design and the construction materials make them better.

In all reality, the most valuable thing would be getting something acutally fitted for you. In golf, it's loft, lie angle, shaft lengths, shaft stiffness, etc. I would be willing to bet this is also true for bowling equipment. If you get a ball from any manufacturer that is set up for you by someone who knows what they are doing, you would get good results from most brands.

[Gmjmma]

there was a guy who bowled a 246,296,300 in my league last weds with a columbia 300 rubber ball from i think he said the late 70's

[panbanger]

That's where the money is in the sport. Not getting the scores you want? Try a new ball! Uh-oh, the first game is almost over, time to switch balls! I'm bowling at a place with slightly less/more oil than I'm used to, what kind of ball should I get? etc...

Maybe it's just the old-school part of me that doesn't want to change with the times, but I think for the average league bowler on a typical house shot, two balls is enough. One for strikes one for spares. Of course there are plenty of people who dont even need a ball for spares.

[Zothen]

I have 7-8 balls! 2-Heavy oil(asymmetrical & drilled different),1-Medium Heavy(symmetrical),2-Medium oil(1 asymmetrical & 1 symmetrical),1-Light/medium(symmetrical),1-Dry lane(symmetrical)and a spare ball. All are used for THS and Sport leagues depending on lane conditions.

The question I get is why so many balls? Answer-Because i'm a serious bowler and need to change balls for the conditions I bowl on,where as the recreational bowler can get away with a benchmark ball and spare ball because he will only bowl a THS and occasional tournament and doesn't care about average.

Zothen