Tournament today (made the field)

[boatman37]

So me and my summer league partner went to the tournament today in Pittsburgh. We were the only 2 I knew there out of about 60 people. Lanes were a 'modified' THS 43'. Scores were low across the board. Took about 600-620 or so handicap to make the field each round. Handicap was 80% of 220. My handicap was based on last years 185 average so it was 28.

This will be a long post with a few images so might break it up into a couple of posts but here it goes:

So the format is 3 qualifying rounds of 3 games each (with brackets). First round I struggled all around. Started with my Conspiracy solid at 1500. Rolled a 137, 156, 155 (448 scratch 532 handicap). Didn't make it. Moved over 1 pair for the next round and apparently someone got powder on the approach or something. First guy threw a warmup and almost fell. I went up and did the same. Another guy went up and did the same. Both lanes but right lane was worse. Worker came up and sprayed some stuff and wiped it all down. Left lane was now sticking but right lane still slick. It affected me until part way into game 2. 2nd round was 117, 160, 152 (429 scratch 513 handicap). 3rd round we went to the end pair. A couple of frames in we started having trouble with the left lane. The sweep kept dropping randomly and re-racking and giving 0 for the score every minute or so. I had thrown a 3 bagger when it got to the point we could not continue so stopped about 20 minutes while they worked on it then we had to keep score on paper cause the scorers weren't working. I lost my line at that point and back to struggling. Rolled a 180, 143, 189 (512 scratch, 596 handicap). Figured I was done and didn't make it. Put everything away then heard my name and 596 announced as the last spot so thought I had made it. My teammate came down and said there was a tie and there would be a roll-off. Roll-ff went bad. 9th and 10th frame and opponent threw all strikes. I opened so was done. Put everything away again then they called me up front. Turns out someone that they put through in round 3 had already made it through so they should have been skipped so I made it and the roll-off wasn't needed anyway...lol. So get everything back out again and change shoes again. Bowled the first round (1 game elimination) and rolled a 162. Went to write my score and noticed they had my handicap at 26. I mentioned it so they fixed it. So I had a 190 with handicap. They announced 189 was the cutoff...lol. So I made it into round 2. If I hadn't noticed the handicap or wouldn't have mentioned it I would have missed by 1 pin. So round 2 I was really worn out and sore. Really struggled. Rolled 132 scratch (160 handicap). Cutoff was 214.

My teammate made it in the 1st round then bowled 2nd round and made it then too. He sat out the 3rd round and made it through the first round. 2nd round he had 212 so missed it by 2 pins. Spent about $140 total today and cashed out $120 so not bad. I did not win any brackets either. Teammate won 2 brackets and also won high game in 2nd round (had 226 scratch). He came home with about $100 more than he went there with.

Will continue....

Here is oil sheet:
43'. Not sure how this compares to others.

[boatman37]

So here are details of my day. I took the Conspiracy solid (1500 grit), the Uppercut (3000 grit), Igniter (3000 grit), Black Widow Gold (can't remember what surface) and my spare ball. Didn't use the BWG today.

Tried every other ball from the 3 board to the 15 board. No matter what I did I had a very tight line. I had a ton of light hits where I didn't even hit the head pin. But if I missed slightly inside I went high or Brooklyn. The Conspiracy started out good but started coming in too hard. The Uppercut wasn't bad but I had no miss room inside. Miss inside at all and it went Brooklyn. The Igniter seemed to have the most 'miss room' and that wasn't much. Most of those were light. If I moved out to adjust it went high. If I got outside the 7 board or so it wouldn't come back. If you could be very consistent and precise you probably could have done ok. I have been struggling with my accuracy the last couple of weeks so that didn't help. The best pair I had was the pair that kept breaking that we had to use paper to keep score.

The only other thing I could think of was moving further right and opening up my angles but as wet as they were I wasn't sure it would come back and I heard another guy saying he tried it and it wouldn't come back for him. The BWG goes a little straighter with more back end angle but I wasn't sure that was the right move. It was hard to tell what I needed when I couldn't hit the pocket. Out of 12 games I'd say I might have hit the pocket maybe 10 shots at the most, probably closer to 6 or 7 shots.

In the end it was fun but I need to figure out these longer patterns. They said they use this pattern at all of their tournaments now so I better get it figured out...lol

But I'm sore. My slide heel is sore, legs are sore, finger tips sore. Got cramps in toes on both feet when I got home. Thumb swelled cause I had to use my bigger insert that I never use and it was even a little tight.

[Aslan]

I have no idea what to tell you. I can't imagine having an entire arsenal that is 1500, 3000, and 3000...essentially all matte finished.

I mean, that surface 'should' work well in heavier volumes. You might have to play straighter than you usually would on a THS.

But, the problem with 3 balls...all with surface...is that if there's ANY oil down the lane...which in a long tournament there almost certainly WILL be....and you're gonna go through the nose, move left, and hit weak. And the only way to fix it is to go to a ball that doesn't react to the lane until it gets to the breakpoint..then reacts HARD. Your Uppercut would work well for that...but not with a matte surface.

It's tricky on a pattern like this, because its gonna be harder by design. You probably needed to move quite a bit right of where you usually are used to playing. But I think you need some type of polished ball in your lineup to make sure its not a "loss of energy" problem.

When I first started, I had trouble getting the ball to hook (as many bowlers do). I thought I could fix this by sanding the heck out of all my bowling balls. It took my a good year to learn that the ball wasn't hooking because of my physical game, not the ball. And it took me another year to figure out that matte surfaces can sometimes cause a ball "not to hook" if the ball is losing energy through the heads and midlane.

I don't always carry a solid, hybrid, and pearl...but I DO usually carry at least one ball that is 2000-4000 matte and at least one ball that is polished. I usually carry at least one ball that is a polished, pearl, low RG, ball with a high PerfectScale number which is my skid/flip ball to take out in later games to deal with carry down of oil at the breakpoint (if any occurs). If you're somebody that doesn't believe in carry down...then you end up carrying a ball that you might not use much. But, if you're wrong...and there is carry down at the breakpoint...you have virtually no shot of carrying without a ball like that unless you want to alter your ball speed/wrist position/loft angle and hope you can stay in time. My 1.5 cents...

[boatman37]

I have no idea what to tell you. I can't imagine having an entire arsenal that is 1500, 3000, and 3000...essentially all matte finished.

I mean, that surface 'should' work well in heavier volumes. You might have to play straighter than you usually would on a THS.

But, the problem with 3 balls...all with surface...is that if there's ANY oil down the lane...which in a long tournament there almost certainly WILL be....and you're gonna go through the nose, move left, and hit weak. And the only way to fix it is to go to a ball that doesn't react to the lane until it gets to the breakpoint..then reacts HARD. Your Uppercut would work well for that...but not with a matte surface.

It's tricky on a pattern like this, because its gonna be harder by design. You probably needed to move quite a bit right of where you usually are used to playing. But I think you need some type of polished ball in your lineup to make sure its not a "loss of energy" problem.

When I first started, I had trouble getting the ball to hook (as many bowlers do). I thought I could fix this by sanding the heck out of all my bowling balls. It took my a good year to learn that the ball wasn't hooking because of my physical game, not the ball. And it took me another year to figure out that matte surfaces can sometimes cause a ball "not to hook" if the ball is losing energy through the heads and midlane.

I don't always carry a solid, hybrid, and pearl...but I DO usually carry at least one ball that is 2000-4000 matte and at least one ball that is polished. I usually carry at least one ball that is a polished, pearl, low RG, ball with a high PerfectScale number which is my skid/flip ball to take out in later games to deal with carry down of oil at the breakpoint (if any occurs). If you're somebody that doesn't believe in carry down...then you end up carrying a ball that you might not use much. But, if you're wrong...and there is carry down at the breakpoint...you have virtually no shot of carrying without a ball like that unless you want to alter your ball speed/wrist position/loft angle and hope you can stay in time. My 1.5 cents...

Thanks for that. I was trying to stay with a more aggressive ball (Conspiracy solid-1500) due to the heavier volume but then it seemed to start hooking too much. I did feel myself trying yo 'guide' the ball quite a bit too and I know that didn't help. This was only the 2nd time I ever bowled on heavier oil and left all my other stuff at the same surface I use for our THS league that is only about 38'. I was hoping to be able to use the Conspiracy a little longer and probably could have if I had worked with it more but in the 2nd set with the right side of the approach being so slick I went with a weaker ball to get more to the left to try to stay out of that slick stuff. We think someone got powder on the approach. I got away from the Conspiracy at that point then when we got to the 3rd pair they were much drier. But then after we moved again for the tournament they were back to wet so just that one pair seemed to be dry. On top of that I only saw a few lefties there but didn't see any of them throw so didn't have much to go on to see what the better ones were doing.
In my league I almost always only use the Uppercut and Igniter both at 3000. They complement each other pretty well as once the Uppercut burns up the Igniter slips right in there. The Conspiracy rarely ever comes out. Same with the BWG.

I think next time I go to that tournament I might buy a new solid for that and get the switch grip. The only balls I have with switch grips are the Uppercut, Igniter and Squatch. I know the Conspiracy would have been too tight later in the day. Even my bigger insert was a little snug. I could get the Conspiracy changed to a switch grip but with over 100 games on it I'll probably just get a new one.

[Ryster]

I used to love going to tournaments all over, but for the most part have stopped. In the rare times I do (it has been a few years since my last tournament), I usually take a solid, a pearl, and a hybrid in addition to my spare ball. That usually allows me to find some sort of playable line. I find the more bowling balls I take, the more confused I get and actually bowl worse.

[boatman37]

I used to love going to tournaments all over, but for the most part have stopped. In the rare times I do (it has been a few years since my last tournament), I usually take a solid, a pearl, and a hybrid in addition to my spare ball. That usually allows me to find some sort of playable line. I find the more bowling balls I take, the more confused I get and actually bowl worse.

I took 1 solid (Conspiracy) and 3 pearls (Uppercut, Igniter and Black Widow Gold). Never took the BWG out of the bag. But I definitely needed something aggressive yesterday, at least early on. My side never really broke down except the 3rd round when we were on the end pair. They were dry on both sides according to the righties that were there with me. One complained about how burned it was. It wasn't that bad for my side but definitely drier than all the other pairs I was on

[boatman37]

Something else I noticed that I forgot to mention. Seemed like there was some oil on the pin deck too. Saw alot of pins just slide off the back of the deck. Much more than I usually do. Guessing there was oil way down there?