Lowball and Practice

[boomer]

Stealing this from an Aslan post - thought it would make a good discussion.

When I practice, I like "games" to play - like lowball, but:

Yeah. The one thing I don't like about lowball is if the are shooting at a 7-pin and miss a little inside (but still could pick up the 7-pin if it were alone there), you might clear out the 4-6-7-8-9-10...and now you can't really pick up anything on the 2nd ball without taking out at least 2 more pins. But if you throw a shot that 'would have' taken out the 10-pin...you get a "0" and a 10-point penalty.

It's too bad I can't just set the lane to put down a 4-7-8 and 6-9-10. Then you could try to pick off corners with minimal penalties.

And yeah - especially as I TRY to hit both 6 and 10 when I shoot for 10s. I'd rather cover both.


So - question - what are your "minigames" you do when you practice?


Here's my present fav:

big fuzzy 6-sided dice. Roll it - that defines what pin you have to hit for that ball. 1=7, 2=4, 3=2, 4=3, 5=6, 6=10 - it's just left-to-right and skip the headpin. Get a point to cover it (and has to be a HIT, not a ricochet). Strike is actually bad because you don't get a second shot. . .

Good actual target practice, fun to play, and constructive.

[Aslan]

I only play lowball...and it's usually if I had some spare shooting issues in league or in that practice.

There ARE a lot of fun, little games you can play in practice. The USBC came out with a coaching guide when they were trying to get people to sign up to be youth bowling coaches...and that book has a bunch of little "mini-games" in it to play with the kids.

I'd 'like' to create one of those PVC things with tape hanging down...where you can practice hitting a certain spot on the lane. Youth coaching uses that quite a bit. But, (and I'm not even going to go into my rants about bowling centers and how the sport of bowling is a joke...with the primary reason being practice related), for me to use something like that, I'd probably need 3 lanes to myself and permission from the center to go place that PVC frame out near the arrows (it sites in the gutters...no contact with the lane). Kinda like when I try to practice using the Mark Baker video. You really need to set up a camera/tripod on the lane next to you...well, how am I going to do that without renting another lane?

[boomer]

why would you need three lanes? These things sit in the gutters so you'd just need one lane. You put it at the arrows so if you dump it in the gutters BEFORE the arrows . . . well, there's a different problem there! LOL

I've seen one used at our center at the very end (lane 40) - and then set out of the way when not in use.

And camera can be set at the ball return - be creative where it goes. Although camera can be a bit more intrusive. . .

[Aslan]

The 3-lane "issue" is more of a 2-lane issue...because you really only need 1 lane for practice. The reason you'd need two lanes is proper camera placement. When I was trying to work through Mark Baker's "The System", there are a few certain spots where you need to set the camera tripod. One I can't remember. One is directly behind the swing, and one is at the foul line on the adjacent lane.

Usually, I'd try to get the furthest lane to the right if it's a center with 2 walkways or 1 walkway on that side of the center. That way, I could use a tripod from behind the swing and could set it in the walkway to the right.

I don't recall the reasons for the camera positioning...Mark explains it in the video. I think it has to do with your swing path and how you finish at the foul line.

[boomer]

OOOH - camera. Sorry - I get ya there. I was thinking of the PVC target rack - which would only need the one lane.

Yeah - you would need a camera directly behind to see the swing-plane and one on the lane next to you so you can see footwork and swing path.