It’s official!

As per plan, I went to the lanes early yesterday because I was scheduled to have another lesson with Ray. It had turned out that Ray was running a half-hour late, so I didn’t start warming up for my lesson until about 4:30. After a while, Ray got his camcorder out and started to film a “before” session.

The “before” showed that my timing was still good, and that my release and follow-through were getting better. I was still having trouble staying under the ball, however. The “before” this time included a series to show axis tilt and revolutions. For good pin action, a bowling ball must have at least 12 revolutions before hitting the pins, but I was only getting 9 or 10 revolutions by that time. The problem staying under the ball and not getting revolutions are related, because, as Ray showed me, my elbow was going away from my body. Another problem related to leverage was that I was not bending my left knee enough in my downswing, so in my drill work during the session, the elbow and the knee were the two points of emphasis. When we filmed the “after”, Ray said I had 8 good shots in a row, and my revolutions picked up to the point where I was getting 11 of them on the ball. Ray said I would get that last revolution with practice. Foreshadowing the league night I would have later, he said he had a feeling I would bowl well.

I was prepared to have to hang around after the lesson, so I had all of my medication with me, including my cholesterol medication, which, on Wednesdays since starting the league, I would take before eating at home prior to leaving for the lanes, and I took the cholesterol pill shortly after my lesson. I later ordered a cheeseburger and a Sprite from the snack bar, and I had dinner while watching Ralph warm up. Ralph said that Brian had pre-bowled because of a school awards function that his daughter was involved in. Joy was also back after missing the regular league session last week.

My work in my lesson carried over to my league bowling immediately; I started the first game with a turkey, picked up a single 2 pin, then had a double, and the only open frame I would have that game was in the 9th frame, in which I only picked up the front pin of the sleeper 2-8. I ended the game with a spare and 8-fill for a 214. My second game was not quite as good, but I sandwiched a lone open frame, throwing an attempt at the single 10 pin in the ditch, between a couple of doubles. I made all of my other spares during the game, and I ended up with a 201. I was worried about running out of gas during the night, but my last game would turn out to be my best of the night…a clean 227 in which I tossed a hambone starting in the 6th frame. The resulting 642 series was my best ever in actual competition. Brian’s pre-bowl scores were around his average for the most part, but he did have a 235 in the first game. Except for the second game, Joy and Ralph were also around their norm, and we ended up taking 6 of the 8 points from our opponents, the team known as “G Force.”

Result: 214-201-227=642
Average (9 games): 186 Last 9 average: 186

My team faces last year’s league champions next week, so I’m really looking forward to that. If we have a good night against them, I feel that it would be a statement of sorts.

The administravia of this post is the fact that I have edited the “About” page of this blog, linked in the sidebar, to reflect last night’s accomplishment. Here’s hoping I make more edits like that in the future. 😀