Friday July 7th

This weeks edition of “The Road Report” comes to you from balmy Jonesboro, AR. Actually this weekend will probably be the coolest weather that I’ve seen in the 8 years that I’ve been coming down here. Its normally pushing 100 degrees down here in July, but luckily its high 80’s-low 90’s. Anyway, things have been pretty hectic lately with the two Fourth of July tournaments that I hosted ( see results on the main page ) and with preparations for our upcoming regional. I took the week off from lessons so I could catch up on some sponsor issues and line up some things like the media challenge. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get down to Jonesboro until today. The golf course owned by PBA member Bob Troutt, pampers PBA members with free golf starting on Wednesday before the regional. I’ve never made it down here for the free golf due to other commitments and this year was no different. I drove down today ( about 5 plus hours ) and got to the bowl right before the practice session. We are bowling on PBA Regional Pattern #1 ( 40’ ) this weekend so I brought my normal assortment of balls. Even though we are bowling on Guardian this week, one would figure that the pattern still should play close to normal. BOY WAS I WRONG !!! My first shot took the 7 pin off…barely ! After about 10 minutes of that I realized that nothing I had was going to even think about getting down the lane, so I used the next hour or so using my spare ball going 15 to the gutter. It looked pretty good, so I figure that will be my game plan for Saturday’s qualifying round. I bowled the early pro-am because I had a lot of work to do with my boss from Storm on the phone, preparing for the upcoming regional. They only had 3 pairs of lanes for the early pro-am and they all were high school bowlers. Unfortunately I probably wasn’t much fun for them because I threw the ball horrible! I was ashamed to have a PBA patch on my sleeve after that performance. I couldn’t hit water if I fell out of a boat.  I bowled my 3 games with the kids and headed back to the hotel to get some work done. After an hour of so on the phone I headed back to the bowl to check on Allen ( one of my “webmasters” ) who was bowling the junior pro-am. Allen is a very talented 16 year old with tons of potential. There’s a good possibility you will see his name on the Wichita State roster in the near future. Anyway, I started working with Allen last weekend while he and Dennis were in town. After the pro-am we headed over to Colton’s Steakhouse for dinner, then I headed back to the room to get back to work.

Saturday July 8th

Since I was up late last night working, I decided to sleep in for some much needed rest. I’ve had a lot of late nights in the last week-10 days working on the regional, and this was the first chance I’ve had to get some sleep. I headed over to the bowl around time for their last 2 games or so……or at least that’s what I thought. When I got there I found out that they had problems with the lane machine and got started around 45 minutes late. That means my day just got longer. I also found out that they changed the volume of oil used for the pattern, which I wasn’t very happy to find out. My opinion is what you put out on Friday, you put out for the entire weekend. All that the added volume did was take the plastic option out of play. Everything else still hooked at your toe, but plastic didn’t quite come off the gutter like it did yesterday. Once we finally got started I decided to use a Pyro, throwing it at what seemed like 100 mph. I know that’s an exaggeration, but that’s what it felt like. I hate bowling like that because I cant feel what’s going on in my physical game. Its more like chuck it and hope! After A squad the numbers were –7 to cash and 8th place was +99. Obviously the goal is to make match play, but issue number 1 is to at least get a check on this mess. I couldn’t get anything down the lane right of 15 so I started around 17-18 and just piped the Pyro with very little hand and a lot of speed ( just letting the ball tip and roll ). With another 2 week break since I had bowled, the rust was really showing.

Luckily I got lined up early and pounded the pocket pretty well for the first 3 games going 247 ( with three solid 9’s and two 4-pins ), 224 ( with 3 more solid 9’s ) and 234 ( two ring 10’s and two more solid 9s ).  I only missed the pocked a few times the first three games and only had one open for +105. My focus was on pushing forward and gaining as many pins as possible going into Sunday, but the “pin-gods” weren’t shining on me for the next five games. Game 4 saw our pair break down before we got there and we had a long wait. Finally when we started I noticed that the pair was a little tighter. I could actually “bowl” on this pair. Too bad I didn’t take advantage of it. I rang five 10-pins ( missing one ) for 204. The pair we went to for Game 5 was hooking a ton more ( if that was possible ). I went strike, 6-9-10 ( chop ), 3-6, 1-2-8, 2-4-5 and I was totally lost. As a matter of fact, I was so lost I could have been on ABC Wednesday nights at 8:00!!! ( humor – you are supposed to laugh here ). At least I tripled to bail a 196 out of that game and moved on to Game 6, which was worse. I went to the next pair for more punishment. I went 4-9, solid 9, 4-pin, strike, 4 pin, double, 6-7-10, strike, ring 10, ring 10 for 182. Not a badly bowled game, but not a very good score. My problem was entry angles with that much ball speed. I decided to go to a Fired-Up for Game 7 and actually had a pretty good look. I went triple, 4-pin, solid 9, ring 10, solid 9, strike, ring 10, solid 9, strike for a whopping 215. At least that got me up to +102 after 7. Now a big finish would get me into the top 16 number for Sunday. What happened the last game was pretty funny…after the fact at least. I went strike, ring 10, strike, ring 10, strike, ring 10, strike, ring 10, strike. I got up in the 10th with the pressure of a Dutch 200 and I promptly delivered ! I went blower 7 ( breaking the string of ring 10s ) and then delivered a clutch strike in the fill ball. Thank god that is over !!! I was totally exhausted after that disaster. There is no way that pattern should have hooked that much. I’m not sure what could have been done differently, but bowling tournaments like these on that soft of a surface doesn’t make much sense to me. Anyway, after I got done I was so tired I just went back to the room, ordered a pizza for dinner and fell asleep watching Mission Impossible II.

Sunday July 9th

Well I didn’t think they could hook much more than yesterday, but I was wrong. To me there was way more friction on Sunday then there was on Saturday. My Pyro checked at my shoelaces and was not an option. I went with a Thunderstruck solid and played the lanes similar to what I had done yesterday. Of course I started with a 3-6-10 split ( LOL ) and promptly chopped it. Great start!!! It didn’t get much better with three solid 9’s and a blower 7 for 203. Game 2 wasn’t much better with two missed spares for 192. I thought Game 3 was going to be much better since we caught a pair that had a little more hold on it, but I just couldn’t execute shots very well leaving a 2-4-10 and a 2-4-8-10 mixed in around 9 strikes for a 218. Game 4 was right back to monster hook at your toe. I was all over the place in that game finishing with 179 to drop down to +94, pretty much sealing my fate. I bowled arguably my best game of the tournament in Game 5, but without catching any breaks. I went ring 10, triple, ring 10, ring 10, solid 7, double, solid 9 and ring 10 for a HUGE 225. I finished at +119, 32 pins behind 16th place. I made a lot of critical errors this weekend that I don’t usually make. I missed 7 or 8 spares that would have made all of the difference. That will definitely be my last extended break of the summer. The time off is nice, but its not very cost effective!

A big thanks goes out to Stacy Wilcox, Chris James and the incredible staff at Jonesboro Bowling Center. They work as hard as any host of any regional there is. They raise a lot of money for the prize fund, cater food for the bowlers and go out of their way to make us feel welcome. Even though I hate bowling on Guardian I wouldn’t miss coming to this tournament. Hosts like these make bowling regionals worthwhile.

I would also like to congratulate the designer of my website, Dennis Hacker, for making his first match-play appearance as a PBA member. Dennis bowled fantastic on a very challenging condition. Of course I’m going to take most of the credit, due to the work that we put in during a few practice sessions last weekend! Anyway, job well done Dennis. Also props to Steve Jaros for winning the event. I joked with him before I left about taking all of his equipment except for one tote bag out to his truck so he could have a free hand to carry his trophy. I don’t think people really know how good Steve is, but luckily I get to watch it week in and week out. Believe me, its my pleasure!

Well that pretty much wraps up this epic novel. Hope you enjoyed reading it more than I enjoyed ( or didn’t enjoy ) bowling. Next weekend we are bowling in Madison, Wisconsin, home of my first regional title. Until then, bowl up a STORM!!!