Well its august, the dog days of summer... Our PBA  league ended, I averaged 194, not to bad I guess.  A regional is coming up next weekend 16th & 17th in Milwaukee Oregon on the Chameleon pattern.  That has been my best pattern in the PBA league and in the regionals this year.

Another high spot upcoming is I have Ron Hoppe coming for a clinic.  This is very exciting and I am looking forward to see how things improve. 

Our local tournaments are upcoming for the CWO, the first one to be held in Pasco @ Go Bowl (tentatively).  I also plan on hosting a series of PBA X Tournaments.  These tournaments are for local bowlers who want that challenge & feel of  a Regional or National PBA event.   I like to think of them as a little sprint.  Format is 5 games of scratch bowling for qualifying. 1 in 3 advance.  Sport Bowling members pay $85 and non-sport members may upgrade or pay an additional $15.  Be sure to check out our website @ Sparetime Lanes - http://www.sparetime711.com/

Well I hope you all had a great summer... time to pull the gear out and tune up for the fall leagues.  Step up to the challenge and bowl a PBA Experience league.

Hope to hear or see from you soon.

Weeks 7 & 8 of the PBA X are on the Cheetah.  I have been bowling pretty good and hope to add to the average the next few weeks.  The timing for this pattern is good as I have a PBA NW Regional coming up in Burley ID that will use the Cheetah pattern.

6/17 - I have been scoring well on this pattern using my old Storm Trauma.... and  my  Brunswick  Sidewinder and my new Storm Street Rod pearl.   In practice I  did not have a good look with the Trauma so I grabbed the Street Rod Pearl and bowled well ..  212, 211, 191 & 201 for a 815... added to the average and missed a few spares..... as a team we are on top for the time being.

6/24 - I hope to bowl as well as I did last week.  I practiced on the pattern using my Storm .  In practice I have a pretty good look.... using my Street Rod Pearl and but when the lights came on spare shooting went well thankfully because splits were plentiful.  183, 189, 192, & 194 for 758.  The main issue tonight was me the bowler and not the lanes ... grabbing the ball at the bottom of the swing to much.  As a team we bowled well and took a lot of points that helped extend our lead.  Not a bad night but I was expecting another 800.  The next 2 weeks we bowl on the Scorpion, I hope to rebound with more 800s.  With regionals coming up I am hoping to do well.

Well this summer is quickly coming to end. Its been a couple of weeks since I lasted posted.

We bowled on the Scorpion 7/1 & 7/8, and I have been in a little funk with my release.... for some reason I am grabbing the ball at the bottom of the swing. With a regional coming up I am not happy with the release, but as with most things it is just a phase, hopefully that passes by quickly.

STUNG!!!

7/1 - 198, 137, 190, and a 178 for 703 ..... by far my worst outing for the summer except the first week of bowling .... and a far cry from the scoring pace that I set in the PBA X tourney. Well hopefully things will be better in Burley ID this weekend for the NW PBA Regional.

BETTER!!!

7/8 - 177, 220, 204, 211 for 812 ... much better.... the first game was 170 a game of opens and/or splits in bad spots. The good news is that I not grabbing the ball at the bottom of the swing this week. This weekend is a NW PBA Regional in Seattle, I hope the good swing comes with me.

The next two weeks we are bowling on the 2008 Masters/ TOC pattern.

This past 2 weeks we have had to bowl on the Shark pattern, this pattern always seems to cause me some problems. I have tried to play them direct early in PBA X leagues, but the best results for me seem to be when I have my feet 30-40 and look 14 to 18 at the arrows and maybe 2-4 feet further down the lane.

6/3/08

I used my Passion that I have been using on this & the scorpion pattern.

• 215, 189, 201, 182 for 787

6/10/08

Tonight I used the "new" Dimension manufactured by Storm. I started off slow, but only rolled one good game. This ball had no problems with the amount of oil on the shark pattern.

• 159, 224, 183, 190 for 756
  

After league was over I stayed and rolled a few more games. I pretty much had to move my eyes down the lane, the ball made the pattern look easy when I rolled it well.  

Today Spare Time Lanes & PBA member Alan Cook hosted the 1st PBA Experience Tournament in the State of Washington and maybe the nation.

Holding any kind of tournament is scary in the summer season, but some of the bowling die-hards in E. Washington gathered to shoot on the Scorpion pattern. We had 15 players turn out from Tri-Cities, Moses Lake, & Spokane.

I personally want to thank them for coming out on a beautiful morning. The event was not as sucessful as I had hoped for but I would say that most would bowl again.

5 GAME Qualifying Block

6 to ADVANCE TO MATCH PLAY - Last spot receives Brunswick Sidewinder courtesy of Advanced Bowling Concepts & Spare Time Lanes.

MATCH PLAY

• Seed 1 vs Seed 6 (Morrow vs. Finnestad)
  • Morrow defeats Finnestad (186 to 183 - Morrow advances (+134))
  • Finnestad - 6th place - receives Brunswick Sidewinder
    
• Seed 2 vs Seed 5 (Cook vs. Nash)
  • Nash defeats Cook (207 to 202 - Nash advances (+24))
  • Cook (+142) - 4th place - $145
    
• Seed 3 vs Seed 4 (Dreibelbis vs Britton)
  • Britton defeats Dreibelbis (214 to 159 - Britton advances (+98))
  • Dreibelbis (+81) - 5th place - $145
    
• Britton vs Nash - Morrow receives bye
  • Britton defeats Nash (218 to 160 - Britton advances)
  • Nash (-16) - 3rd place - $165
    
• Morrow vs Britton - CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH
  • Britton defeats Morrow (247 to 179)
     
  • Morrow (+113) 2nd place - $200
  • Britton (+163) 1st place - $300