Hi folks, update on my first ever coaching.
we started at 10am, open a lane for 1.5hours.
its more of a profiling stage where he asked me to bowl my usual, went on for a couple of shots, then he whip out his notebook and showed me the program he uses for coaching and analyzing bowlers. the program is pretty kool, with the video, u can identify the tape on the ball to calculate rev rates etc etc.
Showed me a clip of an ideal strike, talked a bit more on some fundamentals, then proceeded to the backend of the lane, first time i actually went down the lane in person, its kinda kool, (we were on the side lanes) i could literally see where the oiling stopped (38 ft) and backend was dry.
moved back up, and started with vid shot of me. then plug it to his notebook and presto, analyzed my front, side and back, he could use the program to freeze frame and draw lines from body CofG and line it up to foot, etc etc, pointed out my flaws.
could see for myself my backswing was twisted and thus my shots had high tendency to gutter, but since its intermittent, i cant adjust.
it was like i was on the operating table, and the surgeon was working on me, watching the vid was like an out of body experience. Together with his explanation it was easy to understand my mistakes and the advantages of correcting them.
then we went back to his shop, came a presentation on bowling ball 101. full explaination of important ball reference points, RG, differential etc etc.coverstock etc etc. it was full on and luckily i already had done my ground work with information from here. heh heh
then he went on about ball weight, and he got my PAP, a rough one base on my ball track, but still a PAP nonetheless.
decided on 14lbs, but here comes the tricky part. he wasnt aware i was up to date on ballline ups from the various brands.
his stock at hand was somewhat disappointing,old lineups, from 2007 to some plastic balls to have somewhat a yellow tinge that u would see from old age. saw a couple Columbia ricochet.
there was a crash and bang from ebonite if i am not mistaken. but in light weights.
basically nothing much to choose from. had a choice of firing inferno,world domination (both from the international line ups) and a blackwidow it think.
so when i turned down his suggestion on the 3 high end balls and proceeded to talk about his storm furious as the kind of ball i am looking for, it being a strong solid reactive with its counter part "Fast" being the pearlize version, thats when he was surprised that a) i know my stuff b) i have internet connection c) i can read product catalog. haha
long story short, i found a groove sitting at a corner, it was 14lbs 1oz, it was ideal for me. so tomorrow i am going to get my first "learners car" together with my first leson on ball mapping and the whole process of taking measurements to the finished product. its like the mechanic talking thru with me while working on my car. Is that fantastic or what?