I know when I bowl good their is a noticeable lag between when my thumb leaves the ball and when my fingers come out.
I have always had this strong seperation of thumb...........fingers leaving the ball. In my head it sounded like boooooooooom.............Boom.
When I don't bowl as well it sounds like this boooooom...Boom.
With the first example it seems like I have so much area it is almost unfair.
IN the second example I have no area 1 board to strike on!
Since I shortened my span I've had a lot of boooom..Boom. Not enough seperation.
Almost a tie.
The way it is suppossed to be the long delay it reminds me of the hand action of my all time favorite the late great Earl.
Anyway I had a practice session yesterday that had a ton of booooom...............Boom. 220s were tough not to score even with my mediocre 7 pin sparemaking.
THERE was one clear difference.
Thanks to the direction of King of the Mill I"ve tweaked a few things again about my drill setup. Mainly gone back to more thumb lateral under.
(See posts in this drilling section regarding the Bill Taylor coke bottle test). Also I've evened up my fingers in span and even on a few balls put my middle finger a 1/32 longer. (I used to be 1/8 longer ring).
I've also reduced my reverse on my 4 9/16 span down to about 0. (I've had to add front bevel to accomodate this setting of the thumb.
I took two sets of balls to the alley.
One set with lateral under of 3/32(left for me) similar to right for righies.
Another set with lateral under of 7/32. (just over 3/16).
What a difference! The seperation in time betweem thumb fingers though probably just a 1/16 of second seemed like days!!!!!! Longer on the 7/32 lateral. boooooom...................Boom. Yes the thumb was coming out much earlier with the 7/32.
My arm with the greater lateral under clearly travelled to strongly to the side of the ball. My backend was fantastic and recovery was great as the ball seemed to just stay just on my fingers forever so I could control the amount of backend.
Now I'm not saying this is the answer for all. As when I test on the coke bottle test my thumb points between middle and ring finger(calling for about 1/4). But I had this same feeling at 1/8 thumb under lateral when I had a stretched span of over 5/16 inch longer. Now with a shorter span almost 5/16 shorter I've all of a sudden recaptured that strong feeling of seperation thumb..........fingers.
Now I've got again.
However when I used my 3/32 lateral thumb under balls the arm went straighter up the back of the ball, less seperation in thumb fingers, less recovery if missed slightly to the outside of my mark and much less area.
The difference I want to point out are two things. (Because I've tried 1/4 lateral under palm pitch before).
1. After consulting with King of the Mill we discussed the tension of ring and middle(ring had much more tension. Equalizing that(ie shortening my ring to equal or be slightly shorter than middle). (YOU don't have to have equal spans to have equal tension but I do). Before when I had a lot of lateral under thumb with a lot more tension on ring the ball wanted to move up high and hard on head pin. Now when looking at the similar tension span and combining with the proper (more lateral under thumb the ball is flushing).
2. I've also forgotten the tables and kept moving my forward reverse up incrementally by 1/32 a pop until I'm just about 0 but with quite a bit more bevel than my reverse pitches which had little bevel. (0 is not the magic number for anyone else) it just is the magic number for ME with this span and THIS amount of bevel.
There is a writer Bill?
Who wrote a little book called "bowling secrets of the pros". He talked about the quicker the thumb came out of the ball the greater the area. He and the book have disappeared off the web. But the concept is right!
boooom..............Boom!
Hope you're boom booming too!
REgards,
Luckylefty
PS note I used to use 1/8 under with a tapered vinyl thumb insert. Probably in all reality this was really 3/16 lateral under due to the effect of the taper on the contact surface taper.
PPS I"ve often had the analogy in my mind that the proper amount of lateral under in the thumb is similar to the proper "'strong" grip in golf. If you're grip is not strong enough one cannot swing the clubhead out enough to the side of the fairway to draw it. With too weak a grip one can only draw the ball by slightly pulling it(over the top). So I believe it is with too little lateral for YOUR thumb anatomy. I'm a living example. With the 3/32 lateral above to get enough drive in the pocket I almost feel I must almost pull the ball with my arm swing. With the 7/32 lateral my arm finishes up near my left ear as an extension of my shoulder swing straight or even slightly to the side of my body alignment. Think Walter Ray.
Edited on 8/5/2004 9:13 AM
Edited on 8/5/2004 9:17 AM
