If you track high (and can't get away with pin down drillings in general), you will clip the fingers. Placing an x-hole 6 3/4" away from the pin on a line through the pin-CG at that 45 degree angle will raise the bowtie and this can help prevent flaring over the fingers. The x-hole also increases the asymmetry and dynamics of the core to liven up the ball reaction. Because the pin location is not based off your PAP with this specific layout, everyone will get very different results simply based off that. A person with a PAP 5 1/2" over will get less flare and a later reaction than someone with a PAP 4" over. With your PAP, the reduced flare will help you get more length out of the ball despite the very low pin, which will help prevent the ball picking up too early and overhooking, plus it will help reduce the chance of the ball rolling out and not carrying well.
I put a Rico drill on my old Storm Eraser Banshee -- you can see the ball in action
in this video clip. It's a moderately weak pearl to begin with, so it actually can come in handy on drier shots, though this ball hates carrydown so it's pretty condition specific for me. More of a tournament piece. I initially tried throwing it with no x-hole and it barely flared (my PAP is 5 1/4" over by 3/4" up for reference) and really labored to turn the corner once anything resembling carrydown hit. The x-hole brought the ball back to life and gave it a much more predictable motion. But as you can see from this clip, the Rico drill does not necessarily make a ball early and smooth. It just makes it earlier and smoother than it would be with most other drills. The nature of the ball will still show through (the Banshee is pretty skid/snap by nature, so this layout tamed down the over/under reaction)
Edited on 9/11/2008 8:43 AM