Ive been bowling years, my ball speed is adequate but I am rev rate dominate. Mine goes ~16 off the pin deck and I came generate ~16.5 off the pin deck ok. But I want to generate ~18.5 off the pin deck. So how the heck are kids doing it today? I could not do it 30 years ago in my prime. No matter how much I try I am not using some muscles that they are. So hows it done?

There is only one system that I know of that captures speed at the deck.  Cats, bowlers map does not.  In order for the ball to hook, it has to slow down, otherwise it would go dead straight.

Correct me if I am wrong, but if you threw 18.5 at the deck, the ball would not hook and hyou would have to be around 23 at the arrows.

It doesn't seem that most bowlers need over 16 miles an hour at the pin deck to generate wonderful striking power.

Often right near 19 mph off the hand.

REgards,

Luckylefty
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Open the door...see what's possible...and just walk right on through...that's how easy success feels..

I agree in that I believe 16-16.5 at the pin deck is probably plenty of speed particularly if you are throwing much hook (The more hook thru the measuring trap the slower it measures). But that that wasn't the question.

Some of it is genetics simply having more fast twitch muscles.

But I believe more is technique. As another poster said most of the bowlers throwing those high speeds have a couple things in common.

One the all open their shoulders close to 90 degrees to the foul line. Notice most have their non-bowling arm pointing forward with their thumbs pointed towards the approach.

This allows them to get a backswing above their shoulders. This extra height and leverage position gives them a long acceleration arc. Coupled with a shorter slide they generate the extra speed.

Being older school myself,  I learned to keep everything square throughout the approach. This limits the height of my backswing (along with my limited flexibility) combined with years of wear and tear on my body, my ball speed is pretty limited anymore.

Interesting conversation. Leveraging your shoulders as discussed above, as opposed to staying square definitely affects ball speed.

The trick is to learn how to adjust to increase and decrease ball speed as needed. Generally, I find that if I stay square, while it reduces  my ball speed, it increases my accuracy. When I need more speed, I am learning to drop my shoulder, and use leverage to increase ball speed. I think one must learn to make these adjustments to be a complete bowler.

I noticed that Cimanelli(sp) actually squared up more a shot or two, reduced his backswing, rev rate, and speed a couple of weeks ago on the show. I don't know if it was intentional or not, but I beleive he did it to see if he could get a different look to carry the seven.
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Those that can do. Those that can't complain. Pimpin ain't easy, but it's mandatory.

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I studied the slow motion videos on youtube of several pro'7s for several hours last night. Bowled tonight determined to do a few things differently. After about 7 or 8 frames it started to come together. By the end of the night I was almost natural.

Being rev rate dominate I tend to flat 10 alot (balls just uses up it energy to soon). Having recently reverted back to an old span and finding some quick success (781, 690, 770, 817, 680 the first 5 sets) I still realized that I was still heavely rev rate dominate as I pinged many 10's.

Tonight I scored 714 but my ball speed was 17 to 17.5 off the pin deck. And the benefit was exactly what I expected more power at the pins. FLying bird dogs. It was nice... got many people who noticed the difference.

Basically, I changed my body position at the foul line, standing more errect during the approached all helped to clear the path for my armswing. Additinoally, I tightened up my thumbhole and relaxed the swing. I relaxed the grip on the ball. These changes made at least 1 to 1.5 mph and may have actually increased my rev rate. Two shots in particular looked like someone completely different threw the ball... I thought it was sick! Anyway, it feels good at 49 to be able to throw some shot like that.

I still feel like I have much more potential and will work on using the opposing shoulder to generate more. Thanks to all for your assistance.