Have bowled 3 weeks so far, chameleon 1st, scorpion 2nd, viper this past Monday, and they ain't kidding that when you miss 1 board sometimes if your you can get away with 2 board miss that it ain't going to strike.

I bowled the best so far with 555 on chameleon, then terrible on Scorpion whihc I thought I would do well on, went 506 haha. Then Viper kicked my butt this week with 536.

Shorter Patterns thought-

One thing i have noticed with this house I am bowling at. If you miss outside it is gone, even with a house pattern there 5 board out is slick in general, it is weird. The shorter patterns like say the Viper, they say stay out by the gutter, well here that is a nono, you go to 3 board and unless you use a heavy oil ball, it is not coming back to the pocket. This was something that made the Viper and Cheetah (I practiced on for next week) so hard, it was like I can;t miss left at all or it is through the nose maybe brooklyn, miss outside it is floating away. I am stuck on these two and can see the Cheetah killing me on Monday.

Longer pattern thoughts-

On the Chameleon i did well, even though this pattern from what I have heard was going to be very difficult. I didn't think so that much. started out 223 the first game playing 18-12 with Element NE10. The problems started about 2nd frame of 2nd game, shot I had was gone, I mean gone. I moved around with bad results, missed some spares, 149. Thrid game came back around and changed ball to strong pearl had better game. I have a new look at this pattern for next time. Wasn't that bad.

Scorpion I made bad ball choiced, started with pin under Break S-75, ball made the shot look like a light oil pattern, I kept going through the nose, kept moving left and still goin through the nose. I caught myseklf not focusing that much on my target at all that night which I know led to the lower than happy with scores. I don't think  this pattern is any heavier than our legue pattern only flatter, next time i am starting out with mild solid reactive or a medium strong pearl with some surface. Stayed after and bowled 3 games with my Break pearl and had alot of room it seemed like.

I have noticed i have had to play more swing than i was wanting, or anticipating doing on all the patterns so far. Oh and my release has been iffy lately sometimes, and when I miss at the bootom, disaster lurks 60 feet down.

Big bonus is that it is really improving my stait and hard spare game, I am pretty good with my single pin and un-shadow multi spares. 3-6-10 is still my nemesis for some reason but will overcome it.
 

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What is sandbagging???

Bowling my first PBAX league this summer.  Averaging 196 after 5 weeks, but I expect that to improve as I'm getting more comfortable every week.

I love the house and the people who run my PBAX league, but I've come to the conclusion that what I see every week is nothing like what the pros see.  The lanes are about 2 years old AMF synthetics and they always play slicker than any other house I've bowled in.  Just like LaneHammer20's experience, there is always an out-of-bounds and the outside is always slicker than the pattern ought to be.  For instance, last night I played straight up 4-5 with a Track Rule GP2 (solid particle) at about 500 abralon, and I have OK revs.  5 weeks ago I would have thought that idea completely insane.  That shot ought to pick the 7 pin off the rack.

Like many have said, I have no luck at all playing any swing on these patterns.  Seems no matter where on the lane, one board right and the ball is gone.  So my plan is to play straight up the boards where I am most accurate, and change equipment, surface, speed, etc. depending.  11-13 for Shark, 3-5 for Cheetah, somewhere in between otherwise.

I'm still very happy I joined, and ultimately it is much more challenging, but PBA it ain't.  First, the lane surface, oil type, machine, and human dressing the lanes are all different,  Second, we have two bowlers per lane, so we really don't create much burn or carrydown.  And last, we get 5 minutes of practice to try to find a shot, not 20-30 minutes to purposely alter the pattern to our liking.  So I just take it for what it is and try to find my own way to generate score, regardless of what the graphs or USBC videos tell me.

-Scott in PA.