As a background, I am a 16 mph, 325-350 rpm lefty. My “stock†shot has a good amount of rotation and extremely low tilt. I have been bowling for 50 years, competitively for 45. My composite average since 2000 has been 221. I am currently not a staff member for any ball company. When I do a review, I try to give an honest assessment. Not just “everyone needs to have one of these in the bagâ€. No ball works everywhere for everyone, and I try to honestly identify a ball’s strengths and limitations.
I’ve been struggling in my league this year. It’s a scratch trios league with four games per night. The lanes seem to “cliff†very quickly, resulting in a lot of over/under. I thought a medium condition solid cover symmetrical ball with moderate differential would help smooth things out and give me a better look. I came across an undrilled Forza SS. Motiv had this ball in their “Medium Oil/Smoother Motion†category. Having never thrown a Motiv ball before, I thought this would be a good benchmark ball and decided to give it a try. I left it in box surface and drilled it up with my “standard†45 x 5 x 30 layout. This puts the pin over the fingers, just left of the bridge, and the CG kicked out some. I use pin up drillings since my axis tilt is so low. Pin down drillings tend to roll over the holes for me. I didn’t get a chance to practice with it before league night, so really didn’t have any idea what to expect.
In warm-ups, I started by standing 20, 8 at the arrows, and out to about 5 at the breakpoint. I was using an adjustable support set completely neutral. The ball got through the heads and early midlane pretty easily, although it was obvious that the ball really wanted to read the lane. I remember thinking that this is how a solid should look – smooth with a rounded back end. But it was leaving more 7-pins than I would like. For my first “real†shot, I decided to try cutting the speed just a bit to see if it would come up a little more flush and carry the 7. The ball read noticeably earlier, came up high, and left the baby split. Yep, this thing is looking for an excuse to read and go. I decided to try increasing the lateral wrist adjustment 10 degrees to the inside and increasing to 10 degrees of cup. This would let me come around the ball a bit more to create a little more shape on the back end. Now the ball rolled up dead flush and split the 8-9. It never even thought about deflecting. By the fourth frame people were commenting on the ball reaction. By the sixth frame they were going over to the ball return to see what ball it was.
In the eighth frame the ball read just a bit early and drifted high. This surprised me as I was the only lefty playing that part of the lane and there was still some oil on the surface of the ball to wipe off before each shot. This would normally indicate that it’s not absorbing oil as quickly as some. I generally prefer that, as it means both the shot (short term) and coverstock (long term) will last longer. But I decided to trust the ball, made a “3 and 2†adjustment, and the ball crushed the pocket. Okay, so the ball told me the truth. As the night went on, I continued to make “2 and 1†adjustments every six frames or so. I was starting to get a bit nervous, as I figured sooner or later I was going to get to the point where it wouldn’t recover and I would start to leave corner pins. And since I hadn’t practiced with it alongside my other equipment, I wouldn’t know how much adjustment to make if I had to “ball downâ€. But it just continued to recover as I moved deeper and deeper. Near the end of the fourth game I was standing 30, around 14 at the arrows, still going out to about 5 at the breakpoint, and finally left a “half hit 7â€. Now what? The ball was telling me it had finally reached its limit, but there wasn’t time to ball down and go fishing. I decided to increase the lateral adjustment another 5 degrees to the inside and increase the cup by another 5 degrees. The ball came roaring back, crushed the pocket, and split the 8-9 again. Wow, this thing takes hand position changes really well. I finished out the night with a nice 967 series for the four games. Not bad for its “maiden voyageâ€.
All in all, I think Motiv pegged this one just right. Definitely for the medium oil shots. I think it would struggle on anything drier than medium or short patterns unless you are substantially speed dominant or very high tilt. I think it would be useable on heavier (but not truly heavy) conditions if you’re higher rev or can keep your angles in front of you. The back end is round (which in no way should be construed as “weakâ€, as it is tremendously continuous) and very predictable. It tells you when it’s time to make an adjustment without a huge penalty (no “pocket on one shot and big four the nextâ€). It takes speed and (especially) hand adjustments very well. It’s one of those rare balls that wants to read the lane and is smooth enough to use as a benchmark ball, but strong enough where you really don’t have to go to something else once you get the read. It’s not going to give you one of those eye-popping “somebody kicked it sideways†reactions. I guess you would just have to settle for “10 back†time after time. I can live with that.
