Well, the first regional is under my belt. Took the plunge, along with a few other ballreviews.com members and travelled to the Lombard PBA Wild Turkey Bourbon regional tournament. I can honestly say that I simply don't have as much talent to compete at the upper echelon level of competitive bowling, yet. And that's a big condition. After nearly 45 games of practice and competition over the last five days, my arm is spaghetti. My hands have blisters in places I didn't know I had places. I started off in practice this morning absolutely lost. Could not accurately control the break point with ANY ball that I threw so I could figure out which ball was going to be the one to start with. It was as if I lost two MPH of ball speed overnight. No swelling of the fingers or thumb, but two blisters on each digit. Big, deep blisters. These were not the reason I bowled poorly by any stretch of the imagination. So, after the 15 minutes of practice were over, I took out my Original Inferno and tried to play around third arrow to the gutter with feathered speed and a soft release to get the ball to around 45 feet, the desired break point for me on this shot. First shot, flush 9-pin. Welcome to the big show. I promptly WHIFF the (*&%&%ing thing. This was not the way this was supposed to work, but, was to be the foreshadow of things to come. After wallowing for a 134 outta the gate, I was all but out the door as I bowled with Lennie Boresch, Jr., winner of the most recent tourney in Madison and arguably, Wisconsin's finest kegler, on the same pair as me at +67. Nothing like 133 outta the lead to get your day off to a flying start. However, knowing that this was merely the first "inning" of the game, I decided to to make the best of the situation and hang in there. Next game, front seven. Six bell-ringers and one crossover. Thought I was beginning to throw the ball better. Eighth frame, one board inside for 3-4-6-7-10.. Strike in the ninth, whiff a 6-pin for 228. Front seven, 228, four opens through two games. I've already equaled my optimistic number of open frames for the day through two freakin' games. After five games, I've grinded my way back to +43. Not too shabby. Toss 650 my last three and I've got an almost certain second day of action to come. 160-182-149 to finish off the day -66. My arm absolutely turned to jell-o. I couldn't keep from clobbering the head pin leaving 3-pin after 3-pin after big-4 split combo. I needed twp MPH of ball speed more than anyone in the building. Once again, blisters were a little cumbersome, but nothing that I can honestly say posed a serious hindrance. Steven Taylor and Boresch combined for somewhere around +500 between the two(+295 & +215) while fellow BR member, Josh Adams and I were nothing more than innocent bystanders. Jay Heinzelman and Gene J. Kanak also were there. JA, GJK, and myself will be doing the usual list of honey-dos Sunday. Not sure how Jay did, but I hope it was better than us. Josh and Gene were a blast to meet and I hope to meet a lot more of the upper Midwest BR members for get-togethers like this in the future. In fact, if there's ANYONE that would like to hook up in Watertown, Wisconsin for an impromptu tourney midway through August, I'd be happy to set it up. Until then, my equipment will remain in my bag, I'll mow the grass, clean the gutters, rake the lawn, or shingle the roof to avoid bowling that poorly on one of the easier patterns on the tour. I know my mental game is pretty solid. And the fact that I've coming off of two weeks with strep throat after 10 days in the hospital for pancreatitis couldn't have exactly helped my overall stamina for the rigors of tournament play. But, I'll have to accurately prepare for the next PBA tournament I decide to enter a lot better than this one.
--------------------
Pain is weakness leaving the body.
Edited on 6/5/2005 10:19 AM
