Well, this weekend couldn't have ended better. I was in Madison bowling a conference meet Saturday Night/Sunday morning, and the opportunity to go to the Masters came up. Our team took it, and we were there. We were in row 19 off to the left a little of the pair. It seemed like a ways away, but you could really see the balls moving and the seats were sweet.
Match 1- We were all pulling for Boghosian, but it just wasn't his day. PA was dialed in and Brian was spreading it everywhere. I still would like a chance to bowl in something like that, especially at Miller Park.
Match 2- Once again, we were pulling for Healey(go righties) and it just didn't work out. The match was fun to watch, but Healey should have had that match if he didn't chop that 3-6, or 3-10 for that matter. Very intense, and the fans were going crazy watching Healey come back.
Final Match- Clearly, we were pulling for Wiseman, and it worked well. Wiseman came out and crushed that first shot and everyone went nuts, I think he feeds off of it. Well, many a strike later for Danny and the place was rocking. I was glad to see him win the major, he deserves it.
Afterwards, we made it out to the equipment tent to look at the sponsor booths. Low and behold, there were quite a few pros hanging around out there. First off the bat, I got Mika to sign my ticket stub, and was able to get Mika and PB3 to take a picture of me and the other guys from the team(very cool of them)We got to talk to them for a bit before all the people came in. We kept walking around and saw Tom Baker hanging around. As we moved along we saw Johnny Petraglia (rather unexpected) so we talked with him for a little bit. We made it over to the Dyno-Thane table and saw Dave D'Entremont. We hit up the Ebonite/Hammer table and saw quite a few people. Jason Couch, Doug Kent, Tommy Jones, DJ Archer, and such. I was able to get Couch and Kent to sign my ticket stub, so it was pretty cool. The Storm booth was last on the circuit, and Chris Johnson was there. All in all, it turned out to be a pretty good trip(I bowled well too this weekend so it was all the better).
It was intersting to see all of the things that go into making a telecast. There were so many cameras around, and all the producers running around getting the crowd hyped up. At one point though, there was an interview going on and the audio cut into the stadium while Healey was in mid approach and he had to stop. On last note, Thunder Sticks may be the most annoying fan tool ever created.
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Dan Chambers
Winona State University Bowling