Over the past few weeks, I've been searching for a way to match up better against the lane conditions I'm seeing this year. Because of all the work I've done to match up better on the PBA shots and the issue with my shoes, I've lost the look on the house shots. So recently I purchased 2 Storm bowling balls, a Hy-Road and a Rapid Fire Pearl. I drilled the Hy-Road the same way that I have a T-Road Pearl, which is pin to the right of the ring finger and the CG kind of between stacked and label leverage, this gives me the ability to use it on many conditions because it takes advantage of my ability to roll the ball more end over or with more side roll if necessary. I also drilled up a Rapid Fire Pearl to complement the Hy-Road with the pin over the bridge and the CG out somewhere between 60 and 45 degrees. Both balls have been surfaced to 1000 abralon w/ Magic Shine polish.
Hy-Road:
This ball is basically a stronger version of my T-Road Pearl, which is pretty much what I expected. It picks up earlier than the T-Road Pearl, but is a little smoother downlane. I took this ball to Utah with me on a current vacation and threw it with a Columbia 300 Arch Rival. The 2 balls ended up being pretty close in ball reaction, the only noticable difference is that the Hy-Road picked up a few feet little later. The Hy-Road may have cornered a little sharper, but not much. I also used the Hy-Road in a tournament on New Years Day for the middle games with a decent amount of success bowling on the 41 ft Kegel Beaten Path pattern.
On Sunday night, I used it in a practice session up against a T-Road Pearl, a Momentum and a Rapid Fire Pearl. The 1st game I used my Momentum and was playing the track area and I had a really good look. The second game I used the Hy-Road and it ended up being about 3 boards right of the Momentum (no surprise) using the same ball speed and hand position. The Hy-Road was considerably earlier and smoother than the Momentum. The next 2 games I used my T-Road Pearl with the same surface as the Hy-Road. The T-Road Pearl was about 2-3 boards right of the Hy-Road and needed to be sent to the right a little further in order to recover. The look wasn't great, but it still looked better than what I have been seeing lately. Now that I have a Hy-Road, the T-Road Pearl is getting shined up so that there is more of a difference between the 2. The last 2 games, I rolled the Rapid Fire Pearl (see below).
Rapid Fire Pearl:
Last year, I remember using the T-Road Pearl and the Spit Fire as a tandem, the T-Road when I needed a stronger midlane and the Spit Fire when I needed more backend. I sold my Spit Fire to a friend that is currently using it very well in my Friday night league. I decided to give the Rapid Fire Pearl a try with a length drill to complement the Hy-Road / T-Road Pearl. I picked this ball up on Saturday and put 12-3 games on it Saturday night with mixed results, mainly due to a grip problem that I've been trying to work out lately. I threw a Complete NV the first couple of games and then switched to the Rapid Fire Pearl. After a few shots with this ball, I remembered why I like this core so much, it got thru the front part of the lane better than the T-Road, read a little later and covers more ground in the backend, but isn't quite as sharp as T-Roads on the backend. Because of the grip problem I've been working thru, the carry on the first day wasn't very good, but carry has been bad no matter what ball I use lately.
I cleaned it up Saturday night and hit it with a fresh 1000 grit abralon pad and Magic Shine Polish and took it back out Sunday night. I used it for the last 2 games of my Sunday practice and had an extremely good look with it. It was cleaner thru the front and picked up later than the T-Road Pearl and had tremendous power thru the pins. I think I shot close to 100 over in the 2 games I used it. Granted this is practice by myself on a frish pair after fixing a grip problem, seeing the ball do the right thing on the lane is alwyas good for the confidence. So far, this ball is exactly what I was looking for when I bought it and I can't wait to use it in competition.
