Just got back from nationals and had a pretty good trip.  I think it my sixth nationals and so far the pattern as been pretty much the same (for me at least) with billings being the exception (where the gutter played).  I decided to have a classic zone drilled up while I was there, as I knew that I need something with some length that would clear the fronts a little easier.   I’m about 340 RPM’s, and at the time on that pattern was a little more forward with rotation, about 40 degree’s or so (slightly more forward).

Team event (10:30pm) they were a little tighter than I thought they would be so I started out with ultimate inferno hit lightly with a green pad.  Started out playing 18 to 12 or so but ball was little jumpy in the midlane for me and basically ground out 185.  I’ve heard from many people that the lanes transition very quickly so went ahead and made a change.  Next game moved left, changed to the new classic zone I had drilled onsite; 4.5” pin down, box surface.  Moved into 21 or so out to 14, almost like a fall back shot with a little more arc on the backend.  Did a little better, 202 with an open.  Last game moved in a little deeper still to about 23 to 14 and finished 238.   Our team actually did pretty well, and finished with 2964.  One of our guys had some trouble the last game and shot 120 which hurt us a little last game, but I think that’s the closest we’ve come to 3k since I’ve been coming out.  As far as approaches goes they were OK and got better the more that we bowled but I think they were a little tacky, especially the 24” inches in front of the foul line.  The approaches definitely influenced a few bad shots in the first game.   In singles and doubles either I got used to them or they were just better as they didn’t seem to cause any problems.

Doubles started where I finished in team and was pretty close reaction wise.  I went 208 , 211, 215 still playing around 23 out 14 or so. I thought one of guys in our group had a much better reaction (especially in team) than me.  He was playing a little slower with more surface, 20 to as far as maybe 10 or so.  Farther than that it wouldn’t return.  His light hits were carrying much better than mine, but when his ball started burning up a little he lost his reaction entirely and never really recovered.   Put it this way, he left two 5 7 10’s in the same game on balls that looked great up until the last 5 feet.   So for those that are little softer in speed, set it short, you can arc it out to 10 and your carry will be better, but the transition when they start to hook can be very troublesome so be ready for it.

Singles we moved to the next pair, which looked like were hooking more.  Yep, 4 count through the face on the first shot.   The were sparking about 7 more boards more so took a big step left and played 26 to about the same spot 13/14 and was back in business.  Shot 237, 225.  Then the last game reaction changed just a little for some reason, and could get any strings going, and 7-10, and chopped spare for 169.   A nice game there would have made for some nice bracket profit to.  Not sure if I would have done anything different that last game as I was making good pitches.  Probably could have good to a piece that flipped stronger as I made that last move left going into the last game. I think I was standing close 47 or 48 or so going into the 3rd game in singles.  I think the classic with the arc drilling just wasn’t turning the corner strong enough when I got in that deep.   Should have either just jumped on a little more with the hand or went to a ball that flipped more.

As a whole, nobody was scoring playing right of 10.  I saw people that tried to play the gutter but there just wasn’t anything there to work with.  The old timers of course were playing straight up 10 as always but I didn’t see to many repeating shots either.

All in all cleared 2.5k in brackets with mediocre scores and finished with 1890 AE.  Scores as a whole a down a little, I think more so from the fact that the pattern is transitioning a little faster than in the past and is just giving the bowlers fits trying to put together a big set.

Here’s a webcam pic of me bowling in the team event.  You can see even in team event we were playing pretty deep.

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/burrc/detail?.dir=eb82&.dnm=ced8.jpg&.src=ph

good write-up
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I (was) my only ignored user (until 4/3/05)

BTW, the casino was pretty bad and my experience pretty much mirrors everybody elses experience there.  Video poker had pretty bad payouts, craps didn't offer any odds on passline, etc.  The no limit texas holdem tabels had kind of low buyins considering the $1/2 blinds ($100). I think the walk from the tournament site the casino is where the doors being locked come in to play.  If you don't go to the casino to pickup bracket money or gamble then the doors really aren't a issue.  You have to walk around the entire buidling to get to the casino where if you could walk straight out it would save a lot of time.  In addition the fire alarm went off while I was there as well.  Seems to be pretty common thing.  Somebody onsite said it was weather related to a tornado warning, but I'm not sure.  I didn't see any mobile home around so I wasn't that worried.

Just had time to bowl the BTM tournament.  Bowled a 11:00 am squad. Pattern is 42 feet flat with pretty strong backends.  Low scoring wasn't so much the pattern, but the lack of play on it.  The BTM doesn't get that many entries so you end up bolwing on fresh pairs much of the time, which makes it a pretty low scoring environment.  700 plus entries and nobody to date has had a clean set ($10,000 if you do).  I think it would be much more playable if you could get a good group of bowlers together and bowl several squads to break down the pattern a little.  As it stands your ball reaction changes just about every shot which makes it pretty tough to post up a big set.  Personally I shot 299 the first game out of the gate and then proceded not to shoot another 200+ game for the next 7, lol.

I was throwing a ultimate inferno 4x4 400 grit when I started.  Probably 1 or 5" pin would have been better although it might be hard to get those drillings to hit. They are't normal drillings I take with me.  Basically need something to read the fronts and not over read the fresh backends.  A better strategy would be to get a big group of bowlers together and break down the pairs a little to make them more scorable.  Bowling ghost squads on pure fresh conditions makes it pretty hard to score.  Main problem is that that the lanes change so much during the course of just a few shots.  I would say that playing them straighter seem to work better than trying to move left and hook it more.  I did try the same box surface classic zone that laid off on the back end on the nations pattern.  On the BTM pattern it hook about 10 boards on back end (the last 10 feet).  Not very controllable to say the least.   Ball surface was much more important than layout.