Touring Players Championship Recap

Hey Guys, long time no post. I'm sorry that I have not posted in a while due the fact that I was transitioning from beautiful Washington state to corn field Nebraska for school and bowling. Now I'm finally settled, I figured I would let you all know how things went for me down in Las Vegas for the prestigious JBT TPC.

I should start off by saying that we drove down to Las Vegas which means 2 days of travel, which for me was very unfortunate because I am a bowler where I have to keep up on my practice to continue to perform. So of course do the non stop travel and getting into Reno late, I didn't get to keep up on my practice schedule, which was gonna throw me all off. Luckily we got into Las Vegas, late afternoon/ early evening, which was gonna be perfect for me to work out all the kinks in my game. We decided to eat then head down to the Bowl after dinner, and that kind of back fired on me as cosmic bowling started early that night. I didn't really care that much about the lighting as I was just focusing on my approach first, (I always start with my feet and approach first because you have to have proper footwork and timing in order to bowl at your best. I could talk about that another time. Possible Post?) My footwork during that practice was not good at all, it was off and it was fast, which caused a huge snowball effect to the rest of my game. After a hour of practice, I was getting it back, slowed my feet up, walking straight and the release at the bottom was wierd, I was spinning it which is never good. One thing that always works for me when I am struggling or bowling bad is video tape or have an extra set of eyes watching you (important that they know your game very well) in this case was my Dad. It took time and I just told myself "fingers inside of thumb" which made everything better and ready for the weekend.

So I will be honest, I didn't have very much confidence going into this tournament due to my lack of practice. We started off on Boardwalk, 35ft pattern, which was a good pattern to start off because short patterns are my better patterns I guess you can say. I had this idea in my mind of starting with surface and staying with surface and staying right as long as possible. The ball I started out with was a Storm Tropical Heat Hybrid (one of the best balls i have thrown) with 2000 surface on it. I wanted something that was gonna "burn" off down lane and be smoother and not so snappy in the backend, I wanted my breakpoint to be smooth and predictable. In my opinion, I prefer to use surface on short, it gives you a nice look and not so over/under like what a polish ball would give you. Like other things there are always risks, you gotta know when its "burning" up too much instead of leaving corner pins all day. Once I got to that part in the tournament where I left a couple 10 pins in the game and wasn't carrying how I liked, I switched to the Brunswick Avalanche Solid with 4000 surface on it, just basically knocked the shine off of the cover. It gave me a real good look and cleared the heads where the tropical heat began to check, which gave me a great 1-2 punch for that pattern and it showed as i finished 95 up for the block.

After lunch, we bowled on by far my toughest pattern, 2007 Asian Bowling Federations Indoor Games Long pattern. I honestly have never been so lost or never had that much trouble bowling on long, it was really low scoring and your name had to be Marshall Kent to score on it :) Lol. But I think my problems were largely due not having the right ball in my hand or the right ball in the bag, or even in the state of Nevada for that matter. I just couldn't get anything going, couldn't get a consistant ball reaction. I tried playing the fall back shot, tried playing up the boards but i just couldn't get anything going. It was even harder to bowl because I tensed up because I had to split the boards to get to the pocket, and the fact that I knew I had to split them too so I probably forced the ball trying to force it there instead of letting it get there on its own for lack of better terms. Anyways I had enough of this pattern, moving on.... by the way finished like 100 down for the block... my point exactly.

I qualified 17th for the quarterfinals, for the 5 game match play. We bowled on Beaten Path, one of the patterns I have had success on previous in my career. I had the mindset where I didn't have to beat anybody, I had the target on my back, they had to beat me. They had to bowl their best game to beat me, knowing they had to earn it when they bowled me. The first game, I was trailing the first 4 frames of the match than I made a great ball change and sheet to win by 10 pins.. I believe. Then I started to string and start getting that confidence which was great because I started throwing good shots together and winning matches. I ended up winning 4 of my 5 matches and ended up 6th for the top 10 semi finals.

I just wanted to throw a shout out to all the PAC NW who made the top 10 in both Scratch and Handicap, 11 of the 20 total bowlers in both division hailed from the Northwest, safe to say that we represented very well :)

We bowled on the 2008 Team USA Trials Medium, it was very demanding and was basically a grind out from the get go. obviously being somewhat flat, you had very little room to miss. I started with surface and then switched to polished game 4 of 8 and basically grinded out with the rest of them. after 7 games and going into the position round I found myself sitting in 5th, one spot out of the top 4. I was in striking distance, win my match and beat the 4th place guy scratch plus a couple of pins and I would be in, but the catch is that i wasn't bowling the guy in 4th place, so i really had my eyes on two games... BIG MISTAKE.. I was grinding out but then i found my self forcing shots and ended up missing by a few sticks.

Congrats to Vince Bachteler and Tristan Curtis on their TPC victories and a very fine bowled tournament to Kjerstin Richards and Marshall Kent. Very demanding patterns and you 4 bowlers really deserved it.

I'm will post my recent physical game updates and try outs for Midland U Bowling.

Just thought I would finish off on a quote I find myself saying all the time...

"Strikes for Show, Spares for Dough"

Peace, Love and Good Bowling

PC4

JG Wrap up!

What a perfect idea. There is around 3 hours left on the drive back home, so why not write my JG wrap up to pass the time.

First of all, as I am sure all of you have already seen the results, I would like to send a congratulations to Gary Faulkner, Andrew Koff, Zach Hattori, AJ Chapman, and Tyler Vostry for making 2012 Junior Team USA. I would also like to extend a bigger congrats to my friend Marshall Kent for making it on the team for the second year in a row. These bowlers showed exactly why they should be on the team with their bowling during the week and each one deserves the spot.

So, onto my view of my performance, along with general commentary. There is not much to say about qualifying. 18 games on three different patterns. Long, Medium and short. I went +34 on long, +206 on short, and then +105 on medium. I was pleasantly surprised at my performance on medium, as last year it was my worst. The long played much harder this year than it did last year. The short played like a short. One thing I noticed, especially on the short pattern, is that there were a lot of bowlers who had no clue where to play. Im not talking about not bowling well, just flat out play the wrong part of the lane. I saw a fair amount of bowlers playing in the middle with sanded equipment, even when they saw people scoring up the corner. I have a hard time believing that these players have never encountered a pattern like this. Especially with all this promotion of PBA leagues and the ability to acquire Kegel patterns online. Are we up here just fortunate to bowl on hard stuff a lot?

Anyway, onto semi finals. I was leading after qualifying, which was a good and bad place to be. I felt I added a little extra pressure on myself as I thought there would be more people watching our pair than others. But being the leader by nearly 100 pins helped me relax about how I was bowling. The first 6 game block did not go well, but I was able to push myself up to +6 and sit calmly in 5th or so. There were some high sets by a few people around me, so I was caught by a few. The second block, I was able to focus and bowl probably the best set the entire week. I got lined up and never really lost it. Along with bowling better, the bowlers who bowled well last block, seemed to drop to low + and even minus. This also helped as I saw myself climb back up the standings. I ended up going +182 that block, which boosted me back up to 2nd place going into matchplay.

It would be long and boring to explain matchplay, so ill try to give a brief summary of what went down. The first 8 games, I felt I bowled alright. Never really got into a rhythm, but never bowled bad and ended around the top 5 going into the break. I felt I really needed to lock down and bowl well my second block. I started well, shooting 220 the first game, but getting crushed by a 250. Next game I could’ve shot a 250, but ended with a 7-10 in the tenth for a 230. The next couple games we filled with frustration and that lead to a lost focus, causing me to miss a spare and blow count on some splits. Eventually, I took a minute between shots just to collect myself, get my mind back in the game, then saved a 190 out of a game that was looking like a 160. After that renewed sense of achievement, I then proceeded to shoot 230 and then 220, winning both, to vault me all the way back up to 2nd for the final game. Unfortunately, 2-7 were all within each other by about 40 pins. And if things couldn’t get worse, I had to bowl Marshall the final game.
About midway through the game, I had the edge. After that point, it came down to whoever won this game would finish in the top 4 and the loser in 5th. I ended up splitting on a double. Marshall went up and threw three in a row. After sparing out for a 189, Marshall need high count to win the game and get 3rd. To make things interesting, not on purpose of course, he split in the tenth. After some quick calculations, he need to get the count to shutout, which he did. So then that was it. I finished 5th for $3000 and felt like I bowled great to put myself up there.

After the game, I felt like I was swarmed by all my fellow bowlers and friends congratulating me on my bowling this week. Being that it was my last youth tournament, It was a great feeling. My goal going into this tournament was to win and show the country what I can do on the lanes. I was able to accomplish half the goal, which was just fine with me. I felt like my finale was just what I wanted.

As for the Junior Team USA part, im sort of indifferent. I decided not to worry about as a trick to help keep unwanted pressure off myself. But don’t get me wrong, I wanted to make team just as much as anyone else, but it wasn’t something that was on my mind during the bowling. To the contrary of the thinking of everyone else in the bowling circle, I ended up not getting the at large bid to the team. I was a little disappointed, as I bowled well all week, but as I said earlier, I was very happy with what I did out there on the lanes and took home a cool $3000. The two that did get picked deserved it as well, you cant take anything away from both of those bowlers. I knew going into the tournament, that I wasn’t going to get picked, so I had to make the top 4, which I didn’t. I cant change it now. I just have to move on to adult bowling and the much anticipated collegiant circuit.

Overall, this was best two weeks of my youth career. How poetic it would happen at the very end of my career as well. Im going home with $5000 in scholarship, a 300 game in competition, and the best bowled JG of my life. This is the way I wanted to go out.

Id like to extend a thanks to everyone who supported me during the last two weeks, Ty Treddenbarger for our brief, yet insightful coaching sessions, Pat Johns for drilling those ever important bowling balls, and of course my two parents, Jeff and Jill, for taking most of the flak of my rage and of course all the costs of the trips 

-Cameron
“I type like I talk, unstructured and bad spelling”

Im still here

Greetings! As you can tell, Perry and i have been slacking. But Perry did get his JG recap up so thats a plus.

Just a quick update. I have my JG recap all written out, which includes the Las Vegas Open as well. However, its on my laptop and ive been too lazy to post it. Hopefully i can conjure the strength to go upstairs and post it tomorrow...


Also, i have now started into adult ranks of bowling. My first experience of some of the bullshit came at the Kenmore Memorial Swiss. I bowled with my best friend, Sam Neves, and this guy named Chris Pierce. It was a handicap tournament and to my suprise they had me at 194, so 26 pins on my side... However, there were complaints and i got rerated...saying that im averaging 215 in the summer PBA league, so what. The rule was 09-10 book. Whatever, they rerated me to about 210 which was fine with me. We didnt do so well....i entered in some brackets, but unfortunately shot 200's when the pace was 250. Overall a semi depressing showing as i wish i wouldve got some money from it. I guess there will be other times (like this weekend when i bowl another handicap tournament, greeeat.)

Congratulations, however, to Josh Jackson and Sarah Boe, some good friends ive known for a while and bowled against plently of times. They, along with RJ Boe, won the swiss....way to go guys (and girl :) )

Anyway, ill have that JG recap up soon.... stay tuned and thanks again for your time and hope you continue to stay with us as we move on to bigger, possibly better, things.

-cameron

Junior Gold recap

Well junior gold has come and gone, and i better start off saying congrats to everyone who made the team, and especially to my good friend Marshall Kent.

After bringing down 9 balls to choose from, i had to pick my six

I ended up choosing:

Outburst

Eruption

Tropical Heat

Victory Road

Avalanche Solid

T Zone

Day 1:

We bowled on the WTBA Mexico City, it is 45ft long pattern. I started out with the outburst and started stringing. had a good first 3 games then missed a trasition and missed a ball change and absolutely had a bad game. Strange enough though, everyone had a bad game 4 which was really surprising.. anyways then i switched to my victory road with a light surface to smooth out the breakpoint, It worked but wasn't the magic touch going 183 and 183 to close out the set. finished 39 under for the block.

Day 2:

We bowled on the WTBA Los Angeles, 36 ft pattern. I started out right of 5 and used my tropical heat with 2000 surface to smooth out the backend and let it roll. It worked out great starting plus for the first 2 games then once again missed a ball change. then i made a change to the avalanche solid with 4000 surface so it didnt have the snap on the back end and ended up being a great ball choice going the front 8 the next game only to almost 7 9 in the ninth and leave the 7 pin then the next shot almost pocket 7 10.... lol then i went even the next 2 games so i finished 60 over for the block.

Day 3:

We bowled on the WTBA Seoul, 39 ft pattern, started off with the tropical heat, i was getting to the pocket but i wasn't getting the carry then made a ball change to the victory road and started shooting better then it got really wierd for me, balled down to the eruption then game 6 i had to go back because i got into so crazy over under reaction... i finished 49 under but it could of been worse so i am happy.

Day 4:

I qualified 76th of 145 bowlers who made cut which was a improvement for me since i was the cut last year.

WTBA Tokyo 43ft pattern

Block 1:

Started with the Outburst and stayed with it the whole 6 games. . I struggled the first 3 games then pulled my head out of my ass and finished the last 3 games really strong and finished 60 over i believe.

Block 2:

I had the same game plan but a little different starting point, it didnt work. i couldnt catch a break in game 1 then game 2 it was better, actually went plus but then the bad breaks came back to haunt me, then i made a ball change and it worked. all those pins i gained in the first block, i gave back in the second block which is frustrating...

but i moved up the leader board and finished 53rd.

Now to talk about the finals, i missed the first block and watched the final games of the final block. there is some great bowling the last 3 games that i watched. it was some clutch bowling and some good emotions.

congrats to the winners and the people who were in the top 4, that got automatic spots.

the committee got to pick 2 other bowlers from the field of 16, which fellow torched lane blogger Cameron Weier was in.

Cameron had the tournament of his life, never dropping out of the top 5 through the 3 days of qualifying and through semis and so on. he was even leading after day 2. but he was 5th after the finals which didn't get him an automatic spot on team USA and was an at large pick same for the 11 bowlers.

I thought for sure that Cameron was gonna get picked for the team, and how can he not get picked for the team after a tournament like he had during the week. but i guess the United States stops in the midwest because no one from the west coast gets any credit. and cameron didnt get picked for the team which was shocking to everyone. but this isnt the first time the committee passed up great talent, Greg Geering also got passed up last January at the Team USA Trials... its just a shame to see these two great talents and bowlers i would want representing my country not make the team. and by all means no disrespect to the other bowlers, they deserve it too but no one deserves it more then these 2 bowlers..

You don't have basketball without Michael Jordan, You don't have baseball without Babe Ruth, you don't have football without Jerry Rice. you don't have boxing without Muhammad Ali. you don't have hockey without Wayne Gretzky. and YOU don't have Team USA without Cameron Weier and Greg Geering..

A Vegas update: among other things.

Well, it has been i think almost three weeks since my last posting. At that time i was previewing JWTC. That has come and gone along with another tournament as well. I would usually put a tournament preview in here but seeing as i havent yet updated anyone about JWTC, ill just make a mish-mash post including JWTC, Las Vegas Open, and Junior Gold.

Ill start with a quick recap of what went down during JWTC. As i am sure everyone has read Perry's tournament recap, we all know he and his team finished up in third place. A very well bowled tournament for the whole team. They all worked well together and it was fun to watch. A third place showing against the best teams is not a bad thing at all.

My weekend did not go as well. I think Perry did mention something about me going more in depth aboout the sweepers, so ill do that. The sweepers were the first event for the tournament. We bowled on i think it was Route 66, which is a looong pattern. I ended up slow hooking my 715t for the first 2 games and had good success. Unfortunately, i finished poorly and missed cash by about 20-30 pins. Although my good friend Tanner Spacey did end up winning that squad so a big congrats to him.

I bowled the survivor doubles with Jared McNeal, and we had a good time. However the results just werent there as we ended up missing cut. not much more to say about that. It was on short, but i couldnt get a good luck anywhere i played. I ended up throwing that seismic aftermath pearl and it worked ok. Not overly impressed with that ball but thats another entry for another time.

My team event was a blast. Got to bowl with my homies Tyler and Marshall, as well as Jordan Yoke and Kyle Berry. We all bowled decent, but never really got into a rhythm. It was an adventure as well were the last team into the cut to semis. And it just got worse from there. I took us 2 matches before we finally won a game and i think we only won about 3 sets total during semis. Like i said, we didnt bowl bad, just never found a rhythm and never strung anything.

All in all, it was another very fun and nonetheless interesting weekend on and off the lanes. I look forward to going back next year.



The Las Vegas Open recently wrapped up here yesterday (friday). This tournament is run by the folks who run the east coast JBT tournaments. This year was actually only my second time bowling it. We bowled two 6-game qualifying blocks, then a cut, then 8 games of super matchplay, then a modified bracket-stepladder. Super matchplay is where you bowl everyone else in the field every game. You get 10 pins bonus for every person that you beat. So since there was 30 bowlers, there was a max of 290 per game. This lead to insane +numbers.

I had a curious qualifying. Scores were very high. We bowled on a pattern that, well, was pretty easy. you had hold to the left. Almost unlimited. There wasnt too much recovery to the right, but you just had to keep it in the middle somewhere and it hit pocket. Anyway, I ended up throwing a 300 game 11, which then put me +430 for the 11 games so far. Of course, i go on and shoot a 149 my final game to pretty much ruin a very well bowled 12 games. But, still ended up 6th with some buffer room. During the match play i think i average right around 240 for the 8 games. That, along with the crazy bonus, put my into the lead going into the finals.

I received a bye through the first round. to move on, the higher seed only needed one win but the lower seed needed to win twice. I was able to get through Jake Peters in one game and then snuck by Marshall in 2 games. Now i was only 1 win away from the title and $4000 on top. Was i nervous? of course i was. I think this was the most money ive bowled for before in a title match. I know i bowled Zach Hattori in the TPC afew years back for 2k on top. He was like 15 at the time. Now in this title match i was bowling Kamron Doyle, who himself is only like 13.

Anyway, he crushed me the first game, and it looked to be a blowout in the second. With nothing to lose, as all i was doing was leaving spares, i made the call and switched to my HyRoad and strung the next four strikes after two spares. Doyle ends up sparing twice and i all of a sudden had the chance to take the lead and put a lot of pressure on. The next shot was probably the most important of my entire career so far, and i got fast. The ball went too far down the lane and i left a flat 10. I again had a chance to actually lock it up this time, needing to double in the tenth. My first shot i pulled a lot. It pushed but not enough, leaving the 4-pin. Spared, struck. Doyle went up and buried two shots for the win.

That ten pin that i left will probably be in my mind for a while. Not because i didnt carry or anything, but because i didnt make the best shot for that situation. I dont really care about that 4-pin, cause that ten pin was such a pivotal part of the match. I had my chances to put the match away and didnt do it. Whatever, i have a couple days to rest my mind and then get right back into the grind for JG. (ive lost a total of $3000 to a combined age of 28.)

I threw my Outburst and 505t first 6 qualifying. AZO Area for the next 6 and the 8 of matchplay (300 ball.) Threw Area and HyRoad in finals.


Just a quick note, i bowled this scholarship shootout thing at sams town last night and went +70 on the 3 patterns from last years JG. I wont know final results until monday sometime.


Ill Talk about Junior Gold another time. Until then, thanks for reading and have a nice afternoon....i know i will.

-Cameron

Junior Gold Preview

So Junior Gold starts up on monday, and I would do a preview into my prepartion and mindset going into JOG.

Ball Choices: I'm driving to Las Vegas, so since I don't have to worry about airline fees, I decided I would bring 8 balls plus a spare ball to choose from. We are only allowed 6 balls for competition, and i have 3 of those spots for sure filled up, with that being said, My Outburst, Victory Road and spare ball are a for sure lock into the lineup. I have 3 other spots to fill in the lineup between, the eruption, 2fast, avalanche, natural, wicked siege and some other ball i can't remember what else i brought. I am thinking about throwing the eruption into the lineup as a benchmark ball, and something that is gonna be versitale when i need it.

I really don't want to put my natural in the lineup, unless i have an amazing look with it at practice but the avalanche is something i could use on short.

as the week progresses and practice concludes i will post my lineup right here.

My mind set going into this set is not worry about where i am at in the standings and just go out and do my thing and bowl well. one game at a time and continue to string sets together and be happy with it.

I have made some small changes in my game, i moved up a little on the approach to slow my feet down and keep my timing.

also, I freed up my backswing and letting the ball come down instead of pulling it through. everything seems to be working but we will see when competition starts

sorry this is a short post, i m exhausted and can barely think to myself what i should be saying. look for the recap to JOG. have a good one.

"snap it. pull that string"

Weekend Review: JWTC

Well, the first stop in the "summer swing" of big tournaments is in the books. 4 days of non stop bowling is over, and its safe to stay that i m glad its over because i am exhausted.

Day 1: Thursday June 23, Sweepers.

I decided before I came down to Las Vegas that I was gonna save my hand and not bowl the sweepers, but I was gonna go down and watch everyone bowl.  They bowled on the Kegel Route 66 pattern which is 45 ft in length and ton of oil in the middle. scores weren't ridiculously high but i wasn't paying that close attention to it. Cameron will be able to talk more about the sweepers since he actually bowled them.

Day 2: Friday June 24, Survivor Doubles.

I partnered up with Aaron Foshie, from the A-Z (Arizona), and honestly couldn't ask for a better partner. the Survivor Doubles is a side tournament where you and partner alternate frames or aka baker format. the rules stated that once you set your lineup it had to stay that way for the rest of the qualifying block, so we decided Aaron would lead off and i would anchor. We bowled on a short pattern, Bejing (spell check?), 35 ft in length, and it played a little bit longer but not to bad. outside of 5 was O.B. but you had to be around 6 7 8 for your breakpoint on this particular day (well for me anyways).  we started out 200+ then shot like a 190+ then our worst game of the day was game 3 where we ended up shooting like a 160+ which gave us a small obstacle in the rest of the 8 game block then we preceded to shoot 190+ or 200+ just couldnt get that big game until game 7 where we went front 6 or 7 and shot 230. and got to almost even which would of put us on the bubble.  game 8 came down to the last frame, where i needed to double to put us in the cut and i got the first one and unfortunately i missed on the second which dropped out of cut and eliminated from competition.
Although we missed cut, i still had a great time bowling with Fosh, and we ended up crossing with Cameron Smith and Riley Dempsey which couldn't of worked out better because it was a good time.

Day 3: June 25: JWTC Qualifying
 5 games of 5 man bowling then 6 games of Baker format

By far probably the dumbest team out there is "Will Call in" because it was the team i was on and the fact that we never did call in our team name because we never thought of one. lol the team was assembled by Jared McNeal, he picked up your truly, patrick hickok and riand poblete, and i went out and picked up Joe Steiner, my Midland Teammate next fall. we started on this years nationals pattern which wasn't terrible at all, we came out pretty hot on it and continued to stay that way as well. Steiner read the lanes to perfection and was spot on making adjustments and calling them out, which i believe was a key part to our success during the 5 man portion of the block. i believe we were fourth after the 5 man block, and i dont believe we dropped out off the top 5.
Baker rolls around now and we set our lineup as follows, Riand, Patrick, Jared, Perry and Steiner. we started out hot and continue to stay that way. i believe it was game 5 of the baker, where Steiner threw out this bet where if we shoot 300 he would buy us all dinner, so we took the challenge shooting the front 8 only to my 10 pin in the 9th frame.
we ended up fourth after qualifying.

Semi Final Round Saturday:

After qualifying we were sitting in third, we had a pretty good qualifying block, we got a lunch break and reoiled to a different pattern. we ended up bowling on a 39ft sectional pattern which had a 1.95 to 1 ratio which is pretty flat and had DOUBLE the oil that we just bowled on for qualifying. we ended get off to a very good start at all, during matchplay just getting by and getting into trouble. after the 5 baker matches we thought for sure we needed to do good the next day to make up for our mistakes and poor bowling. but come to find out we were still in fourth place which was a shock for us all.

Semi Final Round Sunday:

same pattern as the day before but we came in with a completely different game plan, using surface to give us a good look at the lanes. I ended up using my tropical heat with a 1000 surface on it and it was consistant and rolled nice. we came out bowling good then position round we had a shot at 2nd going into the stepladder, we ended up shooting 534 for 2 games with bonus that jumped us to 2nd by 4 pins.

Stepladder:
We were the 3rd match in, couldn't do worst then 3rd and one match out of bowling for the title. we came out with a solid first game but ended up losing by 10 then we had trouble the 2nd game and losing the match coming home in 3rd place.

I couldn't ask for a better experience and team, it was well worth it.

Weekend Preview: JWTC

Welcome to another entry in our Weekend Preview series. Today, ill preview this coming weekend in which i will be competing in the Junior World Team Challenge tournament in Las Vegas. This tournament marks the begining of the "summer swing" of tournaments. I like to think of the summer swing as all the tournaments we travel to during the summer, including Junior Gold, Las Vegas Open, TPC, and the Desert Open. JWTC is the first tournament in the summer that we travel to, so hence it is the first stop in the summer swing.

So ill start by saying i look forward to this tournament every year. It is the one time a year where you put your best 5 against others best 5. No restrictions based on school, county, or even state. There are some really really good bowlers on even better teams, which makes winning this tournament even tougher.

My team includes Marshall Kent, Tyler Cruz, Jordan Yoke, and Kyle Berry. We are also the defending champion, with Jordan Plunkett instead of Kyle. Last year, we qualified fifth for stepladder finals and were able to win the war of attrition and climb to the top. To be honest, none of us had any confidence in ourselves to do that. I dont think any of us had experienced anything quite like that before that. On top of the team event, Plunkett and I were able to capture the doubles event, and i won one of the sweeper squads. And with the sponsors, i bagged myself three brand new storm/roto grip balls for my efforts. (There is a rule change, now you can only win 1 ball from each sponsor.)

Its great going in as defending team champion. However, i feel like there is a little added pressure that comes with that title. I dont feel like it will effect any of us, but we are a bunch of hotheads. We will just need to focus on the task at hand.

As for the tournament itself, a quick run down. Sweepers on thursday, doubles on friday, and the team event on saturday with semis saturday afternoon and sunday morning. Finals are immediatly after semis on Sunday. Team qualifying is 5 REGULAR games and 5 two-game baker sets. Semis are two-game baker matches bowling every team once and a position round. With this type of format, lanes will get TORCHED by the baker. If you look at the scores, team will shoot a 230, then a 160. Thats how tough they get. This is the tournament where practicing ball return will pay off.

Overall, i like our chances. As a team, we have great chemistry and that goes a long way in these types of formats. We all kind of feed off of each other. We are all good spare shooters as well. This is key. in the stepladder last year, every team we bowled missed a spare in their game and that gave us enough opening to squeak by.

One thing ill note before i finish the entry. Ive been going back and forth about what balls to bring. Flying kind of restricts me to 6. I always bring plastic so really i can only bring 5. So right now, ive got the four i recently picked up, so really i going between the 718a and the midnight vibe. I know what the lanes are going to be, and the midnight vibe works well, but my recently drilled Aftermath Pearl can handle dry quite well. So i think im going to leave my midnight vibe home. I have a small feeling i might regret this, but at the same time there might be a time where i would say "well, i shouldve brought so n so instead of my vibe." so this is what im bringing:

715T
505T
718A
HyRoad
Aftermath Pearl
Tzone

I have confidence this lineup will serve me well not only this weekend, but at JG and the other major tournaments.

Id also like to continually thank all our regular readers. We've been getting more and more comments and they have been overwhelmingly positive. This is why we do this, for you, the reader. Thanks again and have a good weekend.

-Cameron
"Let's boogie!"

Weekend Recap for JBT invite weekend

Well, it was a long and grueling weekend at JBT Pac NW located at Triangle Bowl in Longview, WA.
I believed Jeff and Evan planned to bowl there around this time because they installed new brunswick pro lanes and approaches, that they recently finished.

Saturday, regular event and format. They threw out the kegel route 66 pattern from the kegel "challenge series". its a 4 to 1 ratio. didnt have to play too far left, mostly anywhere from 11 to 16 is where you wanted to be.  scores weren't ridiculously high but they were up there, I believe i qualified 3rd that day after the qualifying round. I felt pretty good going into the semi final round, Game 1 i ended up losing 250 to 240 (some where in that range) and losing game 2 248 to 245, i was pretty disappointed losing those 2 matches not because i lost and they bowled better but the fact that i lost the 60 bonus pins that would of helped me move up the standings then i lost game 3 of matchplay after chopping a spare. I started putting away my stuff because there was no way in hell i was gonna make top 5 after leaving 90 bonus pins out there on the lanes....
but.... some how, someway i ended making top 5 by 2 pins.. which was a shock to me cause i left the 90 pins out there.
Well i ended up bowling in my opinion one of the hottest bowlers as of late, in Makayla Douglas, I was terrified to bowl her because she is really good. I opened in the 10th frame again and basically figured i was done. but a bad break gave me the win then the next match, i didnt throw the ball worth a pile of you know what. and lost.

Sunday: Invitational time. I had a bye into the top 16 via total points from the whole season. I didn't throw a great opening game,  then made a ball change and threw 2 straight big games, then game 4 i ran into a wierd transition where it went about 3 to 4 ft longer so i shot a terrible game 4, but the 10th frame i made a ball change that would end up being the best decision i have made so far in my bowling career, moving in to about 18 and using a ball with surface and game 5 i couldnt miss, so i finished at 29 over and qualified 5th for the 16 man triple elimination bracket.
I started feeling it and got into that mindset i wasn't going to easily come out of.  I started putting frames together and was winning matches. as we got down to it, i realized that i haven't lossed a game yet and had to bowl Eddy Smith in the round of 4. I was determined and just put shots together and moved on to the "show" or championship round. I had to bowl ,my buddy and co writer of this blog, Cameron Weier.

What happened next was spectular and nothing short of amazing.
Since i was the higher seed i decided i would start 1st and finished last because I wanted the outcome of the game to be in my hands and not camerons. I started out with a split, five bagger as cameron opened up with the front six. after the open in the 1st and watching cameron double to start out, i told myself i have to stay in it and give myself a chance to win this thing in the end. so i got into this mindset and i honestly got lost in the match, like i had no idea how many i threw together and i wasnt paying attention to what cameron was doing or what the score was. i just knew i had to put together the best shot i could, each time i threw the ball. at this point  I had threw a 8 bagger on the board while cammys run stopped at 7, and went spare, spare going into the 10th frame. Cameron doubled to force me to throw the first one in the 10th to win the match and title. I went up and didnt do anything different from any shot before this frame, everything was the same, only thing I did differently was the extra time i took breathing and relaxing to make sure i was ready to throw the shot. I went up there and in my mind it was the best shot i thrown all day long, and got it to the pocket and strike to win the invitational title. 
It was by far the biggest win i have ever had in my career and biggest winnings i have ever bowled for. I was completely shocked that i ended up going undefeated through the bracket and beat one of the toughest and by far one of the best bowlers to ever come out of Washington, my pal Cameron Weier. I was speechless, didn't know what to say. and to this day I still can't believe i managed to pull this whole thing off, considering how far i have come in the past year. hard work pays off, i never believed it til now.

Aside: Congrats to Cameron on being named the Pacific Northwest Bowler of the Year, well deserved and well earned, helleuva season my man.

Tournament Recap

Well, what an exciting weekend. Before we go on, id like to first congratulate The Torched Lane's very own Perry Crowell IV on a tremendous win on sunday. Like i said in my weekend preview, going undefeated in the elimination rounds would prove to be a huge advantage.

Secondly, id also like to congratulate Tanner Spacey on his very first scratch title. Not only did he win 3 matches on his way to doing so, he went through Perry, John Jordan, AND Marshall Kent in the final. (Marshall was +405 !!) Tough competition to say the least. So big congratulations to you two.

Now on to the goods. We bowled on Kegel's Route 66 on saturday. A fairly demanding pattern. It wasnt extremly diffucult but at the same time not wide open. As with a lot of longer patterns, pretty much all the high rev players scored well. I myself did ok through qualifying, but fell apart completely in match play firing two 140-games en route (pun!) to a 20th place finish. One of the things that i noticed was i bowled on the same pair as both Marshall and Perry who were tearing it up. I found that watching them put up numbers while i was scrapping to get up to 200 really drained me mentally. Its hard to watch fellow bowlers, friends do well while you are left in their dust. In the match play same thing. Bowlers around me putting up some number while im 149 out of the gate and now totally out of it. I did find the will to pick myself up and pull it together to find a line. I even threw it well the last game even though i ended with another 140. All in all, an overall flustering day and im still having a hard time taking anything good away from it.

Sunday was bowled on Athens. This is a medium pattern. Let me tell you, it was tough. Not impossible, but much tougher than saturday. Fortunately, i had a bye through qualifying, which i found to help me relax and just try to get comfortable out o the lanes. A lot was riding on my finish. On top of the $1000 first place check, it was also triple points, and there was still bowler of the year stuff. After an up and down qualifying and match play, i somehow found myself in the finals. Like last year, i had 2 losses and my opponent (Perry) had zero losses. Unlike last year however, i was able to at least keep it close, starting front 7. Somehow, on a pattern where shooting 200 would win matches, i find myself having to shoot 264 JUST TO GIVE MYSELF A CHANCE. Perry needed a strike and good count to lock it up and like the beast man that he is, shredded the rack and spared for a 4 pin victory. I am not going to lie, i was a little fried. I was visibally angry and didnt want anything to do with anyone for a few minutes. I ended up just taking a few minutes to calm myself down, go up to Perry and give him his well deserved hand shake and a hug.

Kids, you can cry, whine, bitch all you want, but give props where props are due. If you get beat, you shake your opponents hand and tell him or her good game. They won and you didnt. Get over it. You make yourself look like an idiot and a baby when you dont do this. Especially when there are a lot of people around, or in this case, cameras. I was mad, so i wanted to cool down before confronting Perry. Afterwords i thought i shouldve been the first one to congratulate him. Something i need to work on.

Either way, a good weekend for me and a great weekend for The Torched Lane. I will probably not have another entry for a few days, but stay tuned as we will (hopefully) get to hear what the great IV has to say.

-Cameron

Weekend Preview: 6/11, 6/12

Well, this is going to be a little shorter than what i had hoped for. But seeing as its past midnight and i want to get this in before i start bowling, ill just make a quick post.

This weekend is the JBT invitational weekend. Regular Event on saturday and the actual invite on sunday. They are going to be held at triangle bowl, which if youve been keeping up, is where we recently bowled the all star tournament. Triangle is a modern-retro type center with old style type feel to it mixed in with newer scoring and synthetic lanes.

Saturday is like i said a regular season stop. Only difference is top 10 make it to invitational instead of the usual 5. Cant really speculate on the pattern. I am hoping for a shorter pattern as we havent really bowled on those this year.

Sunday is the invitational (im really getting tired of typing that comepletely.) Qualifying then cut to top 16 including exempts, then single game triple elimination bracket. fun fun fun. I bowled the Mojave invite a few weeks back and this triple elimination is a grinder. You are never out until you are out. Winning your matches is also key. Marshall Kent went undefeated last year in the invite, making it so he only had to win 1 game, or could lose 2 games. Big big advantage.

You can pretty much expect a tough shot for Sunday. Either a PBA pattern or Kegel Sport shot. I think last year was on dead mans curve or something to that nature. The mojave was on the team usa trials long from 2008. (this actually backfired as the cut was somewhere in the +120's that day. weird eh?.) Seeing how this format could make way for a long day, i would assume that a longer or heavier pattern will be used. I dont know what Triangle can lay out, but my money is on either Kegel's Dead Mans Curve or PBA's Shark.

Just another thing to note i was able to get my HY-road drilled today so i will have that for this weekend. Cant really say i like/hate it because i have yet to throw it on something that will give me a read. Anyway, have a good night.

-Cameron
"That shot was MINT!"

Weekend Review

Well, first off let me apologize for not getting to this post sooner, finals is coming up and been putting a lot of time into that, so here is my late night time and gonna post on this blog.

June 4 and 5, the Inter Association All star tournament, Triangle Bowl, Longview WA.

This was my first and last all star appearance, I had the opportunity to bowl the Greater Seattle allstars since i bowled in PSTL, which is a seattle based travel league, so i decided i would see what this all star hype was all about.

With some talk going around and some things i guess you can pissed me off and some people who thought i shouldn't be able to bowl in the tournament since i am not in the seattle association. So i went into the tournament with a little something to prove and send a message silently through my bowling instead of words to the people who didnt want me there.

So saturday, I had my game plan set, which was one shot at a time and do whatever i can to help my team win, as a bowler and teammate. We bowled 5 games of 5 man matchplay and total pins, as a team we absolutely tore it up, everyone was throwing great shots and winning their points which was huge. I personally bowled great, threw good shots and made my spares, although i wasnt very happy with my spare shooting. and during the 9 baker matches we bowled great, everyone coming up with key shots and winning points and team point because it was worth 3 pts, so we continued to rack them up and continued to bowl good.

Sunday rolls around, bowled some tough competition, this time we had 4 games of 5 man matchplay. we came out hot, and i think for the whole tournament i think we only had 1 or 2 games under a 1000, which is over a 200 average.
I personally was feeling it and coming to with big shots for my team. which gave me more confidence and relaxed me.
the baker portion wasnt has good as the previous day, i think we lost 2 or 3 pts back to back, but we came back like all good teams do and ended up winning the tournament.

I got to give a shout out to coach Ty, who i bounced my adjustments off of and made suggestions to me about moves and let me do my thing. I thought we had the best coach in the tournament due to the fact that he would pick us up and get us back moving in the right direction. i dont think we could of bounced back from the 2 match slump if we didnt have him.

Balls i used for the tournament:
Saturday
C System 3.5
2 Fast
Sunday
C system 3.5
Victory Road

A weekend in review

Well, dont ask me why this took a while to post. I dont know. Been kind of concentrating on finals. On an off note, my political science professor who is like 80 is retiring, so i got to see him one final time today. It's rough at the end of quarters. I spend time with people, professors and then it ends up where i will probably never see them again in my life. But i move on. Never really develop relationships with people i meet at school. Probably because of this. I dont know. Whatever, not enough bowling in that story.

Past weekend was an exciting success. We ended up winning the whole thing. Overall a pretty exhilerating weekend. There were definite times when i felt i let my team down which i will get into a little later. Id like to thank my team mates for their support the whole time, as well as Coach Ty, who kept us focused and on target the whole time. My teammates were great and couldnt have done anything more to impress me. There were a lot of solid teams out there, and that made for some interesting matches.

So, ill first discuss saturday. On the whole, i felt i bowled much better on Sunday then on saturday. I feel like i did not make the right ball choices throughout the first 5 games of match play. (Yes, i ended up changing balls about 4 times in 4 games. something i need to work on.) I guess i fell into that trap where on a house shot, if im not carrying, i switch balls instead of changing anything else first. As a team, we did great. Only losing 3 of the possible 30 to start is very very good. In the baker, we took all but one team point, which resulted in 4 or 5 points in 8/9 matches. Overall as a team, we did outstanding on saturday.

On sunday, i felt like i was personally bowling much better. I did not change balls unitl a few matches into baker. However, our team results did not follow suit. We ended taking around 17 or so of the possible 24. In the baker, i think we were close to a split for the day. Ended up getting swept once and lost the total point 4 times. However, teams behind us also struggled and in the end no one really lost or gained ground on anyone. We ended up winning by about 10 points which is two baker matches. One thing is i didnt even know we had won until after it was all done. What i mean is i never looked at the standings as, honetly, i didnt care. I wanted to have a good time and keep my head on whats in front of me.

One thing that stood out to me was that i crumbled under pressure more times than overcoming it. The reason i make a point of this is that those are precious points which we needed. I remember specically on sunday starting +100 after two and not winning either points. Both games i had the oppurtunity to strike out to win. One time was a flat-10 and another was a 9-pin. Some would argue that they were good shots and i didnt get the breaks. Well, obviously they were not good shots if i didnt strike. Another time i went up there needing a mark to win and 7-10. Once again i got close but didnt get enough to leave something easy. I guess ill just not worrry about it. It is what it is and ill just keep doing what i need to in those situations.

Other than that, this win is very special. It was my last association tournament after bowling it for the last 9 years. It is also my first win as the team captain. I also very happy that Perry was able to be a part of this as well, seeing this was his only oppurtunity to do so. Now, if you want to talk about clutch, we can talk all day about Perry.

The seattle girls team also won. A very cool feat, meaning a clean sweep of the youth portion. (suck on it, tacoma.) Leea Haworth ended up taking high game and high 3 game series, shooting some monster numbers. i myself ended up getting high 9-game total. Marshall kent recieved High three-game and Matt lewis high game. Makyala Douglas got high 7-game for the girls, also with a monster number.

I think thats all there is to cover for this recap. Check back soon for this weekends "Weekend Preview" as it is JBT invitational weekend. Lots of bowling and lots of fuschia. Im pretty sure Perry will have his weekend recap up soon as well.


***EDIT***
Just wanted to add a little tidbit of what balls i used the weekend. (In order)

Saturday:
505t
TR2
Outburst
718A
Midnight Vibe

Sunday:
Mission 2.0
Midnight Vibe

*******


-Cameron

Want us to write about something? Let us know!

Spare Shooting... Perry's take

Since Cameron did an excellent post on spare shooting , I figured i would be a follower and do my own take on spare shooting and the mental side of spare shooting.

I will be honest and say that my mental approach towards spare shooting was abosolutely terrible... super bad. Back when I was younger say 12 or so, my friend and frequent practice partner Kevin Hong would practice all the time. He would bowl maybe 4 games before I would join him, and right when I joined, he asked if i wanted to keep score and we did. I am not joking here, after 4 shots into the game and i wasn't striking i would seriously zero out the rest of my game and quit bowling and not bowl the rest of the night while Kevin would continue to shoot spares and not keep score.

Now i know your thinking who cares about that, well looking back on that now i care, and think i am a complete idiot for not taking the time and work on things instead of keeping score. I can't believe how much time and talent i have wasted just by trying to throw nothing but strikes instead of working on the main part of bowling... making spares.

Now my mental approach to practice is a lot different, I have like a mental schedule that I try to follow and it changes sometimes. I would try to get at least two hours of practice in, one hour being making sure that my physical approach is there, such as timing, release, balance, and shot making. and the second hour being nothing but spare shooting, put the aggressive shit away and have nothing but a single plastic ball on the rack.

That is how i approach every practice session, although I don't get to practice much as i would like due to other commitments and working the Bowl with just me and my parents. Although, late night practice sessions is when i put my time and practice into my bowling game.

I always put spare shooting last on my practice schedule, and its not because I hate it but i know if i can make a spare shot when i am tired it should be a piece of cake when i am fresh and early into the tournament. Just like in any sport, free throw shooting is last thing done in practice because you have to make them when your tired. You absolutely have to make your spares when your tired.. its not just a good practice and conditioning but your gonna use it when your late in a tournament after game 25 and you can barely stand up.

Bowlers underestimate practicing spares, some people believe I don't need to shot spares, i will strike alot. we all know that striking alot is rare, but we all know that spare shooting is where people dont bowl good. "I don't need to practice spares, because i know i can make them" "I have made them before, i dont need to practice them." I have made lots and lots of 10 pins, does that mean i still dont go practice them? no i still go out and throw at atleast 20 10 pins. not in the area of the 10 pin. the actual 10 pin. and same goes for sevens and so on and so forth. dont underestimate spares, you will need them, trust me.

Which brings me to my next point or topic to this point, the mental side of spare shooting. I see way too many people, including myself get so pissed off for wrapping a ten pin on a great shot or boning an eight pin, and then carry it over to your spare shoot and flag it by half a lane. YES HALF A LANE. you put a ball on its thumb and square it up to the gutter then place a pin touching it then another ball, it takes up half a flipping lane. This is an area where i am improving on still, but its just makes me think whats the point of making myself look like a jackass for throwing a good shot and not carry then go up and make myself look like a bigger jackass and miss the spare.

After each tournament before i go to bed, I recap my performance in my head silently to myself and ponder how i did with spare shooting. If i missed some left side single pin spares, as i go to sleep i picture my self picking up single pin spares.

People, spare shooting is THEE absolute most important part of the game of bowling. spare shooting wins tournaments, strikes help but not the important part of winning. spare shooting wins cash, makes cuts and wins tournaments. so next time your reracking after each shot, think about what your throwing away.

A look at spare shooting

Well, ive been going through a few topics in my head this week. I figured spare shooting would be a good one to discuss as we are bowling a tournament this weekend where spare shooting makes or breaks you. Now i have no structure for this entry so ill try to keep some kind of structure.

To start, lets take a look at what spare shooting is. Spare shooting is what every bowler does when they do not strike. Spares are an important (if not THE most important) part of any bowling competition. Anything left standing after the first ball is considered a possible spare. Spares mean more pins per frame than an open.

There are easy spares, hard spares, and splits. Splits are leftover pins (two or more) that are "split" apart. Now that i tihnk about it, the definition of a split is harder to explain than it may seem. If the pins are in the same row, there does not have to have a pin spot between them. For example, the 2-3, 4-5, 5-6, 7-8, 8-9, 9-10 are all considered splits. However, if pins are not in the same row, there needs to be at least one pin-spot between at least two of them. For example, the 3-10 is a split but the 3-6 is not. There is an exception. A leave that contains the head pin is not considered a split in stat tracking, but lets be honest, it follows the rules.

Now hard spares and easy spares are all opinion. But my definition of a hard spare is generally any leave that contains three or more pins, and any leave that has double wood (sleeper pin). I consider easy spares any single pin and most two-pin spares (besides what i mentioned above).

Now that we got all that out of the way, we can discuss spare shooting in tournament settings. Ill start by saying that the ability to shoot spares is probably the most potent weapon in a bowling tournament or league. This especially rings true if strikes are hard to come by. Everyone has missed a cut or a cash spot by under 10 pins. I bet if all those bowlers looked back at their games, there is at least one time they missed a makeable spare. Thats at least 11 pins right there. now, I know thats not always the case. This past weekend i lost a tournament in the final game by 1 pin, but had a clean game. But in general, you will find somewhere an open that couldve been a spare.

With that being said, i am always saddened when i see people practice, but not shoot at their spares. A lot of times they just reset and keep throwing strike shots. I understand that maybe in warm up or just tossing a freshly drilled rock, but a weekly practice and no spare shooting is a big no-no. I am especially perplexed when tournament bowlers miss spares and tell me they dont really shoot spares in practice. Are we talking about practice? yes we are. i shoot spares EVERYTIME i practice. i am not satisfied until i am 100% on everything.

In longer tournament formats, you can get away with around 75% on multi-pin conversions, but single-pin needs to be no less than 100%. Single pins have to be the simplist spares to shoot at. With the exception of the 7 and the 10, you have around HALF the lane to pick up each single pin. (two ball lengths + one pin length). Right now i figure im at around 95% on my single pin spares over the last few months of tournaments. Its high, but i would perfer 100%.

As i wrap up this entry, ill give a quick tip. throw straight at every spare. just do it. Especially when bowling on a diffucult pattern, throwing straight and hard will take the lane completely out of the situation and your spare shooting is a direct result of your skill. im not going to lie, i hook at left side spares on house patterns, but thats because i know where the friction is and it leaves more room for error than going straight. miss left it will skid and miss right it will hook more. however, even if practicing on a house pattern, ill throw straight and hard.

So if you are on the fence about throwing straight at all spares, its something you need to do to step up your game. Go pay $50 or whatever for a plastic ball and just throw for an hour everytime you practice. wait what? practice? yes practice. you are not going to pick this up by just throwing a plastic ball, you need to PRACTICE it. Some people throw urethane as a spare ball. I have mixed feelings. if you are good at killing the rotation, then i think thats fine. However, urethane hooks on ANY friction, so if you are revving it, it will grab. Urethane does not mean straight. I have been practicing throwing my urethane at spares that last few days, but i can kill the hand pretty consistently. (missed only one single pin so far)

You see some pro's hook on the pba patterns, but they are PRO and dont miss. However, Walter Ray Williams Jr had a streak of like 600 single pin conversions in a row. And we all know what he has done in his career. By the way, im pretty sure he throws straight at everything.


So, this wraps up this entry. I can go on and on about spare shooting. That how important it is. I hate to use this cliche, mainly because it sounds horrible, but strike for show, spare for dough. I like the expression "SPARE OR DIE!!!" more. It seems more elegant. Strikes may be fun, spares are dull, but winning is also fun. So, think about it.


-Cameron
"Insane to the membrane (at least, this weekend)."

Young and upcoming talent (Part 1)

I decided that I would right about in my opinion the young and upcoming talent around the world of JBT, and why not they are the future of the sport of bowling and JBT. and by all means if I didn't mention you here, I probably forgot about you and doesn't mean that i dont think your a good bowler.


Anthony Douglas, Tyler Boe, Makayla Douglas (no relation to Anthony), Cortez Schenck, KJ Martinez. just to name a few. all have been successful in JBT tournaments this year.

Tyler, who has stepped by from the handicap division last year has made a easy transition to scratch, and currently 14th in the points. Look out for Tyler in the coming years to win lots of titles in the scratch division.

Easily in my opinion, the next big thing to hit JBT, has got to be Cortez Schenck. Tez easily has the physical game to be the next and upcoming star of JBT, He has the tools to win lots and lots of titles, not just JBT but other big tournaments as well. I have heard great things about Tez and finally got to what the hype was all about in March in Kelso, WA for a PAC NW JBT, and he is the real deal.

That is all i have for now, be on the look out for Part 2 of this topic

All Stars

Well, next weekend marks my last association tournament of my youth career. It will be held at Triangle Bowl in Longview, Washington. I am very excited and nervous at the same time. I try my hardest to keep a level head but for some reason, this tournament really gets my blood pumpin. Also, there is some added drama to the mix which is sure to make for some tense mathcups.

Let me start by giving the run down. The association tournament, or All Star Extravaganza, pits all of the major Western Washington Association teams against each other in a two-day tournament using both regular and baker formats. I think there is a total of 8 associations participating in the boys division this year which makes a nice even number. The associations are as follows:

Whatcom
Skagit Valley
Snohomish
Seattle
Tacoma
Kitsap
Thurston
Cowlitz
Yakima

Well, with that count there is actually nine. So maybe i dont know which associations are attending but those are the ones that would think are coming.

Over the two days, the teams will bowl each other once in regular match play format and twice in baker format. The match play is one-point per person and 2 or 3 for team. Baker consists of 2-game matches, with 1 per game and 2 for total pins. There is a lot a baker, placing emphasis on team bowling. Baker is unique because the team with the best look doesnt neccasrily win, its whichever team can fill frames the best.


I said earlier that there will be some added drama to the tournament. Ill just say that there were some individuals who were unhappy with how some teams were created, but fortunately, nothing more came of that. However, this will lead to some very heated matches with a couple of the associations.


I am also very excited cause this year every team is sporting solid rosters. I am going to be blunt and say in the past some teams have been weak compared to others. However, this year i expect no team to run away with the tournament and no team to be out of it either.


To wrap it up, i am counting the days until we start bowling. This is my last one and im going to lay everything out on the lanes and give it my all. I want to win. PLain and simple. There is going to be a ton of emotion both ways and im going to enjoy all of it. If it wasnt fun, i wouldnt be doing it.

Team bowling is my favorite type of tournament play. I feel there is no better feeling than striking not only for yourself, but for 5 other guys who are your team mates and in most cases, friends. It adds a different type of emotion, pressure, and excitement which you can only experience if you bowl.

Thanks again.
-Cameron
#winning

Just a couple things to note:
Triangle recently installed new synthetic lanes.
Kitsap county is the defending champion
Perry's first and last time as all star

House Shot tournaments.. so what!?

I recently bowled a tournament where we ended up bowling on a house pattern on wood lanes. As that tournament progressed, I was completely shocked how much people were complaining about bowling a house pattern... it's a damn house pattern people seriously.. Its not just you, who is bowling on that pattern you still have to bowl on the same stuff that everyone else does. Yes, its a high scoring pace but thats apart of the challenge is keeping up. YOU CAN'T CONTROL THE BAD BREAKS, BUT YOU CAN CONTROL YOUR EMOTIONS AND MENTALITY.

Here is some things that bothered me with that whole situation:
1.) we have bowled on house shots earlier in the season, with no outrage or complaining.
2.) its one thing to complain but to carry it over to the next day, is absolutely ridiculous.

If your so worried about complaining that your bowling on a house shot and worried about the scoring pace. are you gonna succeed? probably not. if you go out there and put your best 12 shots a game and deal with the breaks and not so lucky breaks, your probably going to be contending for a title. If your complaining or pissed off about bowling on house shots, where is your focus, where is your competitiveness, where is your passion, where is it? obviously somewhere in la la land if your worried about some stupid house shot..

You have to have an mentality where your gonna focus and make it seem like your not bowling on a house shot. The best bowlers out there don't worry about what they are bowling on, they go out there and play with the hand they are dealt. its not gonna be the last time you see a house shot at a tournament..

Perry Crowell Intro

Welcome to the crazy mind that i own. My name is Perry Crowell IV and I, with the amazing bowler Cameron Weier, will be writing pretty much everything related to bowling. as Cameron stated before we will talk about "Anything from tournament recaps to discussion on balls, accessories, layouts. and anything that happens to do with bowling."

So here is a little bit about me. I live in the state of Washington in a small town called Hoquiam. Hoquiam is near the coast, about 45 minutes from I-5 and about 2 hrs away from seattle and portland. Ive been bowling since i was 2 years old (due to the fact that my family owns a little 16 lane center). Through bowling I've also met people and friends that mean the world to me, without them I honestly don't know where i would be today. Living in a small town and owning a business in a small town is rathering unfortunate due to business related issues and not as big of a market as Seattle or Portland. I travel everywhere for tournaments, I rarely have a tournament within an hour of a drive, that means I have a lot of alone time on the road. which isn't a bad thing sometimes because I can discuss what my goals are for that particular day.

My award winnings, rather pathetic compared to my buddy Cameron, are around $4,000 which isn't that bad since I busted out on the scene of youth scholarship tournaments only 3 years ago. I never knew that scholarship tournaments were out there and due to the fact that I was a small fish in the ocean, my success rate was very very small. It was hard for me to make it to every tournament since I was just starting to drive and it's only my parents running the business. Now that I am older now and can stay at hotels, I am a regular at tournaments and improving every tournament.

In January, I signed a scholarship letter to bowl for Midland University, in Fremont, NE next fall. This is an absolutely amazing accomplishment for myself, because after all the years of tournament struggles, my hard work had finally paid off. I have a great bunch of guys over there, and its always nice to have some people such as Tyler Cruz and Makenzie Cherne from WA ST. going also.

Welcome to the blog, hope you look forward to checking out "The Torched Lane"

. Ill leave below my tournament Resume so you can get a feel of what ive done over my career. (Not nearly as impressive as Cameron, i know)

2 JBTNW titles (both 2010-2011season)
2 time WA state youth bowling all events champion (i believe its 2 time)
2 time WA state youth bowling doubles champion (1 scratch, other with my little brother Kolby.)
1 Year on the Greater Seattle Youth All-Star team.
Part of the 2010 JWTC (limited) championship team
142nd place finish at 2010 junior gold in Indianapolis.
45th place finish at 2011 USBC Team USA Trials in Las Vegas

Cameron Weier intro

Come one come all and welcome to the spectacle that is my bowling life. My name is Cameron Weier and I, along with THE Perry Crowell IV, will be writing pretty much everything related to bowling. Anything from tournament recaps to discussion on balls, accesories, layouts. Anything really. As you can tell from my terrible grammar and lack of puncuation and capitalization, this will be a very informal blog. Also, there may be the occasional use of a profanity, but shouldnt be too bad.

So let me tell you a little bit about myself. I live in the beautiful state of Washington in a city called Federal Way. This puts me right off I-5 and only 25 minutes from Seattle and a short 2 1/2 hour drive from Portland. Ive been bowling since i was around 9 years old. I went bowling one night and just stuck with it. Through bowling ive met people and friends that i wouldnt trade for anything and been through experiences that will last a lifetime. With bowling ive been able to travel to places i wouldnt really go otherwise. These places include Detroit, Buffalo, Chicago, Miami, Indianapolis and about 5-6 times a year down in Las Vegas.

So far, I have accumulated around $25,000 in scholarship money and always increasing. On top of that, this past summer i recieved an athletic scholarship for bowling to a very awesome school in chicago.

Thats pretty much it. Ill leave below my tournament Resume so you can get a feel of what ive done over my career.

12 JBTNW titles
9 Years on the Greater Seattle Youth All-Star team. (team captain for the last 4 years i think)
7 OJCTA titles (including 3 ToC crowns)
3 South Sound Junior Masters victories (including a recent back-to-back)
2 Milwaukie Junior Masters victories (back to back)

Also was part of the 2010 JWTC championship team (along with doubles and sweepers victory)
A 10th place finish at 2010 junior gold in Indy.

So thanks for taking the time to read this. I look forward to sharing my knowledge and experience with anyone who listens. Have a great day.

-Cameron

"It doesnt matter where you go, you'll always end up somewhere"