Guess no one can say you release too far away from your ankle, huh?

Yep, that is one thing that's good about my game. I've always had a release pretty close to my ankle. I'm sure you've seen my videos. I was playing something like 6 at the arrows out to 3 or 4 which I've only done one other time and that was also in this league. It might have been mental as missing outside my target didn't allow the ball to quite make it back, I tugged the ball a few times too. Some how I caught my ankle on a shot that probably would have been a tug. I believe the reason I did it was because I think my backswing tends to veer away from my body a bit. If that's not straightened out by the time I get to the line that's probably bound to happen. But, I shall work on having a straight armswing through out the whole approach anyways. Not exactly sure how though.

My question would be, how was your balance on those balls where you hit your ankle?Were you either leaning left or right? The reason I ask is because it is not unusual that in an effort to bring your release close to your ankle, some people actually bring their ankle close to the release. Their balance is too vertical and sometimes off to the left. Their slide foot is not centered, but too far right.

We have a lot of moving parts in this game.

In some cases, people try to fix their arm, when in reality, it's their foot.

my friend I use to bowl with would hit is ankle alot, he never knew why until I watched him. He would drop is shoulder about 2" lower then normal and the backswing never came straight down, it come in towards the body and BAM.

So either you're dropping your shoulder to much, or the body balance is off when you slide and causing your foot to drift to the right if you're right handed.

Ah, that's good to know. I thought it was something in my armswing since it's more often than not away from my body, which it probably is, but like you say it could have something to do with how I slid on those shots. As for my balance it was any worse than most of my other shots. For some reason I had pretty lousy balance at the line pretty much all night. I don't believe I lean very much to the right, maybe a little. But if you've seen my videos you know I do bit of bending at the waist.

sometime a pitcher of beer can fix your balance problems

http://richiev.bowlspace.com/blog/2008/08/06/best_series_ever

BowlSpace blog again instead of my normal one...

My first game was only 3 off my best ever (265), and I had a very good last game as well (245), but my middle game was only a 184, and has been my weak game of the 3 all summer (only have had 2 200+ games in the second game all summer). I missed 2 makable spares and had a split in the second game, so if I made just one of those makable spares in that game, I would've had my first 700 series. I'll take the 694 anyway, as it's my best ever, beating even the 689 set I had in practice earlier in the summer. Team swept the 8 points, and I'll give special mention here to my female teammate, Joy, who had back-to-back games in the 190s to key her best-ever set (I think).

My game seems to have really come around of late, as I've been averaging 221 in the last three weeks. I did a quick calculation with my 198 average, and I'll be getting 21 pins/game handicap this Sunday in the "People's Tournament" that I've entered. With the way I've been bowling, I may stand a decent chance of doing well, so wish me well Sunday.

Nice shooting Richie. I averaged 221 also, for the first 2 games. Unfortunately, I bowled 2 more.

Our team rose from 20th to 3rd tonight. What a move. But, the first place team is 16 points ahead, and we bowled them tonight. My opponent is the top bowler, 221 average. I had to beat him to have a chance.

My first game was 221 to his 269. We lost.
My next game was 221 to his 209. But, we still lost.
My next game showed how I can't move left on changing lanes. My 196 to his 214.
We lost again.
My final game showed my complete collapse with 167 to his 266. We lost all games.

My 805 to his 958 showed why he is the top bowled and our team will not make first place.

had a horrible night at the different house I subbed at tonight. I haven't bowled there in months and was the 3rd time there. Had high hopes but it was bad. Got there about 45 minutes early and saw some kids two finger cranking on the lanes. No oil machine was seen. THe sot was tough, I tried to play my normal marks, ball either slide and washed out or snapped. Tried inside line, nope not consistant. tried outside nope same thing. Both lanes were like this but the right lane seemed more in consistant. I threw the Dimension at all angles, threw the Kinetic at every angle I could, tried the Lane#1 Evo. Man nothing was consistant on these pairs. Vaired speed, revs, pretty much threw my bag at the lanes. It would either snap or slide with every ball.

Overall shot a 521 with I think about 3 splits per game. Glad I don't have to bowl there again for a while. But the problem is I'm suppose to bowl a scrach league there in the winter. So far I'm 0-3 on those lanes. My buddies I bowl with are 228 ave and 219 ave on that league. 228 guy shot a 610, 219 guy shot a 579. very tough night for all of us.

Tomorrow I'm subbing at my tuesday night league house. Still ahve high hopes for it.

I came into league last night as ready as ever with some solid outings as of late and 4 out of 5 clean games in practice Sunday. Then I got blind sided with what felt like fried, unoiled for days open play conditions. The Venom was too much resulting in splits. When I managed to sniff at the pocket it gave me 10s, 8s, 7s, 4-9s, 7-10s, 8-10s you name it. The carnage? 134-190-154 for a 478 series!! Pathetic. This is why it's so hard to maintain a high average in my local house. I worked my tail off for league high average which was mine up until last night and I threw it away with one outing. I still have 3 more weeks to fight for it so I better hit a few 700s.

The only thing is it wasnt just me. 520 was the high series for the night on my pair with averages from 164-213. The shot changed drastically 4 weeks ago and now you just don't know what to expect anymore. Next week if I recognize the same thing going on early I'm throwing plastic up 5.