Hi gents and gals,

Last night I was at the house which hosts my league, and had forgotten this was the day of the week at which conditions are the worst. Lanes are oiled on Thursdays, and I was there Wednesday night. So as you can imagine, whatever oil was left, was throwing any kind of consistent shot, way off from being in the pocket every time.

My question is... with very dry and spotty conditions, how do you personally make it a useful practice? I found a way to make it useful in "target shooting", but even this was disappointing as there was basically no way to read the lanes whatsoever.

Have a great day, everyone.

If the lanes are burnt and you have no other place to practice, get out your spare ball. Throw at 10 pins and then throw pocket shots with it. Make sure you throw it the way you would your strike ball though. Dry lanes can burn up a ball. Why burn up a $200 ball when you have a $75 ball in the bag?

Your obviously not going to be able to try different lines but you can work on your consistency and accuracy with your spare ball. If you miss your mark with a resin ball by a board, on house conditions, you can still get the ball to the pocket. With a spare ball, you can see the difference.

That is the problem with summer bowling, some houses don't oil the lanes every day, and only do it when they have leagues, even then only on the lanes the league is bowling on. They don't seem to understand how oil prevents wear and tear on the lane.

Get out your dry lane ball and have a go with that. I would suggest you practice throwing up the twig and the gutter and see what happens with any of the balls that you have. You might be surprised by the results. You also open my shoulder in order to get side rotation on the ball on spotty and dry conditions. You could try that and see what happens.

Demo, it's not recommended to use a bad practice to overcome a lane problem. It could cause bad habits that are harder to fix later.

Yeah like hooking the ball 38 boards to the left side gutter lol.

I have played on some pretty burned up lanes lately and learned to add a little more loft to get more length and it turned what would have been a few 118 games to the 180's and 190's

djbowlin, you may have to learn how to roll straighter, rather than hook. Keep little finger spread out and index finger close to middle finger is one approach, and the simplest.

He asked for suggestions and I gave a few. I've taken some shots up the two board with my Cell on burned up lanes and found the pocket although the ball had burned up a lot of energy. It was extremely interesting because my BW solid on the same line went Brooklyn. Both balls are drilled relatively the same, and I'm pretty sure that I replicated the two shots pretty well.

I'm not saying it is good. I'm not saying to use them in league play or anything like that. But why not try it? I mean isn't that what the goal of practice is? To try new things and become consistent at what you already know how to do.

I did forget to mention two things. The first kind of sucks because almost all bowling centers now are pre-paid and can result in you wasting 3-4 frames potentially, but this is applicable in league and tournaments. You throw the ball half-speed on different boards (5, 8, 10, 13, 15 boards etc.) to find the oil pattern. Your goal isn't to really to hit the pocket as much as it is to find out the pattern. Since this instance is dealing with dry lanes it my not be the best thing to do because more than likely there will not be a discernable pattern at all but you can try it.

Lofting to get length is also a good thing to try on burnt up lanes. Also you could try a higher ball position to increase your ball speed.

The other thing you can do is work a specific facet of your game that you having trouble with or that you think is a problem. For example, about two weeks ago I was still having trouble with my timing. That's all I worked on, I didn't even look at the scorer or was concerned with where the ball hit. I worked strictly on my timing and footwork.

Dennis also brings up another good point, different finger positions can help your game without requiring you to change too much in your approach.

Thanks dennis

I use the extra loft as a last resort, i have played some pretty horrible lane conditions, even on a league night where even staying behind the ball a little more didnt give the results i needed even staight shots rolled at an angle (typical 10 pin shot for example) would roll out and would be running parallel to the gutter by the tenth board. Dry dirty wood is noones friend except a spinner...lol

Though it does help the loft that is