Anybody bowl in a league where the house won't use pins for warmups? The house for my current league decide it cause too much wear on the pins and constituted free bowling. They decide this this mid season with no notice. It is the only house in the are that does this.

Wow, if that doesn't scream cheap, I don't know what does. You pay the house for your league, and that includes practice, they should be able to handle 5 minutes of practice with pins. Seriously, you only have to change the pins in a house like once a year, minus the occasional carnage. I think that's pretty sad on their part.

You should ask them if 5 minutes a night, once a week is really going to save them money in the long run. Figure you get 7 shots in practice, times 8 divided by 2 for a 4 person team. Thats 28 shots at the pins. That is about a game and a half to 2 games of wear total. Unless your center changes pins more than twice a year, they have no reason to do that. You can't get a fair assessment of how your ball will react to the pins, even tough you can see the movement of it. Have the officers of the league talked with the center about it?

I wish my center did this. I can find a line with or without pins. I know where the ball should be when it gets close to the rack. This would also get the people that just stand in the same spot and throw at the same spot over and over to only throw 1 or 2 balls. Around here way back when my dad bowled in 2 leagues a night they always did this. Its called shadow practice balls.

Earl Anthony had a book on bowling and he used shadow bowling to become great. While this practice might scream as cheap, it does work both ways. If you go in to practice you could ask to shadow bowl, the house should give you a discount because now there is less wear and tear on the pins and pinsetter. Shadow bowling is a great way to practice if you are working on your approach or hitting the target on the lane, and you do not get caught up in pin reaction and score.

I've bowled in centers that did this many times. It does save wear and tear on the pins. At $15 a piece, 22 per rack, that's a lot of money in pins. If you have a busy center like ours where you have 1500 bowlers and they all get 10 min of practice each time, it is a lot of wear and tear. But it also runs the machines, ball lifts etc...and those are harder to replace. But its hard times now and every penny saved just might keep the business going a bit longer.

Erin

Wow first I ever heard of it, but the next time I take my son to practice I am going to ask to do this, help break a young bowlers habit of looking up at the pins leaving his mark.

I dont necessarily think the problem is the actual practice with no pins, but doing it in the middle of the league season where it could affect some of the bowlers. You are still running the ball returns, just not the pinsetter. I really think they should put it to a league vote to change something in the middle of a season, and if they do, at least reduce the cost for the bowlers if they are so into saving the money, you should pay less for saving them money.

Well since practice is a concession by the center the league doesn't really have a say in it. They could just cut the practice time all together and make bowlers start cold, which for some bowlers might be a good thing. Sure the league might have a contract that says the league gets X amount of minutes for warm-ups but that doesn't mean pins have to be there.

I would have no problem shadow bowling without pins for warm ups. Most of my first few shots are just to get warmed up, get the aches and pains to go away and to get a feel for what the lane conditions are. Sure fine tuning the strike line is nice but in a few frames that's probably going to change anyways.

In one center where I bowl, we get 10 minutes of shadow balls before league. It actually speeds up the practice time where you are supposed to be reading the lanes, not getting strikes. And, one ball per turn per bowler on each lane.

When i was a junior we use to have real shadow bowling - without pins. I actually like it. Now these days they use pins when get 10 minutes of practice. It takes longer cause everyone hits reset button cause they want a full rack.