Coach’s Corner Tip
It’s Not About Hook
I see a lot of bowlers setting up their arsenals in one of two ways. First, some bowlers purchase every aggressive ball on the market, and have nothing to use when the lanes call for something weaker. Other bowlers also tend to put a group of similar reactions in their bags, but all of the balls are of the long and flip variety. Trust me, when you get on a sport condition, that’s the last reaction you want to see.
So, when you set up your arsenal, what do you want? How would you build a 6-ball arsenal? Let’s put three types of balls that arc in this arsenal, and two types of balls that flip. The three types of balls that arc are one that arcs with a very early move, one that arcs more mid-lane, and one that arcs much later down the lane. The two types of balls that flip can be described as a ball that flips more in the mid-lane and one that flips later down the lane. While these are somewhat general descriptions of ball motion, you should be able to classify any bowling ball in your bag into one of these categories. So, we need to fill the following 6 needs for bowling balls:
- Early arc
2. Mid-lane arc
3. Late arc
4. Mid-lane flip
5. Late flip
6. Spare ball
Let’s also assume that your resources are limited, and you want to build this arsenal up slowly. Start with the mid-lane arc ball and a spare ball. This will be your “benchmark” ball that you can use to read almost any lane condition. This ball will give you predictable motion and will almost always allow you to get to the pocket. The need for the spare ball in your bag is obvious. You can then build up your arsenal as your needs and your finances allow.
You’ll notice here that we are talking about the shape of the reaction and not the total hook of the ball. You want to start to look at where and how the ball goes from the skid phase to the hook phase on the lane. If you watch the following video at www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4Vjmhr_sbA (or Google bowling ball skid hook roll) you can see these three phases of motion. The key is when and how quickly the ball changes direction in the hook phase.
Even when you have the six-ball arsenal, you will never have the perfect reaction to grab using your normal release and your normal ball speed. Ideally you want the ball to go through the hook phase at about 37’-40’ down the lane. If the ball hooks too early it will lose too much energy at the back of the lane. If the ball hooks too late it will not lose enough energy and will either not deflect enough or deflect too much. If you start to leave single pins in the back row, chances are that your breakpoint is not in the right part of the lane.
To make your breakpoint earlier, you need to get the ball to “read” the lane (hook) sooner. You can pick up a ball that naturally has an earlier breakpoint. You can also create more forward roll off your hand by aligning your index finger with the outside of your wrist in your setup and minimizing the turn off your hand through the release. You can also drop your ball speed to get the ball to read the lane sooner.
If you need to create a later breakpoint, you can pick up a ball that reacts later down the lane, or you can make the changes with more ball speed and/or more axis rotation. To get more axis rotation, you can setup with your index finger aligned with the middle of your wrist to as far as the inside of your wrist in your setup.
This will delay the hook and increase the back end motion after the ball hooks. This is particularly good after the lanes start to break down and you are playing deeper inside angles. You can also break your wrist back slightly and/or open up your hand more through the release to take revolutions off the ball. This is not just a trick for the high-rev players. Average players can also increase or decrease your roll a little to improve the ball reaction.
Finally, when bowling on any sport condition, you should have a set of sanding pads available during practice for changing the ball surface. Many people think that these pads are just for lower-rev players to get the ball to hook more. In reality, these pads change the shape of the ball reaction, with more surface (the lower numbered pads) creating earlier ball motion and less surface creating later ball motion. In most cases on sport patterns use of the sanding pads creates a smoother, more predictable hook motion that will be easier to control.