At the time, I hadn’t bowled in over ten years. My average was around 90-100. I bowl pretty much in straight lines, mainly because I can never figure out the whole spin thing.
Then one day…
I was grumpy. I just wanted to sit around the house and get drunk. My friends forcibly dragged me to the bowling alley and were determined for me to have fun. I didn’t want any of it. One friend even made a special side trip to go home to get his own personal ball / glove / Bundy thumb-warmer setup.
I spent more time at the bar ordering drinks than I did bowling. My friends started griping at me about slowing down the game, so I started pounding drinks and running down the waitresses. I got pretty smashed right quick.
I bowled five games in a row above 175, totally putting the bowling beat down on everybody else, even brings-his-own-ball boy. When I hit 160 on the sixth game, they all got mad and we went home.
I’ve had 2 -299 games. In both cases I’ve hit a solid 12th shot and left a 10 pin. Talk about maddening.
I’ve bowled in league for about 10 years now, plus a few years when I was kid. Average was 204 this year, which was 4th best on my team (out of 5). Our best bowler averaged 224 this year and had 3 300s this year alone. He also had an 856 series a couple of years ago. The 800 series is now what the good bowlers measure themselves by since a 300 can be almost random. I’ve known a couple of people who had 300s and didn’t have a 600 series.
The comment about the lanes is part of it, plus the equipment (balls) now can be hooked out of the house by even an average bowler. They do have “sport” leagues now with much tougher oil patterns. Averages are notably lower in those leagues, for the most part.
I’m horribly inconsistent though. For every 250+ game, I manage to toss a nice 160 or so somewhere soon after. For my 299 games, I had small 700 series’ cause I was still pissed and threw terrible games following.
Can’t be. The best score you can have if you have nothing but spares is 190 (19 points every frame).
I have been playing, on and off, on one or two tournaments for 7 years (or a bit more).
My average hovers around the 170’s, occasionally breaking the 180’s. My best frame (out of league) was about 270; during league play I have had a best of 256, maybe 4 times.
It’s simple, really. The absence of strikes during a game condemns you to a sub-20 average per frame. Thus, you would have several frames above 20 points to compensate. The scenario you gave gives us 191 points (19 points * 9 frames and 20 points in the last frame)
In Wii bowling, if I start at the extreme right edge of the lane and give it as much spin as I possibly can (described as “kung fu-ing the ball in” by a cousin who saw me playing), it curves just about exactly into the pins. In real life bowling, if I start at the extreme right edge of the lane and give it as little spin as I possibly can, it does the same thing, but less replicable. Unfortunately, bowling that way gives you very little margin for error, and can easily turn into a gutter ball on either side, so my best score is only something like 71.
I challenge you to a crap-off! I’m bad. Obama bad. I was proud of myself because over the weekend, I managed to knock some pins down. I even got a strike at some point, and still didn’t break 100. I still love bowling, though. It’s good times to drink whiskey, knock stuff over, and not get arrested.
I haven’t played regularly in almost 20 years (maybe once a year since then), but when I was in a lunchtime league with co-workers, I averaged about 150, and broke 200 exactly once.
But that 203 was an aberration. I never came close to tha tagain.
I am one of those with multiple 300 games. Oddly enough they were bowled back in the 80’s and early 90’s when they DID check the lanes. They also checked the bowling balls. I have 3 300’s in league play and two were turned down for lane conditions and one because my ball was deemed too soft (that supposedly gave me unfair advantage because it gave it more grip on the lanes). A few were bowled in touraments that were not ABC sanctioned. ABC was the precursor to USBC.
Even with the new equipment I haven’t had one in a number of years. I reckon it has to do with age(Iam 60 now) and nerves. I still bowl in leagues every winter. Average about 195 or so. I am happy with that for now.
I grew up bowling. The lanes were a block away from our house. I had about a 160 average when I graduated high school. Since then I’ll bowl once every couple of years, using a lane ball. Last fall the folks from work went bowling for a “team building” night. I had a 216 that night. Not bad for being rusty.
Here’s an addendum to my high scores…I used to keep track of my high games and I just found the paperwork.
I did the 267 twice, in exactly the same way as described above.
I also did a 276, which was my high game (contrary to what I posted before). All strikes except for a 6-/ in the 7th frame.
I bowled two dozen 600+ 3-game series, but due to my inconsistency (and tendency to be drunk by the 3rd game) I only had one 600 series with all three games over 200.
I never bowled a dutch 200 and never bowled an all spare game.
My high series was 676. The games were 197, 267 and 212. I must not have been drinking that night.
