 |
| Bowling at Balaia (the whale) |
I have repeated one piece of
advice more than any other in my blogs: get your advancing foot planted before
beginning your forward swing during a delivery. If you consistently miss
rolling your bowl over your stare point this, I have said, is the first thing
to check. I still stand behind that.
Nevertheless this winter, here
in Almancil Portugal, I had been bowling poorly. The symptoms were the same but
I was getting my foot down, so it was not the same ailment. Something different
was the problem. As it turned out, I was choosing stare points too far up the
green. (Your mark or stare point is the spot on the rink over which you try to
roll your bowl.) When I changed to a stare point just 3 to 5 meters beyond the
front edge of the mat my fortunes immediately dramatically improved. So great
was the change that when the match, during which I discovered this, concluded
my skip asked me what had happened halfway through the game.
Since then I have continued
making sure that I picked a clearly visible mark 3-5 meters out and I have consistently bowled with outstanding
line.
So the first thing to check
if you lose consistent line is still whether you are getting your advancing
foot down before your swing but the second thing to check is whether your stare
point is properly chosen.
Good bowling!
