No top-flight lawn bowler that I have seen, either professional or on a national team’s squad, bowls from a fixed stance. By fixed stance, I mean delivering a bowl without taking a step forward of some length- small or large. This suggests to me that this technique has some inherent disadvantages that cannot be completely overcome even by relentless practice.
Not all bowlers who use a fixed stance exhibit all the disadvantages and all of these bowlers do deliver many excellent shots. The problem comes from the inherent disadvantages of the technique causing increased inconsistency.
The first difficulty is that a fixed stance almost completely curtails the opportunity to contribute the body’s momentum to any shot. Every delivery depends upon arm strength for all the velocity transferred to the bowl. For this reason, extra effort is required to reach long jack placements.
Nevertheless, fixed stance bowlers often have excellent arm strength, so if you are trying to take advantage of this potential problem do it at least at the end of a match or even better at the end of a full day of bowling.
The second shortcoming of fixed stance bowling is less obvious but cannot be overcome with strength. For a bowler who takes a stride as part of a delivery, the pendulum arc of that bowl has a greater amplitude than for a fixed stance delivery. By this I mean the length of the horizontal traverse of the bowl, from the top of the backswing to the point of release of the bowl from the hand, is longer for the person who takes a step. The increase in horizontal traverse corresponds to the length of the step. The result of this difference is that for any given deviation of the backswing away from the backward extension of the aim line, the error in bowling angle is less for the bowler who steps forward.
The result is that the bowler who takes a step makes smaller errors in the angle of delivery. This difference is most consequential in delivering to short jacks because with the necessarily shortened backswing, any step is a greater part of the horizontal traverse and the step contributes more to overall angle accuracy. So to take advantage of an opponent's fixed-stance delivery deliver short jacks!
I have tried to illustrate this in the Figure above wherein the fixed-stance bowler is right-handed and the stepping bowler left-handed to keep them out of each other's way in the figure. Each is trying to bowl the same line and each has the same magnitude error in the backswings.
I agree Clarke, if you can take a step it's huge advantage. However, as 90% of the bowlers I play with are 60 or over, most have some impediment that stops perfect form sadly. Bad knees, hips, back, even balance can be a hinderance. Yet, many over these players have somehow managed to turn themselves into good, or very good bowlers, it still amazes me how? The other problem many have is simply getting down. At my club I'd guess 80% drop their bowls from a height, but again some excel. I'm 72 and still manage a step, but I have to bowl slightly after the step these days, so it's not 100% continuous as it once was. Just found this blog and appreciate the time it takes to do it, thanks Richard.
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