Do Lawn Bowling Skips Really Think Far Ahead?

 

Commentators on professional lawn bowling videos often say that top bowlers think several bowls ahead in each end. Is this actually likely? Or, does it depend upon the tactical situation in the head? 

Remember— the situation in the head depends as much upon the location of the opposition bowls as upon the planned disposition of your own side’s bowls.

What I can believe is that certain dispositions of bowls- comprising both one's own and those of the opponents- can present such a substantial combination of positive outcomes that a skip can expect that shot to be eventually attempted either by the opposition or his own team. When such a position arises, this realization can cause him/her to prepare the head to increase or decrease its likelihood, depending upon whether successful execution would be beneficial or detrimental to the side.

What I am suggesting is that it is particular dispositions of bowls that trigger planning further ahead, while m the situation suggests nothing more than that the next bowl should be delivered as close as possible to the jack! 

A skip is unlikely to start formulating a comprehensive strategy for an end so long as (s)he is confident at outdrawing whatever has been delivered so far in the end. It is really only when a bowl is sufficiently close to the jack that it is unlikely to be bettered that both offensive or defensive longer-term strategizing is triggered. 

Nailed Down Groundsheets

 In Canada, where I mostly reside, I had never seen a groundsheet on a lawn bowling green that was tacked immovably in one place, even though I have bowled now for ten years. I have seen lots of temporary, moveable groundsheets. In fact, where the playing surface is real grass as opposed to a synthetic carpet, groundsheets are often mandatory. Lawn bowling clubs that are always trying to keep their membership participation up will always have beginning bowlers who, a certain portion of the time, create divots as well as aging bowlers who can no longer bend down like they used to and now are consistent ‘dumpers’. Maintenance of a high-quality, fast, grass green is expensive; volunteers are usually both amateur and few in number, so some form of groundsheet is a standard solution.

So, at both Valverde LBC and Balaia LBC in Portugal, I was not surprised to find groundsheets although this was the first time I had seen them at either club in the years before the Covid interruption. What surprised me was to find them permanently tacked down and consequently not moveable.

Upon inquiring at Valverde I was told that they had tried moveable groundsheets but they were being lifted by the winds. Although this is observed occasionally in Canada it has never been enough of an issue to encourage the ‘controlling body’, (as it is described in The Laws of World Bowls), to bring out the nails. The more prevalent difficulty in Canada with using groundsheets is that they can seriously interfere with the path of an incoming bowl when the jack is resting on or past the groundsheet. A bowl traveling on its inward bias can catch the edge of a ground sheet and be deflected along that edge.

When I was bowling in Australia, I never saw a groundsheet and the prevailing sentiment, as best I could estimate it, was, “If the weather requires groundsheets, it is too inclement to bowl at all.”

I hear some similar objections in the Algarve but I have not encountered, even among the best players, anyone whose delivery is so precise that the short distance of traverse of the bowl on the groundsheet can contribute in any significant way to the deviations in their performance.

My objection to a fixed groundsheet is not that it reduces the precision, accuracy, or benefit of experience for any player but that it removes one of the important strategic elements of the game itself- moving the mat. 

I know that I am in the overwhelming minority when I maintain that this is a substantial change. At the same time, I want to be clear that despite this loss, I unambiguously support using these grass protectors in whatever form controlling bodies feel is necessary. Protecting the quality of the playing surface must be our highest priority.

Although in social bowls moving the mat forward by more than say a meter is rarely seen, it is part of the game. In fact, as can be seen by watching competitive bowls either outdoors or in, moving the mat up the maximum possible distance is the most frequent tactic when trying to change the flow of a game. Moving the mat up to at least two meters from the hog line is the most dependable way to deliver the jack for a shorter end. With the mat two meters short of the hog line, so long as your jack delivery finishes within four meters of the forward ditch it will be acceptable for play. With the front edge of the mat touching a hog line you still have a target area two meters in length onto which to deliver a playable short jack!

For this reason, I prefer the moveable groundsheet-type grass protectors. They are inconvenient in high winds and they sometimes can interfere with bowls arriving at a jack but they do preserve the strategic options of our lawn bowls game.

 

Back to Bowls in Portugal

The author of the Greenbowler blog has not been to Portugal for two winters. Finally, the pandemic has sufficiently moderated so that my wife and I feel safe to travel again. Since Spain and Portugal have access to natural gas pumped by pipeline from Algeria, energy will be more available there than in the rest of Europe. In any case, the Algarve is not particularly cold- between 14 and 19℃ during the daylight hours- and in the sunshine substantially warmer.

In the past, the clubs we play at, Valverde and Balaia, are swarming with Brits in the winter months. Will Brexit have made any difference? I’m sure the Portuguese government will have done everything it can to make all the usual visitors welcome. 

The Algarve is the best place for North Americans to go for winter bowling. Everyone in the tourist-sensitive businesses speaks English. There is fresh produce in the Saturday markets. Rental accommodation is plentiful. Internet service is good and reasonably priced. Good wine is cheaper and the restaurants aren’t crowded. 

There are very few American visitors because the weather isn’t quite warm enough for them. For Canadians, it’s good October weather.

A Balancing Exercise to Improve the Delivery of Lawn Bowlers

Lawn bowlers really don’t need a lot of strength. So long as the surface they play on is reasonably fast, the potential energy from allowing the bowl to descend to the bowling surface combined with the kinetic energy from a pendulum swing is sufficient to take a bowl the full length of the rink.

What lawn bowlers need, increasingly as they get older, is improved balance. Most delivery motions involve stepping forward with the advancing foot and a momentary brief balancing on the anchor foot alone. Brief as this is, a partial loss of balance by your entire body will cause deviations from the desired line and weight for your shot.

If you have been lawn bowling more or less regularly for six years or more, I think I can provide a little test that will demonstrate that your balance may be more important for your delivery than you think.

Take a bowl and stand in your ‘ready’ position to start your bowling delivery. Now raise your stepping foot slightly off the ground so that all your weight is supported on your anchor leg. Start counting: a thousand and one, a thousand and two, etc. stopping the count when you lose your balance. Now switch the bowl to the other hand and repeat, standing with all your weight supported on what would normally be the leg that steps forward. Again count. Repeat these two tests a few times. At least for me, I have much more enduring control of my balance standing on my normal 'anchor' leg. This, I hypothesize, is because my lawn bowling has provided some practice balancing on my anchor leg.

Doing this exercise, standing beside the back of a chair that you can reach out to when you lose your balance, you should, with practice, be able to stand alone on either leg for 20 seconds. When you can do this controlling your balance perfectly throughout your bowls delivery will be improved commensurate with whatever improvement you have made using the exercise.

 Try it!

A Smooth Delivery and the Subconscious Control of Weight

I have found that after a lawn bowler has played for something like six seasons or more, his/her subconscious can be unleashed to consistently deliver the correct weight to reach any jack between the minimum and maximum distances so long as it is left to the subconscious instincts— that is- being ‘in the zone.’ This is in fact what is claimed in the teaching literature and that indeed is what I have found to be true.

The undeclared caveat, however, is that one’s delivery must be reproducibly executed and smooth. That means no dumping, no wobbling, and no loss of balance. Your subconscious,  according to its secret algorithm, is assuming that your delivery will be executed exactly according to form.

I have further found that the delivery technique wherein I draw my bowl back carefully along the extension of my aim line while counting “a thousand and one” followed by a smooth reproducible forward step with a slight flexing of my forward stepping knee so that my whole foot grounds itself on the count of “a thousand and two” followed unhurriedly by a smooth forward swing of my delivery arm that settles the bowl onto the green as I count “a thousand and three” gives me the best chance to deliver over and over according to the same form.

Now- in the setup for the delivery, it is important not to get away from visualizing the desired arc of your bowl on its path from mat to jack, because this is the data that your subconscious will mysteriously plug into its algorithm for producing the correct weight.

Notice that I intend you to be fully conscious about taking your bowl slowly and steadily back during the count of  “a thousand and one” but from there you should have a blank mind and just focus with tunnel vision intently on your stare point out on your aim line.

If you are anything like me, until you have played bowls for at least six years, you will consider this subconscious control idea to be some form of voodoo. It can’t possibly work, or so I thought. 

Well, it does work but your delivery action has to be smooth.

Big or Little? Winning the Mat

When lawn bowlers don’t have a coin in their pocket at the beginning of play, one skip will often roll a bowl a short distance, end over end, pineapple fashion, and ask the opposing skip, “Big or little?” If the skip calling the outcome is correct, that skip gets to choose either to take possession of the mat or have the last bowl in the first end.

Although the chances of either outcome are approximately the same, there is a small difference in favor of calling, “Big”  because those bowls that,  after the pineapple tumbling motion, finish on their running surface more often fall with their big decal uppermost. I have tested this experimentally and it does seem to prove out (59:54). 

This is not statistically significant but if you want to win the choice it seems best to call out, “Big.”

My Last Secret for Consistently Hitting Your Stare Point

In 2020, I published a blog describing the bowling delivery that I have evolved during my previous 8 years of lawn bowling.

At one point this month just passed, I was teaching a new bowler this delivery and during the instruction, I hit upon a concept that radically improved my own capacity to roll a bowl precisely and consistently over a stare point 3-5 meters out on the green. Further testing and practice have shown that indeed this change can be an improvement.

Over and over again, in my blog articles, I have emphasized the importance of getting one’s advancing foot down on the green before swinging your bowling arm through to deliver a bowl. I have now found that not only is it important that the heel of one’s advancing foot touch the surface of the green but one’s weight needs to have been transferred forward onto the ball of that foot before starting the downward swing of the bowl if one wants to more dependably roll your bowl over your stare point.

So great is the improvement that follows from this change that I am repeating my earlier blog with this change printed in a red typeface below.

I bowl from the Shooters’ stance. My anchor foot is positioned at an angle of 45 degrees to the line of delivery. I have chosen this because it provides less side-to-side tilting during my stepping when I am on one foot only. For the set-up, I use the South African foot positioning which places the stepping foot one-half a stride in front of the anchor foot. This reduces the length of the forward stride and thereby reduces the time that I'm standing on one leg. I expect this increases my stability. In my set position, I have my non-bowling hand resting on the knee of my forward leg. This keeps my center of gravity lower than it would  be in a completely erect posture; again trying to minimize sway. My hand on knee locks in that stability. My weight is essentially completely on my anchor foot in this 'set' position so that my forward stepping will provide a consistent momentum accompanying a consistent forward velocity. 

My wrist is no longer cocked. I abandoned this experiment because it was inconsistent with having a more relaxed arm. The biggest change from previous years is that I now hold my bowl tilted, (the plane of the rolling surface not parallel with the aim line) even in the ready position so that no  Bryant twist is required during the backswing. This follows the observed practice of Stuart Andersen, a world bowls champion. This angle reflects the natural position of my hand when it hangs loosely at my side.  Previously,as I twisted my wrist when I was using a Bryant twist in my backswing I felt that the bowl’s changing center of gravity was throwing off the smooth line of my backswing. Starting with the wrist off-center as Andersen does eliminates this perception. Bringing my wrist back into line, so the bowl’s running surface coincides with the aim line, occurs in my forward swinging and I do not feel it.

My grip for a draw or running (run through) shot is best described as having the “C” formed by my thumb and index finger on the bowl’s grip marks. (Since I use Aero Zig-Zag Grooved bowls, there is an actual channel for my thumb and finger.) My middle fingertip is centered on the running surface of my bowl. In contrast, for a drive, all four of my fingers are on the bowl with my index finger on one grip and my baby finger on the other.  My two middle fingers are near the center of the running surface. Putting all four fingers behind the bowl seems to improve my power while preserving accuracy.

Following David Bryant’s teaching, holding the bowl in a proper grip and standing in my set position, I look back and forth alternating between my stare point, over which I must roll my bowl to get the proper bias swing, and the jack location, whose distance I need to internalize to get the proper weight. At the same time, I make a few abbreviated practice swings along the proposed line, and then when I feel comfortable I begin my backswing.

My backswing is slow and measured; like an archer drawing his bow or a pool player lining up his cue. My mind is focused on keeping my backswing on top of the extension of my aim line out behind me. My eyes stare at the ‘stare point’ on my aim line which I want my bowl to traverse.

I do not start my forward stepping until the completion of my backswing. This backswing along the extension of my aim line is done to the internal count of “a thousand and one.”

On the measured, unhurried count of “a thousand and two” I step forward and bring my stepping foot, heel first, down onto the rink. My bowling arm does not start swinging forward during this step. Doing so would lead to some at least partial loss of balance that would make rolling the bowl over my ‘stare point’ more difficult. Nevertheless, although I do not start my arm swing the bowl moves forward somewhat because my body moves forward during this stepping out.

Then on “a thousand and three” as my body rocks forward and my weight transfers from my heel to the ball of my foot then onward to my toes, my arm swings forward. Thus the bowl is being accelerated both by my arm and body movement at the point when I draw back my fingers and release the bowl just in front of my planted advanced foot.

At this point, my body dips slightly to bring my bowl closer to the ground. I release my bowl just in front of my forward foot. During the forward stepping and forward swinging, my mind is blank—in order to commit complete control to my subconscious. Once the bowl is released, I consciously observe whether I have rolled the bowl over my stare point so that I will know whether I need to correct my line or simply do a better job of hitting it!

It is important, I think, to be sure that one completely transfers one’s body weight forward onto one’s stepping foot. This is achieved by actually walking off the mat or at least raising one's anchor lag above the mat.  I have so far failed to consistently follow this, so it is a work in progress. I am also trying to vigorously draw my fingers and thumb off the bowl as I release it so that there is no last-minute deflection from the line; but, this so far is also just a hoped-for outcome. Since I am trying to leave the forward swing to my subconscious it is difficult to consciously control the bowl’s release.

 

Knowing Your Partners’ Bowls: Advising a Teammate Regarding Line

Do you play often with the same team members? Most likely - yes.

Have you ever practiced using their bowls? Do you know how the bias of their bowls compares to your own? Can you tell that team member what his aim point should be on the forward bank, succinctly but precisely, as you pass him at mid-rink during the first or second end? 

No or much less likely- right?

What I propose here is that you schedule a practice session with each of your regular partners during which you each deliver two of your own bowls followed by two of that partner’s. From this, you discover the correction factor for calculating your colleague’s bias based on your own. 

The other thing you need to accomplish is to have adequate common terminology for describing recommended aim points on the forward bank.

The unit of measure I use is the half-rink width (HRW). This I define as the distance between the center-line marker and one of the rink boundary markers. Many clubs actually provide intermediate marks on the bank dividing the half-rink width into thirds! This is a violation of the Laws of Bowls Crystal Mark 3. Nevertheless, you will often see it, at least in Canada.

Thus moving from the center line outward I can specify 1/3 HRW, 2/3 HRW, 1 HRW (the boundary) 1 1/3 HRW, 1 2/3 HRW, 2 HRW (adjacent rink number), and so on. This can be abbreviated to: center line, 1/3, 2/3, boundary, 1 1/3, 1 2/3,  rink number, and so on. 

So, suppose I am leading and my partner is skipping. I know from practice that his bowls are wider than mine by about 1/3 HRW. Now, for example, suppose I am bowling the first end, delivering over the center front edge of the mat and I discover that on the right-hand side of the rink, my aim point is the boundary marker. I then can anticipate that my partner’s starting aim point should be 1 1/3 on that side and as I pass him  at mid-rink when he is going to the mat to deliver the skip’s bowls, I tell him, “1 1/3 on the right.”

It is crucial for you and your teammates to be crystal clear whether you are reporting the bias you are using or the corrected bias that they should use. 

In the example above, when I tell him 1 1/3, he must know without a doubt that this is the aim point he should use and not the one I found good for me!  In the alternative, if you have agreed that you will report your bias and he will do the correction I would have said, “The boundary on the right.”

Of course, in this case, as skip, he will have been watching all my deliveries and may have a fair idea of what the line should be, but it is not always easy to figure this out from a position just behind the jack. Furthermore, the information you provide is just a starting point to which all bowlers add their own accumulating information.