Well, the new bowling season just started up a few weeks ago.  This year I have decided to cut back quite a bit on my bowling.  Last season, I tried to do too many leagues and tournaments, and I just got burnt out, and it stopped becoming fun for me.  Now I have gone back to 2 leagues instead of 4, and the tournaments will be few and far between.

It's been forever since I have had anything new drilled up, but I've got a couple new ones on the way now.  I found a sweet deal on a BVP Rampage that I bought last Friday, and just ordered a Complete NV as well.  I hope to have them drilled up within the next week or two, and I am looking forward to trying them out.

I'm 3 weeks into both leagues now, and have had a good start to my Friday night league and a pretty bad start to my Tuesday league (although I have taken 3 out 4 individual match points each of the last 2 weeks).  My goal is just to bowl consistantly well all year, and try not to go through any horrible slumps - like I always do every year :(

It has been a couple months since I have switched from Brunswick to Storm, and tonight proved to me that I made the right decision.  I shot scores of 300, 279, and 257 for an 836 series.  First honor scores I have shot since the summer of 2006.  I was throwing a Storm Spit Fire and it rolled great for me all night.  After a pretty bad performance on Tuesday night, I stayed after league to practice a few games to figure out what I was doing wrong, and I am glad I did, because I fixed a problem with my swing that I put to good use tonight tonight.  I am looking forward to getting more Storm equipment and having more great results.

Overall I would consider it a pretty successful year, being my first year out of junior bowling.  It is definitely a different world, some better and some worse.  League-wise, I did very well, in my 4 leagues I bowled in my teams took 3rd, 3rd, 1st, and 2nd.  I averaged 221 and 220 in my leagues at AMF Carolina Lanes, 204 at Skyway Lanes, and 212 at George Pappas Park Lanes.  I also joined the PBA earlier in the season, and have cashed in 2 regionals this year.  I would like to have cashed in more events, and also I had a goal of making at least one match play that I did not meet, but it could have been worse, and I now have a better grasp on what I need to work on to be competitive on the professional level.  Local and amateur tournaments I did very well in, I cashed in most of those.  I am bowling in 1 league over the summer, which is a PBA Experience league, which has been interesting so far.  Right now I am struggling with a back injury and I am not sure how long I am going to be out for, but it has been bothering me for almost 2 weeks now, and I hate not being able to bowl.  I really wanted to get a lot of practice in over the summer to better prepare for next year.  All in all though I had a great time bowling with my best friends, I have learned a lot from my experiences, and hope to "RUN THE GAME" even more next year.

Our shop just got our hands on a couple of cases of Danger Zones, and I bought 2 of them and drilled one up last night.  I threw 4 games with it and shot 161 over for 4.  I am very impressed with this ball so far and look forward to throwing it a lot more.  We also got some purple Rhino Pros in, now I am thinking about drilling up one of them too!

On my 4 hour drive home from Rocky Mount, I had a lot of time to do some thinking. After bombing at my last 2 regionals, I have decided to take a break from the regional tour for a while. I feel like I am at the top of my game, I feel like I have all the equipment I need to succeed, and I have changed my mindset on bowling for the better, however the results just aren't there. I have cashed in 2 out of 12 events. I have definitely learned a lot bowling the regionals over the last year. Last season, whenever I had a bad performance, I always told myself I wish I would have tried that ball, and I wish I would have done this and that differently. But it has been different over the last couple of tournaments. I feel like I have been throwing it great, and have tried making every adjustment and ball change that I know how to, and it has not been working. I have decided to take lessons over the summer to completely reform my game. I am going to attempt to fix my timing, backswing height, ball speed, and ball roll. So basically everything. I know that it is going to be difficult, but I am willing to work hard to make these changes, and hopefully I will be ready to hit up the regionals in the fall again.