The Idol joins the Dare Devil Trick and the Dare Devil Danger in the HP3 line for Roto Grip. This ball uses both a new solid reactive coverstock and a new symmetrical core design. The MicroTrax-S18 cover comes out of the box at a 2000 grit sanded finish, giving it plenty of traction to handle heavy oil patterns. The new Ikon weight block is a low RG, high differential design that revs up quickly and offers plenty of flare potential. All of these elements come together to give bowlers an excellent new option for heavier volume patterns.

We started with the Idol on our heavy oil test pattern, where all three of our testers had a terrific reaction on the fresh. They each felt like they had a good amount of room for error at the breakpoint because of how well the Idol read the midlane. Stroker started with his ball on 16, crossing 12 at the arrows. Tweener was starting his ball on 24 and projecting it out to 16 at the arrows. Cranker, who had even more miss-room than the other two testers, played the deepest in the oil. His ball started close to 30 and crossed the arrows at 18. All three testers were trying to get this ball to eight at the breakpoint, but they didn’t have to be perfect. Stroker had the most area right ...