A Process for Mastering Lane Play

Lane play is complicated. At this point, I’ve written countless articles about the topic. It’s both the best and most frustrating part of bowling because oil patterns, the lanes, and transition are different every time—even if you bowl on the same pattern every week. The more competitive you are, the more variety you face in terms of the bowling environment.

For this article, I want to really distill what it takes to become great at making adjustments. This isn’t to say that you’ll never make a mistake or that it’s an easy process, but elite players are elite decision-makers. It becomes an advantage at every level of the game if you can make decisions more quickly and more accurately. Here’s how you do it:

• Improve your observation skills: Learn what to look for and how to see it.
• Learn what works for you: There’s more than one way to attack most environments. Which one is best for you?
• Practice: This one seems obvious, but do you actually practice your lane play and observation skills?
• Play the lanes: This can be the biggest stumbling block. Accept the conditions as they are and adjust accordingly.

That’s really all there is to it. It’s just like developing your physical game. First, you learn what you should be doing, then you apply it to how your body moves, then you practice a whole lot, and then you just execute. The big difference between the physical game and lane play is that the bowling environment is mostly invisible, which means you need to guess at what you’re seeing every time.

As you learn, those guesses become better and better until you can really create a clear picture of the desired ball motion in your mind. All the trial and error finally unlocks those moments when it’s ...

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Image Credits: Bowling lanes background image (©iStock.com/Suradin) is licensed for use by BTM and is the copyrighted property of its original creator.