Get a Grip

As many of you may know, prior to coaching many of the professionals on tour, my first position on the professional tour was drilling bowling balls. During my career of drilling bowling balls for the best of the best, I drilled approximately 100,000 bowling balls for those who made a living throwing them. In that time I can assure you that many different styles of grips were used by the professionals and all of them were used effectively!

In this article I would like to bring to you some of the more popular styles of grips that were used by such superstars as Danny Wiseman, Pete Weber, and Marshall Holman. All of the styles of grips that will be discussed are still used by today’s bowlers. Since this is such a complex issue, there are a few things that you need to know.

Make only one change to your grip at a time and be open-minded when you make that change. As you try different things, know that it will feel differently than what you “feel” with your normal grip. If you should decide that one of the changes is good for you, be sure to spend at least three practice sessions on the lanes with the grip change to solidify your decision before making the grip change on your other bowling balls. Now, let’s get started.

Standard fingertip grip

The most popular grip used by most professionals was the standard fingertip grip. With this grip, the arch of both fingers is at approximately 45 degrees, as shown in the Standard Fingertip photo. The arch is indicated by the red line on both the fingers. When using a standard fingertip grip, both fingers are inserted in the hole to the first crease as shown by the two red squares located on the tips of the fingers in the Hand Pads Standard photo.

When using a standard fingertip grip, the webbing of the thumb should be contoured to the shape of the bowling ball as shown in this third photo Thumb Webbing Contoured photo. The white rectangular box highlights the webbing ...