Pin Perspectives: Know Thyself

Greetings, BTM readers and bowlers! I hope you have enjoyed your summer and that you were able to relax your body, mind, and spirit. Here in the USA, bowling leagues have already begun. Over the years, my fellow coaches and I have extensively written about whether you should have bowled during the summer, what else you might be advised to do during the summer other than bowling, and how to best prepare for this new bowling season.

However, I would like to approach our return to bowling from a different perspective and ask you two deceptively simple questions: Do you know your game? Does anyone else know your game?

What does knowing one’s game mean? It means that you have a clear and unbiased understanding and appreciation for what you can and cannot currently do on the lanes, both physically and mentally. It means that you know what your bowling goals are and that you work toward them, whether those goals are to be the best league bowler you can, to be the best league and tourney bowler you can, or to compete on the professional tours.

Knowing your game means that you are acutely aware of what level of bowling you seek and are capable of, despite what others might suggest. Last, knowing your game means that you can filter well-intentioned advice and stand firm if that advice isn’t going to work for you.

Which road did you take?

Typically, we bowlers choose to spend our off-seasons traveling down one of two roads. Using an automobile analogy, either we remove the engine from our car and decide to dismantle and rebuild it, or we simply put our car up on blocks in the driveway, cover it with a tarpaulin, and ride something else for the summer.

Back to bowling, either we work on a specific aspect of our physical or mental game by dismantling it completely, seeing what works and what needs fixing, or we give ...