Understanding How Lane Conditions Affect Bowling
What Most Recreational Bowlers Don’t Know About Oil Patterns
Jul 27, 2009
The average league bowler, someone who hits the lanes one night a week with his buddies just to throw back a couple of brewskies and toss his 14-pound house ball down the lanes, might not realize there is something called a house shot. Neither will the group of friends or young family that decides to go bowling every so often just for the fun of it. In fact, the average recreational bowler probably is unaware that there even is oil on bowling lanes.
However, those who like more of a challenge and compete regularly in amateur bowling tournaments, bowl in a sports league or bowl more than one bowling league a week, generally have a clear understanding when someone tells them they are bowling on a house shot, on a sports or PBA pattern or even the United States Bowling Congress (USBC) national shot.
Different Oil Patterns Create Different Characteristics
For those unfamiliar with bowling, the typical bowling lane is 60 feet long from the foul line to the head pin and 42 inches wide (39 boards) from gutter to gutter. While the lanes themselves were at one time all wood (there are still some bowling houses in the U.S. that are real), most now are synthetic. Whichever type of lanes bowlers bowl on, they need to be oiled to maintain their condition. Think of it as putting Old English® oil polish on grandma’s dining room table. However, oil is also used to help carry bowling balls down the lane, too.
Now consider this: a 60 foot by 42 inches slab of wood can be oiled in a variety of different ways. And that’s exactly what happens. Every bowling alley has a house shot or preferred pattern for oiling their lanes for recreation and league bowlers. There are also four sports bowling oil patterns, five Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) oil patterns plus the USBC has a national shot. But what does this mean to bowlers?
It generally means that most oil patterns stretch somewhere between 35 to 45 feet down the lane; that’s starting at the foul line and moving toward the head pin. Bowlers also have to consider how much oil gets laid down – light to heavy – because that makes a difference, too. Plus, remember, there’s side-to-side or gutter-to-gutter. Oil is not just spread evenly from the foul line to 35+ feet. It’s staggered.
That may mean that there’s heavy oil gutter-to-gutter, but only for the first few feet. For the next 20 feet, the heavy oil could begin to narrow toward the middle of the lane inches at a time leaving lighter and lighter oil between the middle of the lane and the gutter. Less oil means drier lane conditions and nothing to slow a bowling ball down so it is likely to move – or hook -- more.
Different Oil Patterns Create Different Ball Reactions
Bowlers also need to keep in mind that the more bowling balls thrown onto an oiled lane, the more the oil becomes redistributed. So as a bowling ball pushes through an area of heavy oil it picks some up and carries it further and further down the lane including to areas where there previously was no oil, changing the oil conditions as it goes and bringing some back on the ball. Bowlers should check their bowling balls. If the lanes are freshly oiled, they’ll see it.
That being said, what might a bowler expect from the different oil patterns? Chances are the typical recreational bowler will encounter a lighter oil pattern than the pros. This is to enable the ball to move more freely for the non-experienced bowler. While a standard league pattern will mean heavier oil but will begin to dry on the outside as the night goes on creating more hook out there.
Then there is sports league bowling. Not quite pros, sports bowlers are more skilled than the average bowler and, therefore, face tougher oil conditions with names like Dead Man’s Curve and Highway to Hell. And, of course, there are the five pro patterns – Chameleon, Cheetah, Scorpion, Shark, and Viper.
The toughest thing to predict is exactly how all this oil will distribute itself. Lots depends on who is bowling and what type of bowling balls they throw. Typically there are more right-handed bowlers than lefties, so naturally the right side has more people to push the oil around. Plus bowling balls have different surfaces, some of which are more porous than others, affecting how much oil will be absorbed.
The point is there are a lot of angles to take into consideration when it comes to bowling. Sure it can be fun to grab a house ball, chuck it down the lane and see where it goes. But the only way to improve is to understand how lane conditions affect bowling.
For more information on sports and pro oil patterns, check out Kegel and PBA.
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