Good day at the PBA Super Regional today. This Regional was hosted right before the PBA Tour stop here in Wichita, KS this week, so we had a full field of 160 for the tournament, with about 40 exempt players. We also bowled in two centers (Northrock and Thunderbird) on two different patterns (Masters and TOC).
On the Masters pattern at Northrock, I started playing out, but didn't have as good a look as I did in the practice session, so I moved back to where I usually play the Masters - a small bank swing just outside 15. As long as I got my hand around the ball just a bit, then stayed firm with my hand, I had a pretty good reaction. I just followed that reaction in, ending up around 18 swinging to about 12 on the hooking lanes. I got to +69 for the first 6.
In the second block, I started playing out, but then went into the mid-track area the second game to try to take advantage of following Patrick Allen on the second pair. However, I didn't have that good a look on the second pair, and so went back out for the rest of the block (around 6). I used my Evolve to smooth out the reaction, and shot 278 in game 4. Sometimes you just need to use something that picks up the lane a little sooner and bleeds off a little to blend the pattern out and get a more predictable reaction.
On the last pair, I was +163 with one to go, and the number was +109. I had to make the turn to 1-2, and lane 1 was hooking a lot more than the previous 2 pairs. I had to make a quick 8-3 move in after2 splits, then move right a little less on the right lane to play "defense". I wanted to make sure I either struck or left a 7-pin, so I could close frames and make sure I got into the cash. This strategy worked, as I saved 178 the last game to end up at +141.
Tomorrow is another day - cash round...
