World cup final!

I just scraped into 3rd place so made the step ladder!



I shot +208 for my last 4 games to make it by 10 pins! I still can't believe it and the whole round robin is a complete blur!



Finals start at 9am tomorrow and I will be playing Ann Marie Putney from Australia.



Zara



www.zaraglover.com



Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

Bowling World Cup 2008 - Cont.....

Well I had a good day at the office today!

I started with my Twisted Fury Destruction again and opened up with a solid 234 then 214. I was waiting for the lanes to burn up so as I could drop in with my Smash Zone as this had been the best reaction I'd had all tournament. Sure enough the first frame of the 3rd game I threw a good shot and the ball instantly jumped and went Brooklyn. I spared, then I went straight for my Smash Zone dropped in a proceeded to go off the sheet for 290!!! :) I followed that up with steady 208, 214, 204 just sparing all the single pin leaves. I have made some ground now on the leader board and have jumped up from 12th to 6th place. Frame by Frame scores click HERE

The field has now been cut to the top 24 and there will be an 8 game block tomorrow played a singles pace, then the field will be cut again to a top eight round robin. For full scores please visit the official tournament website.

I need to make some more ground so fingers crossed I have a few more big games tomorrow :)

Bowling World Cup 2008

2008 Bowling World Cup Hermosillo, Mexico

I had a very uneventful trip over here to Mexico, we flew via LA and had a layover which certainly enabled us to arrive fully refreshed. Official practise was on Saturday and went ok, and I was feeling very relaxed and confident over night going into the tournament.

Day 1 - I opened up 278 and had perfect ball reaction with my Twisted Fury Solid then changed ends of the centre and it didn't look as good so I changed to my Smash Zone shooting 244. I was a little slow in changing balls during the transition and I only shot 184 - 200, then picked up my Fury Pearl and followed up with another 278 and 240 to finish. Both 278's were bowled when I crossed with Shannon Pluhowsky of USA, she must be my lucky charm!!! I finished with a total of 1424 and was leading over night. To see my frame by frame scores click HERE. We had a lovely Mexican meal to celebrate that evening where we met a really helpful German guy who is over here on business. He told us all the best places to visit so hopefully we will have time to go to all the sites in the next few days then I can load some pictures up.

Day 2 - I didn't feel comfortable from the off, I had a good look in practise again with my Twisted Fury Solid but half way through the game it started over reacting. when I moved deeper it didn't look as good so I changed to my Smash Zone but even that started over reacting. The lanes seemed a lot drier to the right but with a higher volume in the centre of the lane. In the 2nd game I continued with my Smash Zone but it just kept hooking and going high on the head pin. Even when I did hit the pocket I was creating the wrong angle and not carrying the corner pins. I pretty much threw every ball I brought with me in the 3rd game trying to find a better angle to the pocket and make up the pins I had lost over the first two games. The 3rd game was probably the best 180 game I've ever thrown lol. I struck first frame then the next shot hooked and left me a split. I made the adjustment and left a pocket 7-10 split in the third frame. I changed to my Twisted Fury Destruction and moved a little further to the right. I had 6 pocket 9's in a row trying different hand positions and moving everywhere across the lane. In the end I picked up my Fury Pearl moved in and just accepted that I was going to have a few carry issues. I finished the squad with a poor 70 under. Frame by Frame scores

Day 3 - I changed some of my surfaces today, I took the shine off my Twisted Fury Destruction as I was planning on trying to stay further to the right. This worked and looked pretty good. I used it for the first 2-3 games then changed to my Smash Zone. The lanes didn't burn up as much as yesterday and I played well and finished 70 over so made up the pins I lost yesterday.
I still had a few carry issues but no where near as bad as yesterday Frame by Frame scores.

My laptop battery is about to die so see ya xxx

European Champions Cup - Germany

European Champions Cup
http://www.ecc2008.dbu-bowling.com/

Last week I added another title to my resume!

The European Champions Cup was dual pattern and I averaged 222 for the qualifying. I used my Ultra Zone the majority of time on the short pattern and Blast Zone the majority of the time on the long oil.

The top 8 then proceeded to best of three matchplay where the first game was played on one pattern and second game the other etc. The pattern order was chosen by the top seed each match.

Results courtesy of www.bowlingdigital.com

Next stop is the AMF World Cup, Hermosillo - Mexico.

Ankara Open Part 2

I bowled twice on Saturday the first squad I started off well again shooting
games of 237 - 210 - 208 -203

I used my Smash Zone again in the same part of the lane as the first squad on Friday, about 13 at the arrows to a breakpoint of 8/9. I have the Smash Zone laid out with the pin below my fingers and on the centre line of my grip, so when the lanes burned up and I had to move a lot deeper in the fifth game it didn't look as good. My plan was to change to the Twisted Fury Solid which I have polished up and drilled pin above my ring finger. This didn't match up that well as the lanes were just too burned up, even with the polished surface the ball was too strong, so I changed to my Twisted Fury in the 9th frame of the 5th game and struck out for a horrible
156 game. Which meant I needed a high score in the last game to have a chance of making the cut. I started off spare, open, and then strung some strikes together to the 9th frame I needed the first one in the 10th to be guaranteed a safe spot on finals day but left a 4 pin. This gave me a game of 234 and a total of 1296 with bonus and meant I was boarder line so had to bowl the second squad I had booked at 21:00.

I was a lot more consistent this block as I knew which balls to change to when so started up with the Smash Zone again and yet again it looked great on the fresh oil. When the lane burned up again I switched straight to the Twisted Fury so avoided the low game in the transition. I shot my first good 5th game of a block during the tournament and went onto the final pair confident I would beat my score. The final pair however gave me a few problems! I struck every shot on the left lane but couldn't get the right reaction on the right, I was going ok though as I only needed a par game. Then a split out of nowhere in the 8th frame made life a little more difficult! I struck again in the 9th on the left lane and needed to make the first one in the 10th frame my first strike on the right lane to beat my 96 over. I threw it good but left a 4 pin, meaning I couldn't beat the score. A mad 5 minutes of working out the final scores ensued but luckily for me there were only 2 high scores in that last squad bowled by the recently married Pat Luoto (previously Patricia Schwartz) from Germany and Jouni Helminen of Finland. I still wasn't 100% sure until they actually announced it but I was indeed the lucky one who fell as the cut to the finals! The tournament had run late and we had only finished the squad at 2am! The finals were scheduled to start at 8am the following morning so I made my way back to the hotel to try and sleep for a few hours after all the excitement!

The finals were a 4 game block with a cut of 50% each round. I started off well and made the second round without much trouble, in the next round I couldn't really find a great ball reaction. I kept fishing around but never found anything consistent from pair to pair and missed the next round.

I am very pleased with my performance on the whole as I was in Ankara to play the Open and the European Ranking Masters. The Masters starts tomorrow and will be a dual pattern format where we play on short and long patterns. To succeed on these specific lengths of patterns you need specifically laid out balls which on the whole don't give the best reaction on medium length
patterns like the Ankara Open pattern. Excess baggage problems limit bowlers to a maximum of 6 balls so I had 2 balls set up for the short and one for the long then two for the Ankara Open and a polyester ball for sparing. In actual fact the Twisted Fury I used during the Open was one of the balls set up for the short, but it may be going to more tournaments with me from now
on as it looked great on burned up lanes.

This was the first time I have played in Ankara and will definitely try and play again next year, I cannot fault the organisation of the tournament. Even though I arrived in the middle of the night I was greeted at the airport and taken to the hotel and everyone of the tournament crew were
always friendly and helpful! I would most definitely recommend the trip to more bowlers and tournament organisers out there looking for tips, these people are definitely a group to try to emulate at any tournament if you want it to be a success!

For full results please visit:

http://www.ankaraopen.com

Zara

www.zaraglover.com

Ankara Open Bowling Tournament

My journey to Ankara started at 3pm yesterday as I left work for Heathrow Airport. My flight was at 21:05 landing here in Ankara at 3:05. We had a slight delay and I landed approximately 4am.

I am here for a week to compete in two tournaments. The first will be the Ankara Open and the second the first European Ranking Masters. The Ankara Open is the first Premier event on the EBT and has higher prize money and ranking points available for the taking.

The Masters is an invitational tournament where the top 16 women and men compete to decide the top ranked bowler.

The Ankara Open organiser Duygu Gurkan was wonderful and had organised her friend to collect me from the airport even though it was the middle of the night!

I managed to get a few hours sleep then headed down to the bowl today. The scoring pace was very high, I managed to get into the 5pm squad and bowled pretty well on the whole. I made a few sparing mistakes in the first game while I was fishing around finding the best ball reaction. But then picked up my Smash Zone and had a great ball reaction, this ball is the hardest hitting ball I have ever owned. It seems to blow the pins away from any angle into the pocket! I feel like I have used it everywhere since it came out on different surfaces and oiling patterns!

I shot games of:

157

256

256

218

180

176

1,243

I was a little disappointed I lost ball reaction the last 2 games, the lane really burned up and I had to move a lot deeper. I need to play with a different ball if I am going to move that far left tomorrow.

I bowl again at 13:00 and 21:00 tomorrow.

World Cup Qualifier - Peterborough, England

Last weekend we ventured to Peterborough to compete in the English World Cup Qualifier. The winners of this tournament would be the English representatives to bowl in the World Cup held this year in Hermosillo, Mexico. The Ladies event was an 8 game qualification cut to the top 16, then a further 4 games then cut to a top 6 round robin.

I decided to bowl on Saturday afternoon instead of Sunday morning, as the schedule was set so as the tournament would not finish until after 9pm on the Sunday night. I started off struggling quite a lot, opening up the first 3 games with 169-178-195 = 540 :-( I was moving around everywhere trying to find a decent reaction. I had used my Blast Zone and Ultra Zone and both
looked close but I wasn't creating much area, the balls were under reacting when I missed right and over reacting when I missed inside. I had played from approx. board 7 at the arrows to approx. 13 and it just didn't look right to me but I knew the break point was in the right place, I just had to find the right way to get to it.

I decided the Blast Zone was just too strong so moved in to approx 17 at the arrows and slowed down with my Ultra Zone; this really enabled me to open up the lane. I suddenly created a great ball reaction and shot 227-266-228-245-205 over the next five leaving me on 1713 and squad leader over night.

I was still in the lead after the second qualifying squad with a 37 pin lead over second place Hayley White. We had to wait for the men to bowl a six game block before we joined them to bowl four games and cut to the top six. I was a bit wary of how to play the lanes on the fresh as I hadn't started so well the day before, during practice I tried to play where I had the day before but it didn't look so good. I moved out to 7 at the arrows with my Blast Zone and increased my ball speed. I wasn't sure whether this was going to work as the practice was without pins so it is very hard to tell, but it was the best look I had found so I went for it. It did work and I shot 254
first game, finishing the four game block on 2545 for the 12 games. Kylie Wills had a great four games shooting 909 and also finishing on 2545.

After another re-dress we started the five game round robin. I decided to give my Racing Zone a go during the round robin as usually when there are only women playing on the lanes the pattern doesn't burn up as quickly so I thought I would need a ball that was going to hook more than my Ultra Zone. The Racing Zone is an international Brunswick release based on the Absolute Inferno, I had a great look on the first pair and opened up with 278 (Win) against Hayley White. I followed that up with 220 (Win), 200 (Win), 157 (Lose) and 214 (Win) to emerge champion with a 120 pin lead over second place! :-)

I am so happy that I am finally going to the World Cup! I have played the qualifier for the last 10 years and finished in second place twice! So I will be going to Hermosillo, Mexico in November!!!

:-):-):-):-)

I'm off to San Marino this Thursday, my favourite tournament of the year, I have won the tournament twice in the past and San Marino is so beautiful I love there!

Until then Z.....

www.zaraglover.com

Euro 5's tournament - Ipswich UK

Last weekend I bowled a 5 man team tournament in Ipswich. I bowled with 4 of the youth members of power play pro shop team. Matt Chamberlain, Aaron Machin, Ash Iacona and Sean Croke.

The centre is renowned for being dry as it is an old wooden lane centre. The scoring was high as the pattern was quite walled up even though it was dry. We started with a 5 game singles event moving lanes after every game. I used my dry zone solid for the first 4 games, I had only drilled this ball on Friday night. I was so impressed with how calm this ball is, It is definately going to be used for any shorter oil patterns I face. I love the original dry zone, the solid however is more even and over all I would say hooks less when drilled with the same layout. I switched to the avalache pearl when the lanes dried out more as this gets longer down the lane. I only managed 980 in the singles finding a couple of pairs very tricky I had 2 sub 200 games.

After the singles we had a 3 game block of 5 man. We drew lanes 7&8 we had trouble getting the corner pins out as a team. The lane felt like it was hooking too much too early then under reacting on the back end. We finished with 3036 for the 3 games. Not too bad for the first time the 5 of us had played together! I used my dry zone solid for the whole block to try and even out the under over reaction I was seeing.

After the squad we travelled to a hotel, the closest we could find that had rooms was 20 miles away. I'm not sure what was happening in Ipswich last weekend, but it felt like half of England was there! We had a nice meal then got a good nights rest ready for the Sunday.

The rest seemed to do us all well and I felt like we were much more of a unit on the Sunday. We opened up with a huge 1170 followed by 1160 and 1080. So putting us over 3400 for the day and 5th place over all! I really enjoyed bowling with the guys and hope we will be able to bowl together in another tournament soon!

Next weekend I am playing in lakeside Peterborough in the world cup qualifier. The winner will get to represent England in Mexico later on in the year!


Zara

www.zaraglover.com

Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

EWC 2008 - Team short oil

We had a good day on the short, no huge games but we were steady. The line up was:

Jenny
Jemma
JoJo
Lisa
Me

We shot 3175 for the 3 games which puts us in 3rd place over night. Denmark took the lead in our squad and the following squad saw Sweden set a new European championship record of 1207 for their middle game and 3331 for 3 games.

I'm writing this from the bus on the way to the bowling centre with the girls. We will face the long oil today for a further 3 games, we are all feeling confident as we sorted out a lot of stuff for the long in the trios.

I'll keep you posted!

Zara

www.zaraglover.com

Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

EWC 2008 - Trios Long Oil

Well we picked up quite a few pins on the long oil after our nightmare on the short. As we were no where near a medal position we all tried a few things out and they worked. I took my Blast Zone down to 600 grit and played more direct to the pocket. The carry from this angle was much better. Lisa stayed out playing around board 12 at the arrows to 10 at the breakpoint, where as Jemma and myself both with 600 grit Blast Zones played approx. 15 at the arrows to 13 at break. The carry in this centre is strange. Light hits seem to work where as flush seems to leave all sorts of back row pins. Lets hope this carries on for the team event.

The other Trios team finished in 7th position, 160 off the cut in the end as the top teams had huge scores on the long oil. The top 4 go to a matchplay final to decide what colour medal they all take home. Denmark ended up going from 4th to the Gold medal position in a low scoring final game of 503 v 544 against France.

5 man team is the next event.

EWC 2008 - Trios Short Oil

I hate writing this when it's not good news, but we really struggled yesterday in the trios on the short. In practise the lanes were playing a bit tighter, but we all moved to the right and the reaction looked ok. However once we started we were getting a lot of under over reaction. I even had a frame with a double gutter and I thought both shots were good! they were both further in than shots that struck in the doubles. It felt like the gutters weren't hooking which makes a short pattern pretty tough! We finished pretty low down the field and have a mountain to clime today! The other Trios team did excellent, they finished in 7th place only about 60 behind the cut for top 4 at the half way stage. Jemma, Lisa and I have come down to cheerlead today as the first squad on was in the afternoon we all had a few extra hours sleep this morning.

We had a lovely afternoon and evening yesterday, we decided we needed to get away from all the bowling. So we had a real girlie time, we all went clothes shopping, then to see Sex and the City and the cinema and then a nice meal afterwards. It was a really relaxing time and just what the doctor ordered.

The girls are half way through their first game and doing well, so I'm going to stop writing and concentrate on cheering louder!!!

Cross all your fingers and toes they keep going!!!

EWC 2008 - Doubles Long Oil

Lisa and I relaxed in the sun before our second block of doubles.

Today we played the long pattern and it felt totally different to official practise. The lanes played a lot tighter. I started off with my Thunder Zone and it looked excellent in practise and then for the first 5 frames then it started going a bit long and leaving flat 10 pins. In the feel ball I threw my Blast Zone and it looked better. I threw my Thunder Zone for the first frame on the next pair though just to see if they were any different and it looked really good and struck so I stuck with that for the second game. However it started going too long again so i made the change to my Blast one and moved in. The Blast looked really good on the lane but I couldn't work out the carry. I got it rolling earlier, then later, moved right then left. The reaction looked so close to being right I was hesitent to make any big changes and Lisa was doing well so I didn't want to risk having a low game as we were doing ok for the top 4. However with two games to go we needed a couple of good games. I made the move in and increased my axis tilt and it worked, but I didn't have much room for any mistakes. Lisa's ball reaction was all or nothing, when it was right it carried when it was wrong it was a split. Unfortunately we finished 14 pins short of the top 4 :(

Neither of us were aware of what pinfall was required to make it but we were aware we were close. In hindsight we did the best we could and didn't make many mistakes. We have learnt what works and doesn't now on the two patterns so hopefully the scores will reflect!

The Trios Teams are as follows:

Team 1
Jenny Billingham
Nicki Ainge
JoJo Allsebrook

Team 2
Jemma Smith
Lisa John
Zara Glover

Team 1 bowl at 9am tomorrow on the short oil and we play at 12:30 also on the short.

EWC 2008 - Doubles Short Oil

(L-R: Me, Nicki Ainge, Jo Allsebrook, Lisa John, Jemma Smith & Jenny Billingham)

We have all bowled the first half of our doubles event now. The doubles is a 12 game event consisting of 6 games short oil and 6 games long oil. Jenny and Nicki started first, then Jemma and JoJo with Lisa and I (the old ladies!!!) playing in the last squad.

We all brought 8 balls with us, but were only allowed to register 6.

I decided on the following equipment:

Short Oil
Ultra Zone - pin below my middle finger so the ball is drilled with negative weight to reduce the reaction.
Twisted Fury - 6 1/2 " pin up.

Long Oil
Thunder Zone - pin below my ring finger
Blast Zone - 4 " pin below
Vapor Zone - pin above my ring finger and the mass bias kicked out 45 degrees


Lisa and I bowled on the short today and we played really well! It was funny as we were starting Lisa had been striking the whole of practise and had an amazing reaction, I had been struggling. I found an OK reaction playing with my Ultra Zone up board 5 at the arrows towards the end of practise, but not great. After 3 frames it switched and Lisa's ball started doing wierd things and mine started striking! After Lisa got lined up again we didn't look back finishing 293 over for the 6 games. This put us in second place so far, first place is Helen Johnsson and Nina Flack (my X-Calibur team mate!) Helen had an enormous 1546! The pairing set a new European record for 6 games of 2897 (241 Ave).

Jenny and Nicki have finished their doubles now as they had their second block on the long oil this afternoon. They both struggled with carry and a few splits, but bowled well on the whole.

JoJo and Jemma have gone to bed now as they have a very early wakeup call in the morning to get down the bowl at 8am. Lisa and I bowl the long oil in the afternoon then their is matchplay finals for the top four teams to decide what colour medals they will all receive.

Cross all your finers and toes!!!

I will let you know how it goes.

ZG

EWC 2008

I've arrived in Denmark! Had an interesting journey, leaving home at 4am on Thursday morning to meet at gatwick at 6. Our flight was a short one of 90mins. We arrived in Billund and then the adventure started. As all the countries were coming into different airports the tournament had only organised pick ups from the train station in Odense so we had to get there by public transport. First mode was a bus for about 40mins, then a train which was so busy we had to stand with our cases in the aisle. I was so glad our balls had been driven over by van, we would not have managed with all our balls!

We finally arrived at Odense and were picked up and taken to the hotel. We decided to go to the bowl to have a look and some of us wanted to bowl a little, just to get used to the centre. I had drilled 2 new balls at the last minute so wanted to bowl with them. When we got to the centre the lanes had been dressed with the tournament patterns. We bowled for about and hour then had some dinner and went back to the hotel to get some rest ready for official practise.

Practise went really well for all of us. Due to the training camps we have had this year we are all far more prepared for this tournament than any other previously. We really benefitted from the practise time due to the skills we had learnt on the camps.

The doubles pairings are Jenny and Nicki in squad 1, Jemma and Jo in 2 and Lisa and I in 3.

I will let you know how the pairings finished up in the next post!

Zara

www.zaraglover.com

Scott Banks Memorial Trios - Leeds, UK

Well this Bank Holiday weekend saw me bowling in Leeds at the 10th Anniversary Scott Banks Memorial Trios tournament. The tournament is run in memory of Scott Banks who died tragically in a car accident at such a young age. Sue, Scotts Mum has set up the fund to raise money for the hospital where Scott spent his last few days and to help fund the development of youth bowlers in the Yorkshire area. This fund has helped to fund some of the most promising youth bowlers currently competing in the UK.



The majority of the tournament was singles however there was a side event of Trios, in which I bowled with Dan French (House Pro) and Nicki Ainge. We started off pretty strong finishing the 4 games qualifying on +110 and breezed into the second round. The lanes started out very quick, I was surprised how little friction there was as my balls were not hooking a great deal in practise and through to about the 8th frame of the first game. However that wasn't the case through the whole squad, it was similar every block, before the first game was finished the lanes opened up and the scores were very high on the whole. There were quite big differences noticed from lane to lane, especially at the low end of the house, however most were easy to compensate for.

I started off using my Thunder Zone, pin below and the cg in the centre of my grip. I have polished this up as it was 800 out of the box. This is my earliest rolling ball so once the lanes opened up I switched to my pin up Ultra Zone in qualifying. I have changed a few things in my game and I am getting a lot more read in the Mid lane now so could really open up the lane and create a lot of area with my Ultra Zone. I finished qualifying in 6th position (top 18 going through) all 18 women would bowl a further 4 games then cut to the top 6 for a round robin. I came out of the blocks sprinting on Monday morning opening up with 486 in the first 2 games, then moved to quite possible the worst pair of lanes I have ever bowled on lol. I had real trouble getting any ball down the lane on lane 3, everything got into a roll as soon as it hit the lane then didn't hook on the backs. I managed to scrape 224 and 180 on that pair but was glad to get off there. This moved me up to 3rd position on +147, we then had the second and final round of the Trios event. We had a steady block 697-606-619-624 to finish on 5056 and in 7th position.

After a re-dress of the lanes we went on for the round robin. I had a funny draw where I only played on two pairs of lanes for the entire final, which could be a plus or minus depending on the pairs... I opened up with really wierd ball reaction, everything was backing off no matter how much up the back of the ball I got and how aggressive a ball I threw I could not get anything to roll up. I opened up with a poor 157 and lost the match by 1 pin lol so neither of us had a good reaction! I moved to the next pair and was pleased to see my ball turn over. I then shot 221 (WIN), 200 (LOSE), 237 (LOSE) and 279 (WIN) unfortunately leaving a little bit late to catch up the eventual winner Hayley White. This was Hayleys first every Adult Team England win and she bowled fantastic in the finals shooting 1180 for her 5 games and winning all her matches! I finished in 2nd place and was very happy with my performance, it's been a while since I've made such good decisions and been able to follow the lane transition as well as I did for the whole weekend.

As well as the excellent tournament, the Scott Banks has a great reputation for the social side of the event. They always organise the aptly named "Big Night Out" on the Sunday night. This event involves and auction and raffles usually with some amazing prizes all to raise money for the fund. As part of this Bowling Vision and Brunswick have been fund raising for the last few months selling the World Tenpin Masters merchandising with all profits being donated to the Scott Banks Fund. So during the Big Night Out I had the pleasure to present Sue Banks-Walker with a big cheque for £1058!

It is a great pleasure to donate this money to such a great cause that has already helped our sport so greatly in the Yorkshire area and I'm sure will continue to do so for years to come!

For further information on the tournament and charity please visit their website:
http://www.scottbanksfund.org.uk

Brunswick 5's

I'm in the car trying to get to Calais for the earlier ferry! I'm not quite sure what happened today? After being so good for the last few days we had a terrible day!

In baker system 5 bowlers share one game, so the first bowler takes frames 1 & 6 the second bowler frames 2 & 7 etc. The order of the players is the most important thing, as you have to get the people who are striking together to make doubles and turkeys. We set the line up yesterday as Matt first then Paul, Missy, Andy and Me. Andy, Matt and I had the best ball reaction over the qualifying squads so by putting us 1-4-5 we had the opportunity to get 3 in a row frames 4 to 6. The lanes played a lot tighter when we started and I didn't have a good reaction at all. We kept the order for 3 games but it really wasn't working we lost all three games. We switched to Missy 1st, Matt 2nd, Me 3rd, Paul 4th and Andy 5th. This order was much better, we were getting doubles so instantly put 20 pins on our scores. Now we just had to win some matches as there was a 30 pin bonus for winning matches!

It felt like we were really battling and going no where! Missy hadn't had the best ball reaction all weekend, she nailed the pocket in one game and threw 3 messengers in 2 frames and didn't strike! This pretty much summed up our whole day! Out of 15 matches we only won 5. I guess when you bowl so well in qualifying every team gets hyped up to beat you! We had some great scores bowled at us and with this tough format of 1 game matches you blinked and the match was over!

It was fun to play baker format again, it's been a few years since I played it and with a few tweeks the format could make for a great tournament!

I've got a few weekends off now, my next trip will be to sweden to play league in 3 weeks time.

Zara xxx
Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

Brunswick 5's - Paris

We've just finished qualifying at the Brunswick 5's in the outskirts of Paris!

We started bowling yesterday morning at 10am our team consists of Paul Moor, Andy Giles, me, Missy Bellinder and Matt Giles. We opened up with a steady 1027 then a massive 1209 then 1116. Finishing +352 at the half way stage.

After lunch we squashed into the car and drove into central Paris. The weather has been terrible, raining heavily and even hale stoneing in places. We parked close to the river and bought tickets for a boat tour. We had about a 40 min wait before the boat set off so went over the bridge intending on looking aroung Notre Dame. When we got over there the que was 100's of people long and the heavens had just opened so we made a quick dash for a coffee shop. We had some coffee's to warm up and indulged in some crepes with nutella and banana :) then headed back to the boat trip. We had a great time took some fantastic pictures and froze! The boat ride was for about an hour and we went past all the major sites of Paris.

We then headed back to the bowl (via a few souvenier shops) for a dinner organised by the Valcke family who were running the tournament. They must be exhausted as they also ran the Brunswick euro challenge last weekend in another one of their centres. We got back to the bowl about 8.30 and joined in the festivities. It was a lovely buffet and we had a great time socialising with all the other teams.

Today we had a much needed lie in, not waking up until noon. Then headed down to the bowl for lunch and to bowl our 2nd block of qualification. We were in the lead by quite a bit as the highest team that had bowled their 2nd block this morning was around +160. We started off slow, only Andy had a good look on this pair and we shot 946 then on the end pair we had a great look and shot 1184 then finished with 1063 +545 for the 6 game block!!!

We have qualified top team and tomorrow is a different format. 16 team baker round robin! I'm really looking forward to it as I always enjoyed playing baker when that was the team cup format! The most important thing is getting the line up right as stringing strikes together is tough in baker format. Each person only gets 2 shots per game!

I'm going to get some sleep now ready for tomorrow. Fingers crossed we have another great day!

Happy Easter!

Z xxx

Zara Glover

http://www.zaraglover.com/

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Brunswick Euro Challenge

Well what a drama I had on Saturday night! I thought I was pretty safe going into the last squad as I could be beaten by 5 people and still make the cut. The most I think I have ever seen make the cut in the last squad was 3. Everyone is telling me that I will breeze in. So I'm upstairs in the pro shop discussing my options for the finals with Rick Bernoit trying to change my surfaces to give me the best chance in the finals. Rick is the ball rep who is on the Pro tour in the USA with all the Brunswick staff players-he is the best guy in the world at lining bowlers up. So we're in the pro shop when Matt comes up to say that I missed the cut by one place, 6 people went past me in the last squad!!! I couldn't believe it, so I ran down to pay my €50 for desperado and quickly got changed!

I got to my lane and was lucky to only have 3 bowlers there so we would be finished before most of the other lanes with 4 bowlers. I always feel this is an advantage in desperado - nice to finish a one game shootout, sit back and wait for everyone else to try and beat your score. Rick had dulled down most of my pearl bowling balls, and I found a great shot in practise with my Vapor Zone. Rick had taken it down with a 500 abralon pad and for the first time of the tournament I had a look! I shot 237 and finished 2nd in the despo the top 6 games going through to the finals. Phew!

After the late finish (3am!) I had to be at the bowl for around 8am. I should be used to it by now as 3 years out of the 5 the euro challenge has been running i've qualified through desperado!

The morning round played very tough and the cut ended up a very low +15 for 6 games! I had bowled really bad the first couple of games and couldn't make up the pins I had lost! Finishing a disappointing 50th.

I am getting back to form now with the changes I have implemented into my game and mentally I am feeling good!

Next weekend I am travelling to another suburb of Paris for the Brunswick 5's tournament again run by the Valcke family. The last time I played the 5's in Paris I was part of the winning team! Let's hope we can repeat it!

Zara xxx
Zara Glover

www.zaraglover.com

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Brunswick Euro Challenge - Day 3

I've figured out I can add videos to this blog... How cool!

Now you'll be able to get a feel for every centre I go in and be able to see what I see :)

Bowling Plaza - St. Maximin

Funny Take 2!!!

Matt being Funny!!!

I bowled again yesterday and today. Still haven't beaten my score from Thursday of +62 the lanes have been hooking a lot more the last few days. I think everyone is finding a better reaction with more surface on their equipment so this is burning up the lane a lot quicker. I moved in with my ultra zone and found some reaction but still didn't have a great look for more than 5 frames on any pair of lanes! Very frustrating!



So now I am waiting for the final squad to finish. I was on the waiting list but not enough people pulled out for me to bowl. 5 people can pass me this squad for me to stay inside the cut, its at +59 right now. I hate sitting waiting, its totally out of my control now, all I can do is wait to see how everyone else does, not a feeling I want to get used to.


Zara

xxx

Brunswick Euro Challenge - Day 1

Well today was the first day of bowling in the biggest European event of the year. The Brunswick Euro Challenge has moved to France this year. In previous years it has been held in Greece, but due to the growth of the tournament and the number of lanes in the Greek bowling centre it is now being hosted by Valcke in their St. Maximin centre on the outskirts of Paris.

My first squad was at 2pm so after a long sleep (13 hours!!) I was very refreshed! I started off on lane 26 and had a real issue with this pair. After 10 mins practise I still managed to only shoot 155! Not a very convincing start! Every ball I threw on this pair went way too long. I left a lot of 9 count and a few nasty 6 counts. For the next pair I picked up my blast zone and went up the back of the ball with less ball speed. This looked a lot better and I shot 190 then got better and better through the squad. I kept around the same place on the lane. Playing straight up 8/9 on some pairs even playing from right to left! The pattern is very tough. High volume on the heads and pretty flat so there is not a lot of room for error in the first few games. Some of the higher rev rate bowlers managed to open up the lane in the last few games, but I had to stick it out just being accurate and sparing. I finished with +33. I bowled again straight after and made some different decisions. I dulled my Fury, Thunder Zone and took the surface off my Ultra Zone. I started with the Thunder Zone and although it looked better, I still had under over issues. After a few frames of the second game I switched to my blast zone again and had a couple of bigger games. I stuck with the Blast until the fifth game when is started hooking less and less. At this point I switched to my Vapor Zone, this didn't work out too well as I left a few single pins and then a couple of wash outs finishing with 173 :(

The last pair were pretty similar. I tried the Vapor for 2 frames but didn't like the reaction so switched to the Ultra Zone. I wish now I had changed to it earlier as it looked great! I had 5 in a row! Only finishing with 209 which put me at +62 which is boarder line on the prediction of the cut.

I am playing again at noon tomorrow. Fingers crossed I will improve on my score!


Zara

Barcelona March '08 ETBF stop

Well this weekend has been a disaster from the minute I set off! I had a flat tyre when I tried to set off from work on Friday! Then when that was fixed the traffic was terrible all the way to Heathrow. It took 3 hours to drive a 90 minute journey. Once at the airport my flight was delayed by 2 hours due to a engine fire on a plane and bad weather.

This trip was planned to be very short, I was arriving in Barcelona 9.30pm on Friday night bowling qualifying Saturday 8am then flying home on Sunday night. The delay meant I only got to the hotel around midnight!

So at 6am Saturday I dragged myself out of bed and made my way to the bowl. It took me 2 games to really get lined up with the right ball. I was playing straight up board 5 with my Original Inferno. There hasn't been a tournament for a while where the gutter has been in play, so I was quite optimistic. That block I started with a 170 game and just couldn't make any pins back. My high game being 211 and low 192 excluding the 1st game finishing on +26.

I went for some lunch with Kirsten and Stu then returned for the 4pm squad. Silly me tried to play in the same place as the morning squad and shot 168 first game. Then started moving around switching balls and found something in the third game. The pattern was playing so much drier outside, I ended up playing 13 out to 7\8 at the breakpoint still with the Original Inferno. Again though I couldn't get that high game to pull back the pins I had lost and finished on a lower score than the morning squad. The final squad was full and I couldn't get a place.

Very frustrating to finish a tournament without figuring out the match up!

I am supposed to fly home at 8pm tonight but I am going to try and get an earlier flight home. Let's hope something actually goes to plan this weekend!

Next weekend I am bowling the British National Championships in Tolworth, London.

Zara Glover

www.zaraglover.com

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Team X-Calibur - Swedish League

http://www.x-calibur.se/

Well I had a great weekend this weekend with the Swedish girls. I have been asked to play for the Swedish League team X-Calibur. I was really excited about playing league as we don't have any team events really in the UK anymore and I have always loved to play team event! All my best memories of bowling are team tournaments, it's always so much nicer to share success with your team mates!

I had a really early start on Saturday morning, leaving home at 4:30am to drive to Heathrow. My flight was at 7:15am and I slept the entire flight until I arrived in Stockholm at 10:45am. I was greeted at the airport by Tina Gustafzon and together we drove to the hotel to check in. At the hotel I met the rest of the girls and sorted out all my team shirts etc.

Meet the girls!

I felt like I was instantly welcomed into the team! We bowled the first match at 2:15 on the Saturday and the girls were reallt up for the match as it was against one of the strongest teams in the league Spada Dam. They haven't lost a match in 18 months, we gave it our all and were so close to changing that record, unfortunately we had a bad last game and ended the match 11 - 9 to Spada Dam.

L-R: Tina, Me, Sanna & Nina

The format is great, you play 8 man team at doubles pace across 8 pairs of lanes. 1 point for each doubles win per pair and 1 point for the team total so 5 points per game. The scores from each pair are displayed as + or - on the bottom of every screen so everyone is following each pair of lanes and cheering for each other.

We all went back to the hotel got showered and went for a nice dinner.

On Sunday we had two matches. One at 9am and another at 2:15 we won both of those matches only dropping 5 points across the 2 matches and set a new team record. We really came together and got to grips with the lane conditions. I bowled doubles with Diana, we were playing a similar part of the lane so it was good to get a read from each other.

The bowling centres was amazing, one of the oldest centres I have ever bowled in...

Check out the pictures for yourself!

Tilburg EBT stop part 2

Well I didn't get much better this weekend. My highest block was 1259 and the tournament was so busy I couldn't get into a squad on Saturday. The waiting lists were 50 people long.

So back to the drawing board. I still haven't got the dual pattern short and long sorted out. I felt like I had my ball arsenal sorted for this tournament. After practising on different short and long patterns at home I was confident. But yet again I had real under over problems on the short. The long I have a pretty good look on now, but the short is a problem for me. Weird as naturally my game matches up to playing the outside of the lane better.



Back to the drawing board and the practise lane!

For Tilburg full results click HERE


My next EBT tournament will be Barcelona on the last weekend of this month. Before then I have a team England training day and I am going to Sweden to play their national league.



I have joined team X-Calibur who play out of Gothenburg. I have heard many stories of how much fun their league is so I'm really looking forward to it!





Z xxx

Tilburg EBT stop

Well this weekend I'm in Tilburg. We set off down to Dover on Wednesday night, to get the 8am ferry on Thursday. Unfortunately the ferry was delayed by an hour but we finally got to France by midday. The crossing was very calm thank goodness, I'm not very good on boats!



Once off the ferry we had a 3 hour drive through France, then Belgium and into The Netherlands. We arrived at the Dolfijn bowling centre around 3pm then checked into the hotel to get a bit of rest before I bowled at 9pm.



This tournament has different conditions to normal. Every left lane has a long oiling pattern and every right lane a short pattern. So thank goodness it is in a location within driving distance of the UK, I wouldn't have liked to try and get 10 balls on a plane!



I wasn't really on my game last night, in hindsight I shouldn't have really bowled. With two different conditions you have to really concentrate on what is going on and I really wasn't feeling alert enough after driving all day, and my scores reflected that! I got the opportunity to bowl all the equipment I brought and decide which balls looked the best ready for my squad today.



I have just got off the lanes now after a very frustrating six games. I felt like I bowled well and only made one bad decision on following the lane breakdown. But every slight mistake I made I was punished to the maximum. I think I have sorted out the problem now though as I had 257 last game using a Vapor Zone on the long and Fury Pearl on the short. I finished up only 59 over for the block, but I am pretty hopeful for my next squad tonight at 9pm.



Zara xx

Tali Bowling Centre – Helsinki Finland

This tournament is renowned for being the toughest tournament of the calendar, primarily due to the standard and quantity of Finish bowlers that take part each year. I didn’t have the pleasure of visiting the centre before they had a massive re-fit three years ago. This enormous centre used to have tiered seating all through the centre and the stories that I hear about atmosphere and excitement of finals held there make me wish I had had the opportunity to compete. Since the re-fit there is only a small amount of the tiered seating left in, but the atmosphere there is still something special all through the event. It is a real honour to compete in front of such a knowledgeable crowd.

I arrived in a not so cold Helsinki on Thursday afternoon and chose to observe the squad and get a game plan together ready for the squad I had on Friday. The lanes as usual looked tough but pretty fare. I watched the squad and then went back to the hotel with the English contingent taking part in the tournament to get some rest. Friday morning came and I felt pretty confident. I have made a lot of changes to my game during the period I took off tournament play at the end of the year, and although I don’t feel like I’m back at 100% yet, I am most certainly on the way.

After two games of the squad it was obvious I had the wrong surfaces on my equipment and really had no ball reaction, so I spent the rest of the squad trying different equipment in different parts of the lane. I was having a joke with one of the Finish guys bowling next to me as we were both not scoring so highly. We decided to make a bet for the last game for a drink, to make it more interesting and luckily for me I found a great reaction on the last pair of lanes shooting a 290 game out of no where… Very amusing and I most definitely won the bet!

In the break I took the surface off most of my equipment to try and find a better match up and re-entered in the next squad. I had a much better ball reaction, but physically didn’t feel right and made some bad decisions which cost me. I didn’t score enough to make the cut so went back to the hotel again to rest up and decide what to do the day after.

On the Saturday I had a pretty good reaction with the surfaces I had on Friday and bowled physically very well. Unfortunately I just couldn’t get to the score needed to make the cut. My highest finish was 1306 but the cut ended up being 1332.

For full results click HERE

WELCOME TO 2008!