The easy thing and the hard thing

In bowling, there are different difficulties of oil patterns. Some give you little room for error, others give you big room for error.

All really great bowlers I know developed their skills bowling on patterns with little room for error. After that, when they go to the easy patterns, it feels like missing is impossible because of how much room they have on the lane to get a strike. The difference in average on an easy pattern vs a hard pattern is generally about 30-40 pins. So a 200 average on a hard pattern is 230-240 on an easy pattern. As a result, many high-end bowlers start to see the easy patterns as “not worth their time”.

I’m averaging 240 right now in my easy summer league. While that is many high scores together, I find there is a different difficulty in it. The difficulty of not overlooking anything. Not overlooking the feel in my thumbhole, or the feel of my slide. Not having a single mental slip up when you are supposed to strike close to every single time.

No matter how easy the pattern is, no one shoots 300 every time.

Every situation is an opportunity to get better, however, in each situation, the items we focus on are different. That’s actually a great chance to make sure we are paying attention to as many critical points as possible.