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I haven't been able to set up my ball stage the last couple weeks because my layout counter is full of accy. I barely have room to layout a ball. I will have to do my best to explain what we did and why we did it.

I was looking to create smoothness without over shelling. The HPL surface always provides more friction than other synthetics and I saw the hold and wanted to keep the players up against it. I was most concerned about the track area. The right hooked which is unusual on the 41 foot Scorpion pattern.

Seeing this I knew players would get as close to the friction as they could get and when they had to move they would feel the track area so the move over the track would challenge some. Whether the player was right of the track or left of the track finding hold was very important. To accomplish this I prefer to use stronger pin to axis distances to avoid the wet/dry a bowler can feel with lower flare layouts. I have several options in doing this. I wanted to use covers that would not force a bowler away from the friction area too quick or cause a player to open up their angles. It was very easy to get the ball to push to the zones near the end of the pattern. I wanted to see the ball make an earlier move to the right but I saw the ball push a little longer. My response to that was roll layouts.

I played around with several cover-stocks and concluded that the best matchup was the Twisted Fury. That seems to be a common factor most weeks no matter what surface or pattern. I did find something that I had not played around with until this week I decided to position the mass out by the bowlers VAL. I usually layout our asymmetrical balls using the degree method. If you understand this I used a lot of 20 to 30 degrees. What I saw out of this was a smoother move off of the friction. It really allowed the players to lengthen their break point window as well as close their angles down allowing them to be more parallel to the length of the pattern. We are seeing a lot more hold almost every week. Some players like it while others are very frustrated over the similar look each week on all the patterns.

One of the things I like about the Twisted Fury is it allows me to use pin to axis distances that are closer to leverage. The higher differential balls are not very effective in these stronger positions. I will tell you that the Twisted Fury is the most versatile ball I have worked with in the 10 years I have worked at Brunswick. I am the more pleased with our arsenal than I have ever been. We have a wider range of ball reactions and I now feel we have the best look in the late games of a block. We have always been strong in the early to mid games but fell behind in the scoring pace late in the rounds. You won't see that being the case this year as my prayers were answered with the introduction of the Pearl Fury and Twisted Fury.