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Author Topic: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED  (Read 3221 times)

notsohotshot

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LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« on: November 28, 2012, 09:22:56 PM »
I have tried backing up on the approach but I end up stopping way behind the foul line.
I have tried raising my ball in my set up but has not helped much.
I have tried speeding up my feet but am having timing trouble with that.
I have tried making my backswing a lot higher but must be slowing the ball down during the forward swing.

Does anyone have any other ideas other than just practice one of these until it works??????

 

rockerbowler18

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #1 on: November 28, 2012, 10:47:55 PM »
Lighter equipment. Lol

In all seriousness, look further down the lane (to the breakpoint maybe instead of arrows?) would be my first suggestion.

Second suggestion: rather than raising your ball in set up, push it up slightly in the push away rather than just straight out.

Final suggestion, think about pushing a ball on ice: rather than trying to "roll" it - literally push it as though you don't want it to gain traction. It will keep your han further behind the ball and get it downlane quicker.

charlest

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #2 on: November 29, 2012, 07:28:30 AM »
I have tried backing up on the approach but I end up stopping way behind the foul line.
I have tried raising my ball in my set up but has not helped much.
I have tried speeding up my feet but am having timing trouble with that.
I have tried making my backswing a lot higher but must be slowing the ball down during the forward swing.

Does anyone have any other ideas other than just practice one of these until it works??????

Those all work, but I'm not sure how much time you spent on any one of them.

What I'm thinking when I see you write such as this, is that you may not have spent a lot of time on any one of them or maybe, better, enough time and focus.

They all can and have helped a lot of people increase their ball speed and they are proven techniques. WHat I suspect is also happening on some of them is that you are not allowing your body to react as it would naturally but are subconsciously forcing it to stay in whatever mode you have been using for all the years you have been bowling.

For example, the stand further back approach, where you say you wind up further behind the foul line. If you allowed your body to do what it wants to do, get all the way to the foul line, you'd find that you took not only longer steps, but faster steps. Both would increase your ball speed, from a little to a lot. If you used a higher pushaway, together with the longer steps, it would produce a higher backswing, which if you allowed it, would produce slightly more ball speed.

These techniques work if you allow them to work. It's human nature to try to force your body to do what it has always done. Kind of like a forced or controlled armswing: in order to allow an unforced one, you have to relax both your "mental grip" on your muscles and allow the arm to swing as much as it naturally wants to swing. By engaging your shoulder muscles you are forcing your body to control the armswing and its height.

In your lengthened approach, you are forcing your legs/feet to take small steps, just like you always have. You have to let them go, relax and let them take you to the foul line.

Your mind subconsciously refuses to let go of its super-control of your body. You have to let go, relax. No two ways about it. 
"None are so blind as those who will not see."

mrfrostee

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #3 on: November 29, 2012, 07:44:45 AM »
Sorry, a little confused. I thought if you lowered your ball in set-up, during your approached it caused your feet to speed up thus increasing ball speed and vice versa for raising your ball in set-up.

Monster Pike

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #4 on: November 29, 2012, 08:54:03 AM »
Sorry, a little confused. I thought if you lowered your ball in set-up, during your approached it caused your feet to speed up thus increasing ball speed and vice versa for raising your ball in set-up.

No.  Charlest post nailed it pretty good.  Lower set up = less backswing = less speed.  Think about it.... The higher your ball drops from the forward/out position, the more momentum the weight of the ball will have to perform the pendulum bringing it back & higher into the backswing.  Thus the higher the backswing, the more momentum going forward into the release. 

Also for visual sake, picture a toddler on a swing... if you just give him a little push out he won't go as far & as fast... If you give him a bigger & higher push, he comes & goes a lot faster & the less you have to keep pushing him.

Gene J Kanak

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #5 on: November 29, 2012, 10:51:47 AM »
Charlest nailed it dead on. All of the methods you listed have the potential to lead to an increase in ball speed, but that only happens once you erase your old muscle memory and allow it to happen.

Because you've bowled for a while, your body has grown familiar with certain positions and/or feelings during the different parts of your approach and delivery. That is great when you're doing exactly what you want to be doing. However, that's bad when you want to introduce something new. You need to dedicate a substantial number of practice reps - I know I've seen an actual number given somewhere - in order to create new muscle memory for the new techniques. Once you do that, you're likely to see the results you're aiming for in the first place.

Just be warned that the process of erasing old muscle memory and imparting new can be long and tedious. Some of you may remember that I participated in a project a few years ago to try to see if a one-handed bowler could be converted to two-handed. Even though two-handed bowling involves very unique movements and body positions, because I had a bowling ball in my hands, my body tried to impart my familiar one-handed movements into my two-handed delivery. It was wild. Just be patient. In time you'll get the results you're looking for.

notsohotshot

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #6 on: November 29, 2012, 02:55:13 PM »
Thanks for all of the input. I was afraid it was practice, practice, practice which is costly around here but it beats being low man every week at league when I used to be the high man and I know it is my low ball speed.

LuckyLefty

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #7 on: November 29, 2012, 03:04:19 PM »
I have seen two other ideas on speed.

1. is a bowler that is one of the top in our house and he claims the lower the ball the faster the speed.

2.  Also as to the pushaway this tape from Storm


Basics #2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjbXpnKFByA

Basices #3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=2Itzj3VtQlQ&feature=endscreen

Regards,

Luckylefty

The above 45 degree arm position I have not seen before or tried.

Ralph is getting some speed here.

Regards,

Luckylefty
It takes Courage to have Faith, and Faith to have Courage.

James M. McCurley, New Orleans, Louisiana

900DJ

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Re: LOOKING FOR WAYS TO INCREASE BALL SPEED
« Reply #8 on: November 29, 2012, 08:47:37 PM »
I have came through this problem first hand!  I used to be rev dominant with ball speed around 13.5 to 14mph at the pins and watching my ball constantly crash the head.  I found out that my span was completely stretched causing me to have a death grip on the ball which lead to a badly muscled shot.  I would try as  hard as I could to throw harder, but would just end up hurting my arm.  Now I have a much more relaxed grip.  This combined with learning how to let my swing be "free" without muscle, I am now consistently throwing 17+ at the pins with little effort.

So check to make sure you have a relaxed grip and eliminate as much "muscle" from your swing and you will see a difference.  But muscle memory will have to be retrained.