The Shark is an interesting pattern to say the least. The outsides are SLICK, but the inside part of the lane can get some friction going. After a few games, the heads start to go bigtime, but carrydown gets really bad. Don't bring anything too strong, don't use a lot of surface. You need to get the ball to save some energy for the backend. However, you definately need options depending on what volume of oil they give you, what the surface is like, and who you're crossing with.
Now personally, I just got done tackling two weeks on the Shark pattern in my PBA Experience league. After bowling awful last season on it playing in, I decided to try moving out and playing more direct like I've seen Norm Duke and Chris Barnes do on the Shark before. It worked great for me! I had to be very, very accurate at first until I burned a hole in the lane, but even poor shots gave me better pin count and fewer splits/washouts than playing inside. I used my Cell at 1000 abralon and on fresh rolled it over 6 at the arrows down to about 10 or 11 at the breakpoint. (Yes, the ball was barely hooking, you read that right) As the shot broke down, I was able to play pretty straight up the 8 board. When I executed my shots well (I threw it like crap for three out of the four games last night until I figured out what the hell I was doing wrong at the bottom of the swing, so let's just toss those numbers out of there), I was able to stay consistently in the 190-215 score range. Carry was very good from outside as well.
