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It is human nature to want to excel. In the case of bowling, we want to excel at bowling strikes. But, unfortunately, we are not always able to do that. The game of bowling is more than just strikes. You also need to be able to pickup those spares. How do we do that? By practicing spare shots.

To bowl better you have to practice
In general, most bowlers don’t spend enough time in practice let alone in practice for their spare shots. Too often when bowlers go to the lanes to put in some… so called practice… all they do is work on is getting a high score. That’s not practice…that’s just bowling. We will discuss how to conduct bowling practices in more detail in a later article. For now, our focus will be on the importance of converting spares and how it will improve your game. Yes… bowling strikes will get you that perfect 300 game but, let’s face it, even professional bowlers don’t get a strike every frame.

Do spares make a difference?
To see just how much of a difference spares can make to your game, let’s look at a score sheet where a bowler did not score a single strike in the game but got a nine and then picked up the spare in each frame.

As you can see, just by getting a nine then a spare for each frame this person got a respectable score of 190. He was only 10 pins away from getting a 200 game simply by picking up the spare. Now imagine if this person got a strike or 2 here and there. He would have easily had a 200+ game.

The right tool for the right job
So now you know why spares are so important let’s talk about the right bowling ball to getting spares. With today’s technology, bowling balls are getting better and better. The top bowling balls deliver strong hooks and are made of the most advanced materials. They are specifically designed to give the best hook to improve your game. But the latest and greatest bowling that will deliver strikes is not the best ball for spares. The best bowling ball for getting spares is a simple plastic bowling ball.

The reason plastic balls are better at converting spares over other more advanced bowling balls is because they do not hook. In 99.9% of all spare situations, a straight rolling plastic ball is the bowling ball of choice because in most spare shooting situations, a greater degree of accuracy is needed because there are fewer pins to shoot for.

Let’s take a look back at the bowling scenario we gave earlier, we saw that the bowler knocked down nine pins with his first ball which leaves 1 pin standing. It is much easier to roll a ball straight on to knock it down then to try to hook the ball. There is a greater risk of error with the hook.

Worth the investment
One of the great things about plastic balls is that it is a no brainer when it comes to buying one. All plastic bowling balls are the more or less the same in terms of performance. They all are created to do one thing…roll straight. Also, in comparison to high end hooking bowling balls, plastic balls are cheap. Then when you compare the price of a plastic ball to the improvements you will see in your game, you will see that it is actually quite a bargain.

Different looks
The only hard part about selecting a plastic ball is what kind of look you want for it. There are so many styles to choose from these days from cartoon characters to your favorit sports teams. You can find ones with roses in the center or ones that look like a billards eight ball. There is almost an endless variety of plastic balls to fit your personality and style.

So, in conclusion, if you are serious about bowling and want to improve your bowling, you must have a plastic ball and use it for your spare shots. You will see a definite difference in your game.