Bowls

This Sunday Graham signed me up to play in a lawn bowls tournament at our local Bowls Club.  Before I begin, a basic guide to Bowls.

Now being an American I did not grow up with this popular Australian past time. To describe it, its kind of like Bocce Ball, but different.


Basically you have a long flat grassy playing field, similar to a golf green. You place a rug on the ground where you will be tossing your balls (bowls) from. You then take a small ball about the size of a white ball on a pool table, about as heavy too, and you toss it in a strait line from where you stand. This is the "Kitty" ball. Its the ball you want all of your Bowls balls to get closest too. Then you start bowling.

In the picture above is the small Kitty and two Bowls balls. These balls are weighted to curve to one direction so its important before you throw it you know which way the ball is going to curve. If you get it wrong your ball will end up in someone else's bowls game, or way out on the other side of the lawn. 


The objective is to get your bowls as close to the Kitty as possible, you have 4 bowls balls to toss, as does your opponent. Your opponent can hit the Kitty out of the way of your balls, or knock your balls further away from the Kitty. Its a tricky game. You should be getting a rough idea of the game. If not go and check out this link.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowls

Now back to my story. As I said before Graham signed me up to play in a Lawn Bowls Tournament this weekend. Now it was nothing really serious, but  when we arrived at the club I quickly realized I was going to be on the losing end of this tournament.

Bowls is mostly an old persons activity in Australia but just recently it has enjoyed a spark of interest from young college aged people. At this tournament however Graham and I where the youngest in attendance. After a few practice tosses and a chance to buy a pint of beer the tournament was ready to begin.

For the first round I was paired up with two older gentlemen who at first seemed annoyed to be playing with a young American woman who knows only the basics of Lawn Bowls. After a few frames the group atmosphere warmed and I laughed listening to these two men use phrases such as "thats good green", and "come on get that kitty". This is a really competitive sport, with lots of courtesy rules similar to golf. Like no talking when someone is bowling, not acting in a distracting way when someone is bowling, picking up your next bowl only after someone has just bowled and not while they are in the act of bowling. But on the other hand this is also a sport that allows you to play barefoot and smoke cigarettes while playing.

I won a few frames and was happy to give the old guys a run for their money a few times. But at the end of the game my score was 16 and well... thats really really low.. like scoring a 13 out of 200 at the Bowling Alley. So I lost. Graham did well though and got to play on in another game. It was an interesting afternoon.

Now I am not sure if I am going to take up this sport more seriously, I think I had better get a little more practice before I try to compete against anyone again. But you never know if you never try.