(*Credit for great photo below (Don Klackner with 12th Anniversary Cake) to Jeanine Conway forwarded to David Cowell forwarded to me and edited by me to make Don look better)

 

A delicious spice cake was offered which served as the main assembly point for the bowlers (until it was fully consumed).  Did you know that the 24 lanes at Olivette are equal to the largest bowling alley in the country of Colombia?  And Olivette is far more advanced as it has automatic scoring (that’s a good thing as some bowlers would have a much higher average if left to their own devices), however, it does lack the ice cream parlor.  To maintain perspective Don should know the largest bowling alley in the world is located in Japan with 198 lanes.  But bigger is not better as they (some) say.

 

On to the night’s accomplishments.  Team Lane was on a tear as they demolished Team Weiss 20-2.   All four team members (lead by David Cowell’s 230 and 217) had a good night as they established new season records for scratch team total (2084), team scratch game (724) and team handicap series (2552).  The Weiss team had a few highlights.  Onlookers would have thought Team Weiss won the Powerball as they celebrated when all 4 bowlers registered a strike in the first frame of game three.  Despite saying he was too old to do splits, Matt Weiss managed 4 in the first game (however, Terry Werner claimed a higher total of 5 to acquire bragging rights to this dubious honor).  Katie Lamarsh had a nice series of 633 (beating her husband) and Kent Steinbrueck (a very unpopular guy after he handed invoices to all bowlers) manged to pull out a respectable 644 after a slow start. 

 

Team Baebler (12) split with Team Piper (10) led by Dee Baebler’s league leading handicap series of 729.  However, it may be a pyrrhic victory as she decreased her handicap by 21 pins.  Despite sporting new shoes and a new ball Jeanine Conway only managed to make her average.  But it will improve as we all know it takes a while to break in new equipment.  On the Piper team David Safarian had a good night rolling 41 pins over average, and reliable Ken Schuman had a nice 632 series.

 

Team Michaels catapulted to first place after sweeping Team Zuke 21-1.  The lone Zuke point was provided by newcomer Joey Papa (Gary Jones’ grandson) as he tied Amy Lewis with a nice 620 series.  The games were closer than indicated by the point total as Team Michaels won the total pin count by a measley 20 pins.

 

Team Werner (14) and Team Wilson (8) had a very competitive match as 5 of the 7 bowlers beat their average.  Rick Tinucci raised his average by a whopping 14 pins with a nice 687 series (second only to the aforementioned Dee). The winning victory margin was 17 pins for Team Werner.