Home Page
Something About Me
Recreation: Sports
I was never much of sporting person when I was younger and I would go to any lengths to avoid attending PE classes at school. However, there are a few sports I do enjoy. Admittedly, they are mostly solitary activities...
Martial Arts
As I've already mentioned, I'm a big fan of martial arts. To find out more about my prowess/ineptness/accident-prone nature, or to find out some general information about martial arts, check out the Martial Arts section.
Weight Training
I also enjoy weight training. As a student, I used to practice karate some four or five times per week. As I've always had a pretty fast metabolism, I felt that I needed to do something to counterbalance the general 'trimming' effects of my typical cardio-vascular-training-intensive week. Hence I started weight training, also four or five times per week. However, I tried to avoid any sort of CV training in the gym, and instead stuck to bulking-up, limiting sessions to free weights only and rarely performing sets of more than 8 or 10 repetitions.
(For those who are interested in why, here is a really, really quick explaination: if you want to tone / get fit / lose weight, then do lots of reps. When I say lots, I mean 12 to 15, generally. Of course, if you are training for stamina, you can go much higher than this. If you want to bulk up and pump up those muscles, don't do many reps, but lots of sets. 6 to 10 reps per set is a good guideline.)
Waste of time really. Despite eating six meals a day, I could never get past 12 stone. (That's why they call me 'Fat Boy'.) Of course, some people would see my problem as a blessing, so I shouldn't complain really!
These days, my karate is limited to once or twice a week and weight training happens whenever I can be bothered. Still, given how much I pay each month for gym membership, I really should make more of an effort! There's never enough time...
Tenpin Bowling
You're thinking, "You can't call that a sport!" I have to disagree. If you play as many games on the trot as I used to, even bowling can tire you out.
I used to be a big fan of tenpin bowling. It's sad, but true.
In fact, I was quite good at it once... I had a 195ish average when I was 16,
and made it into the top 12 of the junior national rankings... if anyone cares.
Through bowling, I got to tour the country in various tournaments when
I was a kid. "Tour the country..." Who am I trying to kid?
Visiting a bowling alley in the grimy center of Notts or Heathrow Airport
is not exactly the Costa Brava is it? It did give me an excuse to brag about
my big balls though. Most people seemed to find it odd that I had six of
them. And they had strange names: Piranha, Cuda, Rhino Pro, Ninja Fury,
and others I can't even remember.
(Time for some poor jokes... Did you here about the Russian guy with three balls? Whodyanikabolockoff. How about the Chinese dude who only had one? Wotwent Wong.)
I really do believe that bowling at a high level is the supreme test of Man's ability and patience, neither of which do I possess in abundance. My wife can testify to that. So I haven't done it for a few years now. I did try to get back to it a couple of years ago...
To bowl well, you have to do very frequently. I would recommend at least 12 games per week. Otherwise you will lose the 'rhythm' which is exceedingly important in the game. Since I don't really have the time to bowl that frequently anymore, I gave up the game. I think I'd rather not do it at all than play once a week with an average of 60 or so less than I used to be capable of!
Some trivia for those of you who don't know much about the game...
Did you know that there's oil on the lanes? A decent lane condition will have
a lot of oil in the first 20 foot or so, less oil in the middle, and a completely
dry back end. Not only that, but there will be less oil on the edges than
there is in the middle. Why? One reason is to protect the lanes. But more importantly,
it's for the game.
Pro bowlers and amateurs alike (such as myself) throw the ball
with a hook. That's what it's called when you throw the ball out toward the edge,
and then it comes flying back in towards the pins in the last 20 foot.
This happens because bowlers generate a high rate of revolutions on the ball when
they release it, revolving at a slight angle to the direction in which it's thrown.
The ball slides along the oil along the projected path generated by the arm swing,
but when it reaches the drier part of the lane (where there is less oil),
the rotations cause the ball to turn and so the ball arcs back in.
Why do we do this? To generate a better angle-of-attack (yes, AOA can be applied to bowling as well as to landing an aeroplane) to the pocket. This is the area that includes the head pin and the one to the right of it (for a right-handed bowler). Why do you need a high AOA. To make sure you get the 5 pin; that's the one immediately behind the head pin. Straight bowlers often leave this one standing since the ball deflects to one side and the head pin usually also misses the 5. With a hook ball, the ball deflects less and carries on to take out the 5 pin after the head pin.
What makes the game more challenging is that with every ball you throw, the lane conditions are changed. Lane's have a tendency to dry out anyway, but bowling balls accelerate the process and tend to push oil into areas where you don't really want it. That's why good hook bowlers have more than one ball. The various balls have different characteristics which may or may not be suited to a particular lane condition. There are various categories of bowling balls which include plastic/polyester (for straight bowling, i.e. spares), urethane balls, reactive resin, composite, and the list goes on. Ball technology is big business!
Confused? Bored yet? So if anyone ever tells you bowling is just about chucking the ball down the lane, you can tell 'em.. They're, erm, dead right!?!
For bowling tips and equipment, make sure you check out my old friend Mario's Pro Shop.
Others
This is the category for sports which I enjoy, but have never really been able to devote much time to (and therefore am not very good at). It's a short list and includes badminton, snooker and pool.
