Lawn+Bowls

// New Skill - Lawn Bowls // - Home I chose to learn lawn bowls as my new skill because I have never tried it before and also I wanted to mix with a different generation of the community, because I thought that they would enjoy teaching us and give them something to look forward to. I also did this project with a group of 4 people who also wanted to learn the same skill and who were close enough to travel there. We decided to do this at the Eskdale bowls club because it was easy for us to travel there and ask a member named Wally Prior who we knew would be enthusiastic and overly organised.

Week 1 - The first week was much anticipated and waited for but before we got there it poured down rain, and obviously you can't play bowls in the rain. So Wally and his helpers Pat Swazbrick and Joan Prior taught us all the basics of the game such as the rules, the equipment, the action, the aim and bowlers etiquette. I picked these things up pretty quickly and to help us remember Wally printed off a few 'Beginning to Bowls' sheet. I read these at home and was looking forward to doing the real thing in a fortnight's time.

Week 2 - This week was a fortnight from our first lesson due to Vrap so we were once again well organised. It was another gloomy day with patches of rain so we had to shorten our lesson. Wally made us practice on our line of the bowl and focus on our length later on. I picked this up fairly quickly but obviously needed practice on my length. Towards the end of the lesson I could already see a dramatic improvement on my new skill, but still had a long way to go. I soon learned that bowls was not an easy sport and required great concentration and skill. I thought this week was very successful and the only thing I would change is to have concentrated a little more and to have had more time than we did.

Week 3 - This week was good weather and we got a full hour and a half lesson in. Wally had already organised what we were doing today and got the green ready. I have improved heaps this week and have shown it with pictures, and this is the first time I have realy enjoyed it because we scored our games. The things I need to improve on is my length which is a little unconsistant and to concentrate a little more while the other person is bowling. Wally told us that we had all improved and he wanted us on his bowls team. A very successful and exciting lesson. Can't wait till next week!

Week 4 - I was really looking forward to this lesson because last week was so fun! I think I must have been overconfident or ahead of myself because I bowled really badly all night, Wally said it was because I had a different set of bowls or the green was faster then the week before. This made the lesson frustrating and unenjoyable, although the others were having trouble as well. We had a weighted shot exercise that was fun and a bit different, I was a little better at this one. The things I will work on next week will be to adjust to the different conditions and bowls better, concentrate a little more and to realise that everybody has off days.

Week 5 - This week had to be cut short to allow Laura to get to work but we fitted everything in that Wally wanted us to learn. I think I played reasonably well this lesson and can see an obvious improvement from my previous weeks. We focused on learning how to measure which bowl is closer to the jack if you cant tell by looking at them. To do this we used a little tape measurer that was very accurate or if the bowls were really close we used this tweezer looking thing. I thought this was a good skill to learn and I think we have covered everything needed to play bowls in a competition.

Week 6 - A lesson I hadn't planned on going to, since it was the morning after the social and I stayed at home the day. But I was conviced to get out of my PJs and go by Laura and her new phone :-( Although I was tired, Wally certainly wasn't and had oraganised for two 3 way teams, Laura, Wally and Joan Vs Steph, Pat and myself. This took up the whole lesson but was quite exciting and close. We have confirmed that in 2 weeks we will have a kids vs parents day, and so we need to get more practise in to make absolute sure that we win.

Week 7 - Another week of practising our lawn bowls skill and still we are improving heaps. Wally wasn't there this week, so we just dd our routine bowling at each end. The games are getting more and more exciting as we compete and bring some strategies into the game, such as a blocking bowl, one behind or a weighted shot.

   Week 8, parent challenge -                <span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Lucida Console', Monaco, monospace"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif">    <span style="COLOR: #000000; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif">Finally the week had come to show the skill we learnt and to prove to our confident dads that they aren’t so great. It was great to see everybody turn up and had a go, even if they had never held a bowl. Wally had done a great job in organising the night and had snacks and drinks for free. Once we got into the competition, the green was filled with laughter and everybody had a great time. At 6:15 Wally called everybody in to have some snacks and a chat. Once everybody was full, the four of us kids got up and I made a short speech about how much we appreciated Wally, Joan and Pat teaching us and organising the night. Then we gave them our gifts (tin of cookies for the girls and a bottle of port for Wally. After we had a few more short ends and then said our goodbyes and went on our way.  <span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif"> <span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif">  <span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif">I think it was a great night that summed up our 8 weeks of new Skill and couldn’t have gone better. As for the improvement, it went from 3 consecutive bowls in the ditch at the first lesson to 2 within half a foot of the jack. I’m very proud with myself for taking on a sport that never really appealed to me and now it does.  <span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif">                 <span style="FONT-FAMILY: Georgia, serif"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Impact, Charcoal, sans-serif"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Lucida Console', Monaco, monospace"> <span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial Black', Gadget, sans-serif"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif"><span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">