Your Favorite Pair Of Bowling Lanes

bowlingball.com, Originally Posted: 4/1/2013; Updated 5/17/2023

Have you found your favorite pair of bowling lanes? Perhaps you have a pair of lanes at your local bowling center where you feel most comfortable bowling or where you have recorded your highest scores.

Bowlers typically refer to “my pair” of lanes when they think of a pair of lanes where they had previous successes. There seems to be a pair of lanes or a section of the bowling center where you feel most confident when you bowl.

Having confidence in a pair of lanes means you understand how to play the lanes, how to adjust on them when the oil conditions change, and you can “carry” pins well when you hit the pocket more so than on other pairs nearby.

There is nothing wrong with having a favorite pair of lanes where you prefer bowling. In fact, if you feel comfortable on a given pair, you will seek to practice on that pair whenever you can to boost the quality of your game.

If you perform well consistently it can give you self-belief that your game is on the right track, and you will feel you can to do well in competition - on any pair of lanes.

The mental state of any bowler is such that seeing the end result before beginning to bowl allows the bowler the freedom to perform successfully. Knowing the outcome and visualizing positive results is a key to winning, to succeeding in competition.

Being well practiced and in good bowling form will get you only so far unless you combine the belief that you will perform to a high standard before you begin competing. Visualizing a desired outcome is part of the mental preparation any coach or bowling mentor will suggest.

Finding your favorite pair might develop into your “favorite house”, your favorite lane condition, your best time of day to bowl, or identifying and using your favorite bowling equipment.

As humans, we are creatures of habit, of repetition. The more success we encounter, the more intoxicated we become with success, with winning. It is about achieving the end results we visualize before we set out to compete.

Competition need not be restricted to battling an opponent or an opposing team. Competition can be with yourself by challenging yourself to strive for the best results you can produce. Beating your best performance once leads to convincing yourself it can be done again - and again.

Every bowler has his or her own secret place where achieving the desired state of mind occurs before you achieve your desired results.


Some bowlers refer to this state of mind as being in “dead stroke” where every delivery just happens smoothly and without force and positive results occur time and time again. Being in "dead stroke" has no mechanical feeling whatsoever - everything just seems to flow.

Achieving this level of freedom on the lanes where you allow yourself to not force deliveries, but rather just freely swing and release your bowling ball with no doubt that you will hit your mark and get a strike is the state of mind any competitive player seeks.

Any level of nerves is irrelevant when you are in “stroke” because no amount of body tension will disrupt your physical game. When you achieve the state of mind that making a good delivery is simply part of a larger process and it is an expected outcome, as opposed to fearing the outcome and not knowing if you will make a good delivery, you will achieve your best results.

This state of mind on the lanes is known as confidence.

In bowling, it is your ability to visualize the end before delivering your bowling ball. It is accepting any outcome as part of a larger process and knowing that an extended series of trusted deliveries will lead to the end you set out to accomplish.

So the next time you bowl, make any pair of lanes your favorite pair, especially after so many of us were not able to bowl for months. After all, your favorite pair resides in your bowling state of mind.