relax and eat
snacks
"Tenpin bowling is a game similar to skittles. It is played in special centres where you can rent or freely obtain all of the accoutrements required to play. Players take it in turns to bowl a special ball at a set of ten pins positioned into an equilateral triangle with the apex pointing towards the player.
"Bowling balls are large objects (21cm in diameter) weighing up to 7.5kg with finger-holes in them so that the player can grip the large ball. Players need to wear special shoes to prevent them from damaging the highly-polished wooden floor on which the game is played.
"Tenpin bowling has had its ups and downs over the years. Descended from a long line of bowling games that go back at least as far as the ancient Egyptians, it is more recently descended from Kegal, a nine-skittle German game which spread across Europe and into North America.
"In an era when gatherings of people often meant bad news for the powers-that-be, ninepin bowling was banned. As you may imagine, with concerted effort and great mathematical insight, a loophole was found in the law and an extra pin was added to the original nine. Thus the diamond of the nine pins became the triangle of the ten.
"1946 was a big year for bowling in the United States of America with AMF (now part of Qubica AMF) producing the first automatic pin-spotter. In 1960 the newly-mechanised tenpin bowling was introduced to the UK.
"Bowling has a complicated scoring system which has put off many people over the years, but with the advent of computerised technology players can now enter their names into the computer and their scores as they occur and the machine takes the pain out of the scoring.
"Talking of pain, the main frustration of the new bowler is seeing your ball slowly make its way across the lane and tumble into the gutter which runs down each side. This means you have missed and another zero is put on the score sheet. This became such an issue for new bowlers that lanes were fitted with devices to block the gutters (known as bumpers), so that new players would at least score something. League bowling does not make use of such devices."
Above extract taken from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; full article can be read by clicking here.
WTBA Rule Book 
If you'd like to read more in-depth information about the rules of the sport, you can download the latest World Tenpin Bowling Association rules in Adobe Portable Document Format (suitable for versions 6 and above).
Looking for the latest version of Adobe Reader? Click here.
