
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, February 5, 1995                   TAG: 9502030029
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: F-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

BOWLED OVER

THE WORLD has entered the computer age, but bowling is largely unchanged from Fred Flintstone's game. The talking pterodactyls and other prehistoric animals that stand in for modern appliances in Bedrock have long since gone the way of the dinosaur, of course; their jobs are mechanized.

But quaint as it may seem, actual physical movement - picking up a ball, swinging it, releasing it - is still at the heart of the game. It is not yet relegated to a computer screen, with little pictures of bowling balls manipulated by the user to knock down as many little pictures of bowling pins as possible.

No, for bowling, the changes wrought by the computer are in the ball.

Differences in surface texture, hardness and the configuration of a bowling ball's heavy core all affect how the ball hooks, spins and breaks as it rolls down the lane and hits the pins. Computers help engineers design balls that perform in particular ways, and have particular advantages on various lane surfaces.

Serious amateurs no longer have just one bowling ball all their own. The serious amateur has as many as eight or nine - and is likely to show up for a game toting 'em all, so they can be switched according to lane conditions or even the split of the pins.

The number of bowlers in the United States dwindles, but each of the stalwarts remaining needs more bowling balls, which works out nicely for manufacturers.

This is all very enterprising, but we're holding out for a computer-designed bowling ball that rolls only strikes. Then we'll be back to the good old days, needing only enough closet space to store one.

by CNB