Today was an off-day for me. While Mario dealt with the two closer centers and shuttling the kids to the practices, I only attended check in. We're trying hard to keep Zoe from spending an entire week in a bowling center when she doesn't actually get to bowl until Thursday. Check in wasn't terribly far, and the registration went amazingly quickly. The chatchkes (freebies) were pretty nice, and the clothing for this year's tournament was great. Most of the kids got something--either a polo or a name shirt that lists every one of the 1700 bowlers expected to attend. I was able to finally meet the wonderful woman in person who has helped get the tournaments done from Wisconsin. Sadly, she will not be making the transition to Arlington, and there seemed to be a real feeling that the sport is losing a bit of the "brain trust" that makes the whole sport run. The fact that this will be our last tournament as a group makes me hope I'm wrong about the direction of the sport, but I thanked the people who were so integral to the program I've built.
I encouraged everyone to stay for Rick's seminar, and it was every bit as informational as I imagined. The kids need to remember preparation, execution, and reaction. That's it. Rick is probably the most unsung hero in the sport. Instead of an infomercial for Brunswick, he offers a wealth of knowledge, and the kids in attendance learned quite a bit. Two balls were drawn for, and as Michael has mentioned, he won. Thankfully they will ship it to our driller and we'll pick it up in the OC when it's time.
The side tournament was a bit of a disappointment, since we drove out there and realized there were going to be six or more kids per lane, and that none of them had the desire to stick it out that long when we still had to get up and get rolling for the last practice squad tomorrow morning. On the way back though, we found the Dave and Busters (it's essentially Chuck E. Cheese for bigger kids), so it was worth the trek. We will end up going there tomorrow or Monday evening. What I was especially happy with from their decision not to bowl, was that the kids made a decision based on new information, and just said "no" rather than trying to make the same thing work.
Tomorrow is the practice session at the farthest center from where we're staying and then we'll just keep a low profile. The goal is to get the kids to settle down early and get them up and ready early for that 8 am squad time on Monday. We're just over one day from the actual bowling, and the excitement is mounting.
Gotta split,
Angel
