QuestionDuring the past 3 days, I've done a ton of bowling. I had a sport shot league one night, a 2 day clinic and after the clinic one day I had a league and after the other day I had a tournament. On the last day, I noticed a fairly large blood blister on the pad of my ring finger. It's rather painful and I was wondering what I should do about it to avoid hurting it more, but still be able to bowl in the coming weeks.
Answer
www.TrueBowlerAdjustme
www.LULU.com
Hello Hanna, sorry to hear about your injury. I coach over 250 bowlers per year, this often happens to someone I have worked with and gotten them on the right track with bowling.
The first thing I learned as an instructor when showing bowlers a better way to bowl is, the body will only take so much. :-)
Unfortunately, you may have experienced what Pro bowlers subject themselves to during tournament play. I have been in the medical profession for 25 years, as well as being a bowler. Blisters happen naturally when you irritate the skin. The best you can do is rest, and refrain from bowling. You do not want the blister to get infected. In short, stop injuring, the injury. If you have really over done it, you should get checked out by a doctor.
Protecting the blister at this point is the main concern. I caution my bowlers to "calm their excitement" about learning the proper way to bowl, without over doing it. However, I know how hyped they get, wanting to go practice immediately after working with me. This is so they do not loose the "feeling" of delivering a good shot down lane.
True bowlers know, it's all about muscle memory and you do not want to loose that key adjustment and "feel" that your coach or a new instructor may have given to you.
Sometimes though, there is a benefit to finding out that this happens when you bowl a lot of games. Underlying fit issues may be at play here. Please insure you go by your pro shop and have your fit checked out. Some bowlers go for long period of time and their hands have changed. Some bowlers grow, shrink, or generally change in some way that does not allow the hand to exit the ball as comfortably as when they were first fitted. So a bad fit, may be something to investigate when you have healed.
Thanks for your question Hanna. This has been a fantastic summer for bowling in Las Vegas. I hope your experiences and feelings are the same for Illinois! May all your tenth frames be filled with 3 strikes in a row!!!
- Coach Gary
Las Vegas, NV.
www.TrueBowlerAdjustments.com (It's a great bowling book!)
