Welcome to the Greater Iowa Bowling Association

March 1, 2013

I want to start out by thanking everyone of you for helping to make this season one of the most successful in the history of the GIBA. We kicked off the season with a Fusion Realtors Open at Cadillac Lanes in Waterloo where we drew 188 bowlers, and finished our season last weekend with another Fusion Realtors Open at Maple Lanes in Waterloo with a full field of 180 bowlers. These events obviously had an impact on our other tournaments as well as we had full fields for our tournament in Pleasant Hill as well as the 50/50 Doubles at Cadillac, and the Fort Dodge Ford/Calisesi Chiropractic Open at Ridgewood Lanes in Fort Dodge. We also had increased entries for the Big Gun tournament. The Iowa Open drew another big crowd this season, and we had 100 bowlers for the 50/50 4 person Team tournament. We did have a disappointing showing in Mason City for the Blake Lobdell Memorial due to the ice storm that hit the day of the tournament. We had a field of more than 70 signed up for that one, but the weather cut that number to less than half. There were a couple of disappointments when we cancelled the GIBA team tournament and doubles in Muscatine due to lack of entries.

The Fusion Realtors tournaments are successful because of our great sponsors. The Waterloo Convention & Visitors Bureau provides us with huge support along with Zach Beschorner as our title sponsor with Fusion Realtors. We also receive unbelievable sponsor support from Jason Guest with Brunswick. The Brunswick involvement allows us to present the live streaming video coverage of the Fusion events along with Mike Flanagan’s willingness to be involved in presenting that coverage. We also need to thank our other sponsors for their support not only to the Fusion Realtors events, but our other events throughout the season. They include the Cedar Valley Sports Commission, Budweiser/Bud Light, Waterloo Implement, Rydell Chevrolet, King Pin Lounge, Beck’s Sports Brewery, Diamond Jo Casino-Northwood, Premiere Bowling, May City Bowl, Cadillac Lanes, Maple Lanes, Fort Dodge Ford, Calisesi Chiropractic, The Isle Hotel & Casino, and Fran’s Pro Shop. I tried to think of every sponsor we have, but I apologize if I missed any others. Without the help of these sponsors, we would not be able to provide our bowlers with the quality tournaments we try to present.

We ended our season with about 300 paid members in the GIBA ranks. I hope our members see value from their $10.00 membership fee. We use those fees to pay for our website hosting expense as well as for some of the supplies we use throughout the season. The majority of those dollars actually go back into our yearend bonus prize fund which this year included $3000.00 in added money from member fees and extra bracket proceeds from our tournaments. We had a total of 65 bowlers who paid their entry into the bonus prize fund at the Fusion tournament last weekend, and we paid out a total of $4,495.00 in prizes to the top 30 places among those 65 bowlers. This bonus prize fund is our way of rewarding our regular GIBA tournament participants for their support throughout the season.

Thanks to Brunswick, we also were able to give out prizes this season to the top 14 bowlers in our season long point list. Brunswick provided us with nine bowling balls for the list as well as four 3 ball roller bags, and the top point earner gets to choose between a $400.00 cash prize or a paid entry into the next USBC Masters tournament.

Congratulations go out to Nick Heilman who was the champion of our Fusion Realtors Open tournament last weekend at Maple Lanes. Heilman stepped up huge in the tenth frame of the championship match and struck on the first two shots to top Duane Kilts 224 to 216 for the title and the $3000.00 top prize. As an aside, Heilman was not in the bet you win side pot so we will take 20% of the amount into the end of season bonus prize fund for next year, and the remainder ($580.00) will carry over to the next Fusion tournament (assuming we get funding approval). Kilts took home the second place prize of $2300.00 for his effort plus the top spot in our bonus prize fund of $420.00. Kilts was followed by Mike Peters in 3rd place, Nicholas Kruml in 4th,and Rick Volhard in 5th. Others who made the top ten modified stepladder finals included Brian Crane in 6th, Ken Kempf and Dave Beres who tied for 7th, and Rick Miller and Derek Sapp our champion from the September Fusion tournament who tied for 9th. We collected a total of $21,600.00 in entry fees, and the total prize fund payout was $31,655.00 including the extra three senior prizes we paid out of bracket proceeds. You can view the final results by clicking HERE.

I really need to give a shout out and a huge thank you to my family!! I could never do this without the fantastic support and effort from my daughter Jennifer, my wife Rosie, and my son Gregory. Jennifer and Rosie make things happen throughout the tournament process, and I know the money will always be balanced and the scores recorded correctly as well as timely. Gregory does all the work on our GIBA website so if you like what you see, he is the man behind making all that happen. Also, I want to thank Mike Flanagan and his crew with Insidebowling.com for making the trip up here to present the live stream of our tournament!! They do a fabulous job and put in some very long hours!!

We also held a junior scholarship sweeper last Friday evening sponsored by the Cedar Valley Sports Commission. The weather played havoc with our entries, but 20 bowlers showed up to play for a total of $1900.00 in scholarship prizes plus two paid entries into the main Fusion tournament. The sweeper was won by Kyle Anderson with Tyler Cruz finishing second. Both of those bowlers earned paid spots into the Fusion Open as well as scholarship money. Rebecca Broerman won the girls division and she was followed in second place by Alexus Wilson. I am attaching the final results from the sweeper to this note as well.

February 18, 2013

Here the squad assignment list for this coming weekend’s Fusion Realtors Open. I tried to do the best I could to accommodate your squad preferences although with a field of 180 bowlers, there will be some who didn’t get their first choice. Please contact me right away if you see any issues with this list. Please note, there may be additional spots available on the last squad if the junior sweeper on Friday night does not fill. The entries for that have been coming in slower than I had hoped so a few of the spots saved for the junior bowlers might open up. I do have a few bowlers still on the waiting list, but if you know someone who wants to bowl, let me know and we might be able to get them in on that third squad. Also, if you know scholarship eligible bowlers who might like to bowl the Friday evening sweeper, please have them get in contact with me this week.

Maple Lanes and Kegel have finalized the plans for the pattern we will be using. The pattern is 45’ in length with a total volume of 30.05 ml and a ratio of 3.66 to 1. Please note, the AMF HPL surface at Maple Lanes tends to hook, and that played a part in the pattern decision. While the ratio is a bit above the threshold allowed for a ‘sport’ compliant condition, I do not anticipate this to be a high scoring pattern. Nobody bowling the tournament will have an opportunity to bowl on this pattern until the Friday afternoon practice session at Maple which will be from 4:00 to 6:00 PM.