There are defiitely difference between five and
ten-pin bowling, starting with the size of the ball.
spare, the ten is carried over into the first ball of the next
frame. A perfect game in ten-pin (all strikes) is 300.
Dave Forfitt belongs to a men’s senior league at Super
Bowl and has bowled in leagues and tournaments on both
sides of the border. He’s had a few of those perfect games.
“I just remember the shot…and that was it…I think it
was at Rose Bowl,” said Forfitt, referring to Windsor’s other
major ten-pin bowling centre.
Clarkson has come close to a 300 himself.“A 299,” said
Clarkson with a laugh. “That 10-pin sat up there. It kicked me
pretty good.”
Between Windsor’s Pillette Village and Riverside sits a
brick building that’s been there since 1946. The building, near
Brennan High School, houses Playdium Lanes, Windsor’s only
remaining location for a uniquely Canadian pastime: five-pin
bowling.
Mariano Meconi, the manager at Playdium, has spent a lot
of time around the sport. He’s been at Playdium in some
capacity since 1980.
“I came from a management perspective,” said Meconi.
“My dad was a silent partner here for many years. He plugged
me in here as manager and it became a lifestyle that I found
agreeable.”
The smaller facility has very strong connections for those
who run it as well as those who use it.
“A lot of people become family, it’s only a ten lane centre,”
said Meconi. “There were only two five-pin centres in town.
You got to know the players, the coaches, the people who coach
the kids. So friendships developed and kind of glued me in.”
The other five-pin centre, Parkview Lanes on Ottawa
Street, closed in the early 2000s, leaving only Playdium.
Meconi says there are definitely differences between that and
the ten-pin version, starting with equipment. The bowling
ball, for example, fits easily into one hand.
“The five-pin ball is five inches. They’re allowed to be four
and three-quarters to five inches in size,” said Meconi. “They
vary in weight from three-pounds-six to three-pounds-ten
ounces.”
Like their ten-pin counterparts, pins in the five-pin
version are spaced in a triangle with the point toward the
bowler. They are spaced further apart than the ten-pin
version. Each pin has a point value assigned to it once the
bowler knocks it down. The head pin is worth five points, the
pins on either side of that are three, the farthest ones two,
making the point total for a strike 15.
Five-pin bowlers get three chances to knock all the pins
down per frame, with scores for a strike or spare carrying
over, as in ten-pin. A perfect game in five-pin is 450, and
Left: Steven Scherle, pro shop manager at Super Bowl Lanes, works on
customizing a new bowling ball for a customer
Right: A bowler delivers a ball down a five-pin bowling lane at Playdium Lanes