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Why It’s Almost Impossible to Make a 7-10 Split in Bowling | WIRED - YouTube

Channel: WIRED

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in professional bowling about 60% of the

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shots are strikes but what about the

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rest of the shots there are over 1000

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possible spare configurations and

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players convert the hardest less than

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one percent of the time so what's the

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most difficult spare of all well there

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are a lot of notorious spares out there

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but today we're gonna be looking at the

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most notorious of all the 710 split now

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look some of you may have noticed that

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this episode breaks with our format a

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little bit because unlike previous feats

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that we've looked at people have

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actually hit 710 splits here's the thing

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nobody on earth can hit a 710 split

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predictably or reliably and that's

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because that split is even harder than

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it looks so today we're gonna look at

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why converting the 710 split is really

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truly almost impossible to find out what

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it takes I played a few frames with a

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professional bowler I believe the 710 is

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the hardest spare split conversion to

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make in bowling tried hacking the game

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with a bowling robot and crawled inside

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the jaws of a pin setting machine to

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find out what really makes the 710 split

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the most difficult spare of all this has

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been turned completely off which I am

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grateful for but first I went bowling

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I've made the 710 three times in my

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lifetime and I'm 43 years old I've been

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on tour for going on 19 years that is 10

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time national titleholder Wes Malott we

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met up with him at the u.s. bowling

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Congress in Arlington Texas do you have

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any pro tips on how to how to convert

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this thing well I'll tell you one thing

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in order to make two you gotta hit one

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or in other words accuracy is essential

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come on it's also not my strong suit

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come on it's hard to hit the one at

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least for me it is Malad can hit

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whatever pin he wants almost every time

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but there's more to converting this pair

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than accuracy and to fully appreciate

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why it helps to understand the anatomy

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of a bowling lane it's 42 inches wide

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and 60 feet from the foul line to the

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head pin that's pin number one the nine

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remaining pins are numbered like this

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each pin stands 12 inches away from its

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neighbors creating a pattern of

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equilateral triangles two gutters run

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along side the lane and trap the ball if

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it strays too far left or right removing

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it from play bowling just boils down to

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angles when the ball and pin collide the

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pin bounces in a direction perpendicular

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to the tangent plane that intersects

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with the point of contact so if you hit

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the pin here it'll bounce here hit it

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here it'll fly here and if you hit it

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here it'll go this way that means that

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in order to send the 7 pin flying across

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the lane and into the 10 pin or vice

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versa in theory you need to hit it right

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here here's the problem it is impossible

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to get a bowling ball far enough outside

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the 7 or the 10 pin without it first

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falling into the gutter there's just not

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enough room that makes the 710 split the

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only spare in bowling that can't be

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converted with ball and pins alone to

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pull it off you actually have to bounce

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the 7 pin or the 10 pin off the

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machinery behind the pins and the more

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power on the shot the better when the

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lot goes for the 710 split he throws at

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about 22 miles per hour that's harder

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than he usually does and he often gives

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it a little bit of forward spin so the

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ball won't hook and lose speed but

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there's one more essential ingredient

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for converting the 710 split luck

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even if you hit the pin hard enough and

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even if it heads toward the pin setter

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at a good angle there's just no telling

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how it's going to ricochet without some

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kind of lucky bounce and the machinery

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in the back end you're just not going to

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convert it and that's because this isn't

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like banking a shot in pool for starters

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the pins have

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that causes them to bounce around

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unpredictably but you also have to

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consider the barrier behind the pins

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it's a curtain not a wall which means

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that it moves and anything bouncing off

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of it is going to ricochet around even

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less predictably and some of those

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curtains move more than others here's

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what I mean by that

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okay so unless you work at a bowling

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alley you've probably never been back

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behind here this is a pin setter it's

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what collects and sort of repositions

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all the pins every time you're bowling

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and the piece that we want to look at is

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in here okay so this is an older-model

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pin setter it's anchored in two places

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once up here at the top and again down

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here along this more solid bumper

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section when you're trying to convert

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the 710 split the goal is to bounce

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either the seven pin or the 10 pin off

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of these surfaces and into the opposing

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pin now what you might have noticed when

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I touch it is that this curtain has some

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give to it and that movement actually

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reduces the energy of the pin bouncing

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off of it which makes it tougher to

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ricochet into the other pin here's the

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thing on newer model pin setters this

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curtain moves even more and when we were

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at the u.s. bowling Congress we actually

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got to see what one of those pin setting

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curtains looks like on these newer

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mechanisms this curtain is only attached

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at the top and so it swings completely

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freely like a doggy door and then the

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pin instead of bouncing all of that

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energy just gets absorbed into the

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curtain all of which means that in the

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end when it comes to the 710 split

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your best bet is to hit either pin as

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hard and as consistently as possible and

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then just hope for the best and when it

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comes to consistency no bowler on earth

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is as reliable as this one meet Earl

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that was mildly terrifying Earl is our

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staff bowler here in the equipment specs

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department he's a robotic arm and he

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throws bowling balls very very very well

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Earl can put a bowling ball pretty much

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anywhere you want at up to 24 miles per

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hour and it's pin rates as high as nine

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hundred rotations per minute that's

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triple what pros put on their shots and

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once you've dialed in all your

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parameters Earl can roll the same shot

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over

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and over and over normally the US

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Bowling Congress uses Earl to test

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equipment but today we're gonna use it

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for an experiment the goal to see if

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Earl can hit a 710 split

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come on Earl I'm changing the trajectory

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from one point seven to one point two to

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increase our chances of hitting the

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sparrow we decided to let Earl Bowl on a

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lane with an older model pinsetter with

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a fixed curtain

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we tried bouncing into the side at an

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angle towards the middle of the curtain

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and even got the pin to double bounce

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off the ball and while some of our shots

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looked like they might have come close

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to converting the spare we never managed

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to actually pick it up Earl might be

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powerful and consistent but not even a

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robot can engineer luck so if you bring

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all of these factors into consideration

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you wind up with a conversion rate on

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the 710 split of just 0.7 percent but

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there is a spare that players hit even

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less often this is data journalist Ben

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Blatt a few years ago he analyzed close

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to half a million frames from the

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professional bowling Association to try

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and figure out what the hardest shot in

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bowling really is so you analyzed close

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to half a million frames what did you

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find there a conversion that was picked

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up least often is a shot that she has a

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nickname called a Greek church it was

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picked up about 0.3 percent of the time

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compared to the 710 split which is about

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0.7 percent of the time so they're

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obviously both extremely hard to pick up

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but the Greek Church sophistical II was

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converted much less than the 7/10

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flipped if you've never heard of the

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Greek Church here's what it looks like

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for right-handers it's when you leave

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the 4 6 7 9 and 10 pins and it's the

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mirror image of that pin arrangement for

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lefties it's called the Greek Church

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because if you look at the pins head-on

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and use your imagination they look a

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little bit like the spires of an old

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cathedral to convert it you need to hit

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all the pins on one side while sending

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at least one of them

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Alaine to knock over the remaining pins

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it's a highly technical and very risky

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shot if you miss which you probably will

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you earn far fewer points than if you go

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for the three pins you know you can hit

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that second strategy is called going for

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counts and bowlers typically do it when

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they encounter difficult spares if

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you're in a game time scenario strategy

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more often than not calls for just

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picking up the three on the right most

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of the time yes you're going for a count

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and you're going for the three on the

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right but let's say you're going for all

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five pins is the Greek Church actually

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harder than the seven ten not according

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to malotte

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I think the seven sounds harder than a

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great Church because the Greek Church

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you can shoot at it and you've got a pin

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that can slide across to make the other

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pens a seven-ten they're even farther

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apart and it's virtually impossible

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because the lane is only so wide you

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can't hit that side of the pin and get

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it to slide over to the seven pen to

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prove his point millat agreed to try

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converting the Greek Church he struggled

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at first it is after all a really

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difficult shot but it only took him

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about a dozen attempts to finally

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convert the whole spare and he came

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pretty close three or four times we saw

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