A Story of Seconds (Part1)

As I get ready for my final exams and a couple of bowls trips up to Ballina and Coffs Harbour it is my ‘so-close’ finishes that I reflect on more so than my victories. I try to learn the lessons of my defeats and draw positives from how I got to be in those finals situations in the first place.

Winning is important to me and I have won a few things in my time, but by far the most interesting story I can tell is of my second place finishes. Of course I desperately wanted to finish in first place. Sometimes this just does not happen as my opposition has an equal or some may say greater will to win on the day. It may be the rub of the green or the change of wind direction in the air, but in the end they were too good and played in a way that I could not match or overcome them.

Dac Cameron (former Bowls Co-ordinator and now Chairman of Ballina Bowling Club said to me over the phone yesterday, ‘It doesn’t matter, people still talk about that final and say how great it was’ in reference to my second place finish to Brian Baldwin (Queensland State Singles champion and Club Secretary of Musgrave Hill Bowling Club) in 2007.

In this particular final I got off to a flyer. I will link the newspaper article at the end. Aptly it is entitled ‘Brian Bowls Over Ballina’ it is a great article and it captures my lack of cognition that the final was 31 up rather than the previous 25 up format. I thought I had lost the game when Brian had got to 25, I shook his hand and said, ‘well played, too good’. He looked at me strangely as if I was having him on. Steve Glasson was marking and assured me it was indeed first to 31...Christmas had come early! I had a second chance!

Just as a background to the above, my manager at the time NSWIS coach Geoff Campbell had clearly told me at the start of the game it was 31 up (first to score 31 shots). At the beginning of the game I knew this but I had gotten into such a state of focus and flow that I forgot about the score and went on a rampage early amassing a ten shot lead (15-4). The game then got a bit epic as the green slowed and Brian toughened up, I played a few in-between shots and drives culminating in dropped shots, then it got to about 20-19 against. By this stage I was fighting hard to adjust my feel to that of a firm passing draw as bowls were not rolling on as they had earlier in the afternoon sunlight.

http://www.finda.com.au/features/2007/07/30/apn-brian-bowls-over/