Last Saturday night, the umpires all traded their runners for a couple of bowling shoes and hit the lanes down at AMF Cannington.

From a bit of a slow start – due to a minor fault in one of the lanes – all of the umpires took part in what was our first social night of 2011, that wasn’t preceded by a vigorous training session.

Seldom were shy when it came to giving it their best. Some of us where keen to experiment when it came to a particular bowling style. Personally, I thought it was Mitchell and his ‘twirly whirly’ bowling technique that took the cake. Coach and President where neck and neck in our first game, Scott was in front by a point at the end of the 9^th bowl with 101. Although a spare on his 10^th wasn’t enough, as it was Daniel who won the one on one with a strike and end score of 119, putting him two points ahead of Scott.

There were a few of us who possessed great skill in the art of high scores. There was Wayne with a wicked 129, Scotty just topping that with a solid 133, but it was a high score of 136, made by Michael Villanti, that was a winner! Alex also came close, but perhaps still needs a little more practice with an average score of 55 and about 20 gutter balls.

We had our meal at about 8.00pm in which Sheepy took the time to give out some encouragement awards. He presented both Josh and Jayden with these gifts that recognised their efforts on the night.

After we stuffed our bellies with some delicious burgers, some of us left, where as others stayed and hit the arcade games. Russell certainly has a broad vocabulary and should perhaps make some enquiries in entering The Wheel of Fortune, as he managed to rack up a neat amount of tickets on the simulated version. Michael earnt himself a $1 fine since he managed to not once, but twice hit the jackpot on another game. Kudos to those two.

Thanks to the great amount of umpires that attended and made this year's annual bowling night one of the best yet.