Lawn bowling is popular outdoor game that is played during summers in England, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. There are bowling clubs in these countries where it is quite popular and one requires having membership the clubs to play.
Bowling started as a sport in England and exactly when it started is not clear as it is described among other sports like archery, fencing javelin throwing as casting stones. So in all probability round shaped stones were used when the game started. Stones were replaced with iron balls and were black or brown in color. Each ball has a small color mark on it so that the players could distinguish them also the colored spot indicated the side of the ball that is slightly heavier then the rest of the ball. Two or more players can participate and the person who wins the toss gets to start. He or she will lay the bowling mat and roll the ball down it on to the open lawn. The rest of the players have to bowl their balls as close to the first ball which is called a ‘jack’ and can even hit it with their ball. As each ball is weighed on one side it is not going to go in a straight line but will go in an arc. So the player must roll it such that the ball either touches the ‘jack’ or comes to rest as close as possible to it. Points are awarded on how close the balls are to the ‘jack’.
If one is into lawn bowling then all what one needs is to have is a large lawn in the backyard that has an even surface to play. The lawn needs to be mowed and ideally should not have any weeds in it. Two four or even eight people can play in this game and most competitions involve two teams. As a general rule the team that scores 21 points wins however there are other variations to these rules. Normally people wear white clothes and soft rubber soled shoes and in some clubs people play it bear footed. The white dress code has probably been taken from cricket a very popular English game.
As this game is mostly played by middle aged and elderly people it is not very popular with the younger generation as it is more a way of spending time chatting and relaxing then being fiercely competitive. The Glebe Manor lawn bowling club in Toronto, Canada is perhaps the oldest lawn bowling club in history. It started in 1923 and continues till this day. The club is always trying to increase its membership and get more people to play this game. Lawn bowling equipment is getting lawn is getting a set of lawn bowling balls and mats. If one cannot find them at their local sports shop one can easily order them. Bowling balls are now available in fluorescent colors also and the balls still have a spot that indicates to the player which is the heavier side of the ball so that he or she will know how to roll the ball as it is going to roll in an arc on the lawn. If the backyard lawn is big enough then more then one set of players can be playing alongside. If there are more then one set of players playing then there are certain additional rules that have to be followed as any player’s ball could roll into another games area. One can get lawn bowling shoes if one is really seriously involved in this game. Lawn bowling tutorial lessons can be downloaded from the Internet and some lessons have videos also that one can download. Lawn bowling clubs do keep publishing lawn bowling news to keep the interest in this game alive.
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