When we think of bowling, we think of casual nights out with friends, relaxed after-hours with colleagues, or even childhood family events. Most people are surprised to learn that bowling is indeed a perfect form of exercise. The best thing is that there are practically no limitations on who can bowl. It’s a low-impact, simple-to-learn sport suitable for people of all ages, from toddlers to senior citizens. Some bowling alleys even have separate lanes for wheelchair users and the visually disabled.
Bowling is a common participant sport, especially among the elderly, due to its slow speed and low physical demands. Professional tournaments are now common among older players. You do not think of bowling as a sport that needs warming up, but completing stretches before throwing a ball is essential to avoid tearing a muscle or injuring your lower back.
A warm-up is much more essential for senior bowlers, who may not have the stamina they once did but find that bowling helps them remain fit, balanced, and social. It’s a low-intensity exercise that always gives you a good workout.
Is Bowling Good Exercise For Seniors?
Bowling is an excellent way to keep your heart rate up and your arms and legs moving in a concentrated, low-impact, demanding way. Aches and pains, lack of mobility, loss of control, and even slipping and losing something are all issues for seniors. This is genuine. Sitting around will not help with all of this, except that you will not collapse. You should move and get your blood circulating. You also want to maintain your stamina, agility, and of course your balance.
A traditional bowling outing, whether it’s a league game, a company party, or an evening with friends, consists of three games. A typical individual can stroll around the bowling alley and bowl for what is equal to about half-mile. That’s great. In operation, she or he will burn between 170 and 300 calories. When developing strength and balance, the arm can swing a lightweight of 9-16 pounds fifty times. That’s a full-body exercise. As with all other workouts, you must do it correctly to avoid injuring, straining, or endangering yourself or others.
You’re doing a lot of things in terms of exercise: Picking up the ball requires the use of arm and shoulder muscles. Standing and carrying the ball necessitates good stance and balance. Trying to approach the foul line to throw the ball requires the coordination of leg, arm, shoulder, back, and torso muscles as you move while moving the ball and releasing it correctly with momentum.
This entails bending your upper body and dynamically offsetting your weight on one side of your body. It is important to have good hand-eye coordination. Approaching the foul line correctly necessitates rotating your wrist, releasing your grip on your bowling ball in a timely fashion, lunging forward, and dynamically halting yourself while maintaining a relaxed posture.
Did we add that you’re relaxing your joints and using your grip power at the same time? And that you’re improving your bone density and reducing your risk of diabetes, heart disease, and stroke? Your mental health is changing as a result of your increased attention and social contact. In fact, you should do this activity with your children and grandchildren on an equal footing.
Your pulse is pounding, you’re breathing, your blood is flowing, and if you get the strike or maybe even a spare, you could do a little fist bump, hop, pose, or dance. That’s a good workout.
Physical and Mental Health Benefits for Seniors Who Bowl
Bowling has many health effects for both young as well as old. Bowling is a particularly beneficial mode of exercise for seniors. Bowling can burn up to 250 calories per hour based on your weight and bowling style. Bowling a three-game series entails walking more than a half-mile while swinging an 8-16-pound weight. This workout improves the bowler’s stamina, boosts the bowler’s productivity, and aids in the bowler’s bone density maintenance.
Bowling is a “whole-body” workout. The bowler’s legs carry him or her from the rear of the approach to the foul line, where the knee and thigh muscles retain the tension as you slide to a halt. When the shoulder swings near, the bowler’s core muscles transform and flex. That’s where the arm and hand come into play, releasing the ball in a raise and turn motion and bringing it on to a stretching end. Many bowlers are probably unaware of how much exercise they have with each shot or that exercise can be fun!
So, if you already like bowling or are searching for a fun new way to lose calories, here are all the medical benefits of bowling only one night a week.
Burns Calories
In a typical three-game set, the typical bowler walks up to 60 feet per direction for a distance of more than half a mile—Bowling burns between 175 and 300 calories per hour, equal to skipping rope for 25 minutes.
Strengthened Muscles
A bowling ball weighs around 14 pounds on average. When you swing and throw the ball regularly, the 14-pound weight strengthens your shoulders, wrists, stomach, and legs. The act of gripping the ball activates the muscles in your hands. You’ll release the bowl 54 times on average during a three-series game. That’s a lot of repetitions!
Improved Flexibility and Balance
Since we’re on the topic of throwing a 14-pound ball, this repetitive motion will gain more than just your power. Bowling allows you to curl, lunge, and extend, which increases your stamina. When you stretch your arm and body, your joints, muscles, even ligaments extend as well. Not to mention that having excess weight on your upper half causes your lower half to compensate by improving posture and poster.
Better Hand-Eye Balance
Throwing a ball and hitting a set of pins about 60 feet apart necessitates a great deal of hand-eye coordination. Consider this, the half-court line in basketball is 47 feet to the net, which implies you’re tossing a bowling ball further than NBA players trying for the game-winning play. Over time, performance increases with practice, but the more you bowl, the nicer you’ll get.
Enhanced Social Life
Bowling is a recreational activity. When you’re not on the lane, you’re normally with your teammates and families. People who interact even once a week have a better immune system and are less likely to experience stress and some forms of cancer, as per Psychology Today.
Things to Consider When Getting Ready To Bowl
If you are an inexperienced average-range bowler with no experience playing and are about to play in a bowling tournament, let’s look at a few aspects to help you prepare.
Check Your Equipment
The first move in preparing for a competition is to get your bowling ball ready to meet the lane conditions. Examine your bowling equipment to ensure that everything in your bowling bag is ready to use. Begin by inspecting your bowling balls to ensure that the gripping holes are not damaged or require revamping or beveling. Check your finger inserts for extreme wear and repair them as appropriate.
Select the Best Surface Texture Preparation
Choose the most appropriate surface texture preparation for each of your bowling balls. Bring them in for the required repairs to guarantee you have the finest surface finish and finish for the lane surfaces you hope to play on during the tournament.
Have Smooth Bowling Shoes
Then, make sure your bowling shoes have the smooth sliding potential that any match player needs. If you bowl on wooden lanes at the local center and the tournament venue has plastic lanes and approaches, you can consider buying a new pair of bowling shoes with adjustable sliding heels and durable soles. The slipping friction effect on approaches varies depending on the temperature, the actual approach surface, and how well the approaches are maintained. Being prepared and finding several pairs of bowling shoes on hand is still a good idea.
If you bowl in a competition where the pair of lanes you draw triggers rubber marks or undue dirt from the ball return track, maintain the surface of your bowling balls clean per frame. Check that your bowling towel is clean and that you have a stock of ball cleaning compound that has been approved by the USBC and is prepared to use.
Practice a Lot
The next step is to get some more practice games and focus on your athletic game’s strong points. Preparing for a tournament entails being well-practiced and understanding that you will be playing specific delivery angles than you do in daily leagues. Use all of the bowling ball supplies, not just those that fit well for you, at the local bowling alley. Be flexible and prepared for any lane situation that can arise.
In addition to preparing your equipment for the tournament and playing enough games to keep you sharp, you may want to devote some of your preparation time to the below steps to the good competitive environment.
- Maintain complete attention to the goal across the strategy and execution.
- During your approach, keep an athletic stance and great balance.
- Maintain a steady walking speed. Try not to rush your steps, especially the final two steps of your approach that are the most important. Rapid measures can result in rushed and inaccurate launches.
- Swing the bowling ball effortlessly and easily, without tensing your arms. On each delivery, strive to maintain a constant swing pace on the backswing and forward swing.
- Maintain your form at the foul line until the ball has reached your goal. Balance is important for consistency and good performance before and after the crucial release of the ball.
