The basic bowling
action - or, how to bowl faster
In the simplest possible terms, bowling is about
getting the ball from one end of a 22-yard
pitched wicket to another, with the restriction
that your arm stays straight in the rotation
leading up to its release. This isn't the place
to enter into debates of the technicalities of
the throwing laws; but at lower levels of the
game there are few instances of no-ball calls
for 'throws'. Suffice to say, barring your
action being very suspect, you are unlikely to
experience many allegations of chucking - unless
you've just taken 10 for 13, in which case I'm
not sure why you're reading this.
The basic biomechanics (a term used to signify
the study of body movements in the name of
optimising the use made from them, and minimise
injury) of bowling, and indeed the basic
biomechanics of propelling any object, tell us
that in order to get the highest speed possible,
we need to make sure that all parts of our body
are working in the same direction.
If, for example, I attached two lengths of
string to a tennis ball and then pulled one
length in one direction whilst a friend pulled
the other length in another, then the ball
wouldn't move (provided we both pulled with the
same force, google 'Newton's Laws' for more
detail!) If, however, we both pulled in the same
direction, the ball would would accelerate at
the maximum possible rate (given the forces that
we exerted upon it). Should we then take two
steps apart, and create an angle of around 15
degrees between ourselves and the ball, the ball
would still accelerate when pulled - but not to
the same extent as it had before. Are you
following? If not, bookmark this page, grab a
tennis ball, some string, sellotape and a mate,
and come back in ten minutes.
Okay? Good. Now, how to we translate our
experiments with the tennis ball into getting
the most speed out of our bowling actions? Well,
because of the large number of moving parts in a
fast bowler charging to the crease, it's
difficult to line everything up into that same
direction to propel the ball at its maximum
speed. The two most important parts of the body
to guide us in this lining-up exercise are the
hips and shoulders - if you imagine two lines
running through your body, one through the hips
and one through the shoulders, when these are
parallel with one another, then everything's
pointing in just about the same direction.
There are many different angles where you can
align yourself with the crease with equal
validity 0 England's Andy Flintoff and Matthew
Hoggard exemplify two extremes, Flintoff lining
himself up in a very front-on manner, with both
imaginary lines running between mid-off and
mid-on, at right angles to the wicket. Hoggard,
on the other hand, has a side-on action, and the
imaginary lines in his body point roughly in
line between the umpire at the bowler's end and
the wicket-keeper. Between each end of the
scale, there are myriad possible positions -
called 'midway' actions in current coaching
speak - Glenn McGrath is one of the many
Internationals who bowl in this manner, his
imaginary lines will tend to point towards the
slip cordon. Next time you're watching a video
or DVD of highlights, try to pause the recording
at the moment where different bowlers release
the ball and ask yourself where the two lines
lie.
Problems start to occur when the two lines are
not parallel - not only does this mean that
there isn't as much speed being generated as
there could be, but more seriously greatly
increases the risk of injury, especially to
teenage bowlers. Think about it, if the line
through your hips is pointing between mid-on and
mid-off, and the line through your shoulders is
pointing between umpire and 'keeper, how does
your upper body move to allow this? The answer -
not one for the faint of heart - is simply that
the back and spine have to twist. Doing this
every ball in match and practice for weeks and
months on end can have a huge effect on a
bowler's back; the number of bowlers with these
flawed 'mixed' action is the direct reason
behind the ECB's restrictions on the number of
overs that under 19s may bowl.
So, why do these mixed actions occur, and what
can you do to smooth them out if you realise
that you or a friend have an action like this?
To get back to our imaginary lines, we need to
move either the hips or shoulders so that
they're in line with the other. It doesn't
matter which is moved, but it's generally a lot
harder to adjust your run up and the way that
you plant your feet (in order to change your hip
position) than it is to rotate your upper body
and bring your shoulders into line.
The easiest way to rotate your shoulders and
upper body is to change the position that you
look with respect to your front arm (your left
arm if you're a right-handed bowler, and vice
versa). Whilst a side-on bowler ought to look,
as is traditionally emphasised, behind it (to
the left of it for the right hander), a front-on
bowler should look in front of the front arm
(i.e. between his two arms). This will then
bring the shoulders around and drastically
reduce the twist in the back. In a large number
of cases where a mixed action occurs, it's
because a young player has been drilled to look
behind the front arm no matter what alignment
his hips take. As the explanation above
hopefully conveys, this isn't always the case.
Taking this to its conclusion for midway
actions, the bowler should be looking
approximately through his front arm (obviously,
this will vary depending on the nature of the
action and the degree to which it is removed
from either of the two extremes).
Forgetting the biomechanics of alignment for a
minute, what other factors are there that can
help someone to bowl faster? Well, it's time to
return to science, which tells us that we need
to increase the force that we place into the
delivery to extract extra pace. Two of the
simpler ways that can often increase force where
it's lacking are to increase the effort placed
into both driving the front arm down as you
bring the bowling arm up, and doing the same to
the back leg (the same side as your bowling arm)
as you follow through. The follow-through itself
is an area that's often neglected by young
bowlers; it should be as long as is needed to
naturally slow down without exerting any sudden
forces which can both cause injury and reduce
the effectiveness of the action (if the
follow-through is harsh, it may have to start
during the bowling action itself, slowing
everything down). The same applies to a run-up,
in that it needs to be long enough to allow a
bowler to reach the fastest speed where he's
comfortable delivering the ball - if it's too
short, then the bowler won't bowl as quickly as
he potentially could, while an overly-long
run-up is just a waste of energy.
Finally, we've got everything sorted out - so
how fast do you actually bowl? Naturally, the
best thing possible to use would be a radar gun
- however they're not generally widely available
to clubs and schools - but there is a simple way
that needs just a stopwatch and a calculator (or
maths geek) to provide approximate results.
Start the stopwatch when the ball is released,
and then stop it again when either the batsman
hits (or misses) it, then divide 45 (or 72) by
your answer to get your answer in miles per hour
(or kilometres). For example, a delivery timed
at 1 second has travelled at about 45mph
(72kph). To break the magical 100mph (160kph)
barrier, the clock must register at 0.45
seconds. Once you get used to working the timer,
you will get surprisingly consistent results.
I've found that standing at the back of the net,
either directly behind or just to the side, gets
the best results.
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