Bowling is alive and kicking on Saipan

The success of a particular sport does not depend solely on the success of a player or athlete who plays the game. Sometimes it is weighed based on how it is being run by people who do not even play it. In this case, bowling is a sport that many actually engage in but they do not even hit the sports pages.

Bowling has never been in the Olympic calendar. This puzzles every bowling aficionado because a lot of bowling clubs are holding tournaments almost everywhere else in the world unlike some of the regular Olympic sport.

Here on Saipan, bowling is alive and kicking. Different clubs have their year-round programs for quite a long time. The good thing is that companies and their rank-and-file employees are involved in both running the league as well as playing the game. Oftentimes, this makes businesses happy together even in times of economic slowdown.

Ross Zapanta, who is involved with two bowling associations, gave an outlook about the game as well as updates on the regular tournaments and other programs.

Zapanta is the secretary general, treasurer, and tournament coordinator of the Saipan Bowling Association.

Jerry Tan, president of Tan Holdings Co., is the current president of the Saipan Bowling Association, which is the national bowling association of the CNMI.

SBA is officially recognized by the international governing bodies like the International Bowling Federation known as the Federation Internationale de Quillieurs or FIQ, World Tenpin Bowling Association, and the Asian Bowling Federation to name a few.

Zapanta explained that SBA runs tournaments (but not bowling leagues) and is the association that has to sanction bowlers who will participate in official international competitions.

Another association that Zapanta is involved with is the Philippine Bowling Association.

PBA started as an exclusive association for Filipinos but is now accepting anyone.

The current president is Milo Orallo while Zapanta is the treasurer and tournament coordinator.

The association also runs leagues and tournaments.

There are four leagues—the Monday Night and Saturday Night Leagues at the Saipan Bowling Center in San Jose, and the Thursday Night and Friday Night Leagues at the Capital Bowling Center in Garapan.

There is also a Wednesday Night league at SBC that is partly sponsored by Budweiser but is not run by PBA.

The 7th Season of the Budweiser Wednesday night league started last Sept. 1.