A BIG THANKS to Hi Joy management and crew for hosting the 9-Tap Tour this past weekend and helping to ensure things ran smoothly.  Despite having the whole house for the first time it still wasn't enough to accommodate the massive turnout in the first two squads.  The four-game format for the 'Best 3 of 4' limited us to 6 bowlers per pair and we still ran a little late.  However, we set a record 244 entries for Hi Joy and paid out $16,587.00.  For the FOURTH straight Tourney, we had a Champion earning over $3,000.00, a string never seen before on the Tour.  In our record smashing 2024, we only had ONE $3K Champ all year!  The scoring was a little higher than normal all three squads, not only a giant winning score and a high 'Cut Line at 740, but also a much higher percentage of 700's shot in all squads.  We had THIRTY-EIGHT bowlers top 700 that didn't make the Cash List. 

NOTE: Next week's 3-Game format will allow us to expand up to 8 per pair, which will help us a lot.  Increasing each squads capacity by 28 bowlers and we have FIVE squads next week. 

The 9-Tap Jackpot got off relatively easy this week... again, several bowlers had nice strings getting 6 of 7 Middle Taps, while Oscar Gestoso even made it 7 of 8 Taps.  But it was Ruong Sa Tang that ran off the Front-5 Taps, derailed by a real strike on #6, then getting another 9-count on #7 as well.  He was obviously disappointed, but the $375.00 Consolation helped to soothe the wound. 

        Oscar's 7 out of 8 Taps                  Ruong's Front 5 Taps for $375.00 

1st Place - Bruce Mang had the 'Bowling Day' of his life Saturday, earning his 1st Tour Title in the process!  It's always fun for us, whenever a Tour Member wins and is as excited as Bruce was with his win.  He barely shot his average in his first game but then got so HOT that he averaged a monstrous 70 pins per game over his average for his last 3 games.  THAT'S HOT!!!  Wearing his Dexter SST 8 shoes and throwing his Storm 'Absolute' ball, Bruce scored an 'out-of-body' 873.  It was easily his best performance since joining the Tour last year and it included his highest game (266) and best series ever.  He received a huge payday of $3,394.00 for his stellar performance.  The only previous Top 5 finish Bruce had was a 2nd Place at Bowlero-Acme last year.  Bruce wants to thank his mentor July Soun and his 9-Tap family for always believing in him.  He had to take some time off the last 6 weeks because of a bad case of the flu, but boy did he come back better than ever!  (not a recommended training proceedure)

2nd Place – Matthew Hert scored an impressive 850 missing his 3rd title by just 23 pins but he still received a very nice check for $1,477.00.  Add the $185.00 he got for  High Scratch Series and the $185.00 he got for High Scratch Game and his total for the day was $1,847.00. not counting whatever he made in Brackets & HDCP High Games.  Great Day! 

3rd Place - Montana Xaysana, scored what would normally be enough to Win with a sweet 845, earning an equally hefty payday of $737.00.  Montana joined the Tour in 2022 and has a couple 2nd Place finishes under his belt along with this 3rd place win.  Will this be the year for a 1st place Title?