Champion-of-Champions review

Bowling News

The BCGBA is asking bowlers to reflect on the Champion-of-Champions weekend and offer their views on what worked well and what could be changed in the future. Here is a copy of that invitation.

***Feedback Request - Champion of Champions***

There has been a few posts about this year's Champion of Champions - so lets try to get the feedback into a format that can be used by BCGBA as part of a review process.

***Please Read the Full Post BEFORE Commenting***

The Competitions Committee wanted to increase it to a 64 for 2025 as a trial.....did it work? That's down to the bowers, spectators, etc... What I can tell you is the feedback from the bowlers on the day was mixed from whether they preferred 32 or 64 (and I spoke to a LOT of the bowlers). Some preferred the one green option, some appreciated that they got to play in the event because it was expanded, all were happy with the increased prize money......but NONE said that it definitely shouldn't be a 64.

Agree with comments on other posts that there was a mistake that the Last 16 moved to one green instead of only the Quarter-Finals - this cost over an hour and meant a much later finish (the Ladies finished at 5 45 yesterday). For me there's 3 options....please let me know your thoughts so I can feed it back to the Competitions Committee directly (unfortunately I won't respond to everyone BUT will read, and note all the thoughts).

1. Return to a 32 on the previous format. Remember, this means only 11 Competitions qualify for the event with a LOT of others missing out.

2. Return to a 32 on a new format using only qualifying competitions. In this version, County Merit winners don't qualify (their competition is the Senior Individual Merit, and the winner of that qualifies). This will enable LOTS more very worthy competitions to get access to the Champion of Champions and help then to both develop, and fill their competitions.

3. Continue to develop the event as a 64. To clarify, there is NOT a shortage of competitions, nor were we scrabbling round for qualifiers. The method that the Competitions Committee used where organisers had to 'apply' didn't work, and this would definitely be changed. 64 enables far more sponsorship to be generated to cover costs such a live streaming, etc.... and increasing prize monies, along with ensuring that as many as possible of the sport's top players are involved.

If people have other ideas, please also let me know.

Please either post your feedback to Steve Clamp on Facebook.....or drop me a direct email to Region1@bcgba.org.uk ....and let me know if you attended, watched on livestream, or its just purely your thoughts.

As I've always said since I got involved with BCGBA 18 months ago, I'll always be transparent on what happens, and I'll certainly pass on all feedback. At the end of the day, myself and others are doing what we do to try and develop, and improve, the sport we all love