STANDINGS AFTER SQUAD 6 - THURSDAY, MAY 24 -
19:00
Bo Winther (pictured), a Danish player from
Esbjerg, went off on a scoring spree to open his
account on the first squad on Monday evening,
starting with a perfect game and followed that
300 with a 258 to be well ahead of the pack. A
225 in his third for a halfway score of 783
looked good for a fighting finish, but he ran out
of steam with a trio of sub-200s and finished
with 1305.
Jimmy Dan Mortensen set the pace with 1424 on
squad one and Mikael Brandeskov came within four
pins of that on Tuesday evening's squad two.
Wednesday evening features a fairly small squad
and battle will begin in earnest on Thursday
with squads at 11:00, 15:00 and 19:00.
Wednesday evening's squad certainly brought
more than a hint of excitement, despite just 24
players taking to the lanes. An opening
three-game series of 737 from local girl Kamilla
Kjeldsen, including eight pins per game women's
bonus, saw her as leader of the pack but she was
not able to maintain that standard and finished
with 1417 for the six games.
Then the spotlight switched to a newcomer to
the European Bowling Tour from far away Iceland.
Magnus Magnusson, 34, (pictured) from Reykjavik,
whose only previous Tour appearance was here in
Aalborg last year, rose above the field by
coming home with 1514, finishing with a superb
279 to top his five outstanding previous games.
Ladies on top for the Squad 4 scores on
Thursday morning with Denmark's Rikke Holm
Rasmussen and Linda Haglund of Sweden vying for
the honors. It went
 down
top the last game before it became evident that
Linda was in control and her 1368 puts her in
ninth place overall.
Rikke, rather rueful after a 189 in the last
game, slotted into 21st place on 1283.
Linda, partner of Tore Torgersen, has not been
bowling extensively in recent years and the pair
are celebrating the first birthday of young
daughter Tone. There will also be a further
bundle of joy in late September this year and
Tore stated that he doesn't mind whether the
newcomer will be a boy or a girl.
Maybe the pair of youngsters should be taught to
bowl left-handed, two-handed and as spinners,
then they'll have all options covered and carry
on the gold medal achievements of their parents.
Further down the pike and Squad 5 Thursday
afternoon had Michael Wittendorf
 of
Denmark (pictured) as the squad leader. The
45-year-old Copenhagen pro shop proprietor has
been hitting the Aalborg International for over
20 years but, sadly, admits that he's never got
as far as the top 16 in all that time. This was
his second entry this year and his score of 1326
in this squad places him 23rd overall. But you
can bet he will be back to try to break that two
score run.
Thursday's final squad saw more big guns come
into action as PBA pro bowler Mika Koivuniemi
from Finland entered the arena along with fellow
countryman Kimmo Lehtonen, the maestro of
Helsinki, in more ways than one. Another
renowned Finn entering the fray was the unique
two-hander Osku Palermaa, so a spectacular
battle was ensured, but could they knock Magnus
Magnusson off his perch?
A 734 from Mika topped the leader board after
three games, although tied with Denmark's Martin
Mozny, and Osku threatened from fourth place.
It was a story of three Finns after the fourth
game. A 290 from Mika consolidated his top place
and both Kimmo and Osku moved up to second and
third places respectively.
 Mika
(pictured) upped the ante to 1240 after five
games and Osku slotted into second with 1176.
Alix Yoan from France now came third as Kimmo
dropped to sixth.
Mika needs 275 now to take over the lead.
Now the dust has settled and the heat subsided a
little and very nearly another 1500 as Mika hit
259 in his final game to total 1499 overall and
second place on the leader board.
A disappointing finish from Osku brought him
down to eighth and Kimmo's bid for glory fizzled
out with a couple of lowly final games.
Danish ladies Britt Brondsted and Kamilla
Kjeldsen still top the distaff table, holding
fifth and sixth places but those spots will come
under severe challenge on Friday and Saturday.
|
BRUNSWICK
AALBORG INTERNATIONAL