Sport: Fifth

Because an Ashtabula bowler was kept at home by his wife’s illness last week, one Mike Blazek of nearby Conneaut, Ohio, was recruited to substitute for him in the American Bowling Congress tournament, which was last week entering its seventh and final week in Chicago’s huge Coliseum (TIME, April 18).

A factory worker who bowls thrice a week and averages 200, Mike Blazek was no blazing ball of fire on the Ashtabula team. In the five-man event, he bowled a creditable enough 610 (for three games), in the doubles he posted 614. In the singles, he started out even worse with discouraging scores of 171 and 145 for his first two games. But suddenly in his third game, Mike Blazek began to hear again & again the hallowed sound that is music to a bowler’s ears—the clean, choral crash that means a strike. Eight, nine, ten times in succession. Aware that something momentous was happening, excited crowds began to jam behind his alley, but Bowler Blazek refused to be ruffled. Again he rolled a solid pocket smash. Taking his stance for his last and crucial shot, Mike Blazek just perceptibly faltered. His ball crossed the head pin for a “Brooklyn”‘ hit.* The No. 5 pin wobbled, teetered, finally fell. The crowd yelled. Mike Blazek had done what only four bowlers in the 38-year history of the American Bowling Congress had been able to do—he had rolled a perfect game.

*Bowling vernacular for a ball that curves too far across the alley, hits the head pin on the wrong side.