A Recap of the May 9th BLBC Triples Tournament

What a day it was! On Saturday, May 9th, the Berkeley Lawn Bowling Club was graced with the kind of weather that makes you forget about marine layers and remember why we live in California. Under comfortable sunny skies, 24 bowlers, forming eight teams, took to the greens for our latest Triples Tournament.

As a well established club we have seen many bowls delivered, but rarely have we seen a performance as clinical and dominant as the one displayed by the “Bell Brigade.”

The Early Rounds: Setting the Pace

Game 1 saw Janice Bell, Michael Leutzinger, and Bernadette Chan signal their intent immediately, dispatching Rob, Annie, and Mark with a decisive 14-3 victory. Meanwhile, Hugo Deaux, Patricia Erwin, and Joseph Chow began their climb to the final with a hard-fought 10-7 win over Chris Davis, Lennon, and Sal.

Special mention must go to Mike O’Leary, Ethan, and Glenn, who looked like early contenders after a 12-8 win over Mike Armstrong, Charlie, and Gordon.  Also the team of Daniel, Cindy, and Ginger seemed formidable with a strong 19-5 showing over Kevin, Leslie, and Steve.

The Mid-Day Charge

By the time the shadows were beginning to shift, Team Bell was a locomotive without a brake. In Round 2, Janice and company navigated a tricky 12-9 match against Chris Davis’ team, while Hugo Deaux’s trio kept pace, grinding out an 11-6 win against Rob’s team.

The drama peaked in Round 3, where Team Bell hammered home their advantage with a 15-5 victory over Team O’Leary. On the adjacent rink, Team Deaux kept their streak going with a 14-6 win against Mike Armstrong’s crew. It was clear we were on a collision course.

The Final

The final showdown pitted the only two undefeated teams after three rounds — Team Bell against the consistently excellent Team Deaux.

It was a tactical chess match on grass. Hugo Deaux, Patricia Erwin, and Joseph Chow put up a valiant defense, showing the kind of chemistry that usually requires a laboratory. However, there was no stopping the momentum of Janice Bell, Michael Leutzinger, and Bernadette Chan. Janice seemed to have her bowls on a remote control, Michael was the definition of “cool under pressure,” and Bernadette provided the kind of setup work that makes a skip’s life easy. 

The Bell team emerged victorious, claiming the title and the bragging rights that come with it.

Final Standings (Notable Highlights):

• Tournament Champions: Janice Bell, Michael Leutzinger, Bernadette Chan.
• Runners-Up: Hugo Deaux, Patricia Erwin, Joseph Chow.

If you’d like to see all the scores from the matches throughout the day, check the tournament spreadsheet.

Thank you to everyone who participated, to those who helped prep the greens, and to the weather for being perfect. We’ll see you all at the next one!

We won again!

Our friends at Rossmoor graciously hosted the annual Tunnel Challenge on Saturday, March 14 (Pi Day). We played 12-end triples games with 8 teams during the morning and again in the afternoon. Berkeley fielded 25 bowlers.

The day started with pleasantly cool weather although we expected the heat to come later, which it did by mid-afternoon. The morning games got off to a slow start with most of BLBC’s teams down, but our bowlers did what we do best; we worked together, we didn’t give up, and we went into the lunch break with 5 wins, 2 losses, and 1 tie.

Remembering a disaster several years ago in San Francisco where BLBC needed only one win after lunch (a win which never came) we didn’t want to be overly confident going into the afternoon session. Berkeley’s teams focussed, bowled well, and won 4 games, enough to clinch victory for the day.

Thanks to all who helped us keep the trophy and thanks to Rossmoor for welcoming us to their club. It’s always a joy to bowl with the Rossmoor folks.

Our next interclub tournament is the Bay Bridge Challenge on May 2 at Berkeley. Look for an announcement as the date approaches. 

The BLBC 2026 2-Bowl Singles Tournament took place on Saturday, March 7 under sunny skies. But despite the higher-than-average Bay Area temperatures for the time of year, there were no complaints   from the 14 bowlers who had signed up for the competition—although maybe a few were left wondering if the late morning gusts of 25+ mph winds could be used to excuse an errant shot or two. 

The format was, as the title identifies, two bowls per player. The goal in each game was first to 15 points. Following a random draw to determine the first round of play, bowlers were matched in a modified strength v strength process. From a strong field, four players emerged as the leading quartet after the first two rounds—Kevin Reynolds, Cris Benton, Chris Davis (each with two wins) and Daniel Gorelick (one win, one loss, but just enough of a positive differential to edge out both Ben Corson and Mark Baker by one point). 

What was effectively a pair of semifinals matched Kevin against Daniel and Cris versus Chris in two tight games. In the latter, Cris and Chris traded the lead until the position stood at 9-9 after thirteen ends. But then Chris D got into a run and brought the score to 13-9 by the sixteenth end and within sight of victory. Cris B was not giving up, however, and took one point on each of the next two ends to narrow the gap to 11-13. But on the following end, Chris managed to find the remaining two points needed to secure the win.

If that was a close enough battle, over on the neighboring rink Kevin and Daniel were in a dogfight. Kevin jumped into a 10-5 lead by the tenth end, but then Daniel applied the pressure as only Daniel can, scoring seven points over the next four ends to edge in front 12-10. Kevin replied with a 2, a 1, and a 1, to reverse the lead to 14-12. Daniel wasn’t letting that phase him, and tied the game up at 14 apiece on the next end. But Kevin kept his cool and, with one point on the final end, prevailed by the narrowest possible margin 15-14. 

Perhaps it was Kevin’s continued adrenaline from the third game, or perhaps Chris had relaxed a little while waiting for the Kevin v Daniel scrap to finish, but Kevin built up a steady but substantial head of steam in the final, leading by 11-4 after thirteen ends, and by 14-5—on the edge of victory—after sixteen. Chris sought to recover momentum with one point on each of the next two ends, but Kevin killed the game off with the needed single point on the eighteenth, thereby preventing Chris from repeating his win in the 2024 edition of this tournament. Congratulations to Kevin on his consistent strong performance throughout the day, and thanks as always to the “usual suspects”—the greenskeepers, the markers, the hospitality team, and all those who helped with early set up. The TD wishes to express his particular thanks to Daniel who brought his computer to the event with the tournament spreadsheet on it—unlike the TD who forgot his! 

The 4-3-2-1 Tournament format remains relatively new to Berkeley, this being only the second year it has been held. It may be related to “The Belgrano” devised in tribute to General Manuel Belgrano, an Argentinian military hero and Founding Father who has many sites, streets, and institutions named after him in his native country, including the Belgrano Athletic Club, home to Argentina’s first and largest lawn bowling club (situated unsurprisingly in the Belgrano neighborhood of Buenos Aires). It is speculated

that Argentina originated this variation on the more casual “Cutthroat” game of bowls involving involves three players. The 4-3-2-1, in contrast, is a Singles game, but follows Cutthroat scoring—the closest bowl to the jack, irrespective of whose it is, gets 4 points, the second-closest 3 points, the third bowl 2 points and the fourth a single point. Thus, in principle a total of 10 points is available to either player in a given end.

Consistency is the key goal of any lawn bowler and consistency pays off particularly in this format—make sure you get something out of each end and don’t give up too many 9 or 10-pointers. Otherwise, you’ll find yourself deep in the hole after only a few ends, even with first to 65 points being the decisive goal.

This year, the BLBC tournament was held on Saturday, February 28 under fine bowling conditions. Following a preliminary set of matches held over the preceding three weeks, 12 players qualified for the final day’s contest. They faced each other in a modified version of strength-to-strength play in which the stronger players after each round went up against bowlers lower in the rankings with the field tighteningafter each round.

By Round 4, only two players—Daniel Gorelick and Jim Corr—had won all three preceding match-ups: Daniel against Russell (Rolly) Coe, Cris Benton, and Mike O’Leary, while Jim had prevailed against Michael Leutzinger, Tom Birt, and Sarah Allday. The final was keenly contested. Jim built up a small but significant lead early on, playing his short jack game. But when he got an opportunity, Daniel began closing the spread with a T-to-T strategy, so that after 10-ends the gap had been closed to only 4 points, 52-48 in Jim’s favor. Over the next three ends they split the points 15 apiece resulting in a razor-thin 67- v63 victory for Jim.

Congratulations to Jim on his success in the first club tournament of the BLBC 2026 calendar, and thanks to all participants, the greenskeeping team, the hospitality folks, not to mention the always welcome markers who made the games flow smoothly.