Micheal Van Peeren (Wyandotte, MI) won his very first Michigan Junior Masters Title and Carrie Hopkinson (Drumbo, Ontario) won her first singles title at the Turbo 2-N-1 Sports Challenge event held on December 12-13 at Sunnybrook Lanes in Sterling Heights, MI.

Turbo 2-N-1 sponsored the event and added an additional $1,000.00 into the scholarship fund for the event and held a pre-torunament clinic for the bowlers. Lou Marquez and Carolyn Dorin-Ballard co-hosted the clinic as nearly 80 bowlers attended the event.

Once the clinic was over it was time to put that new found knowledge to work and many of the participants did just that. Tawni Vollmer (Tecumseh,, MI) led the way for the ladies through qualifying shooting 1544 while Van Peeren led the boy’s side shooting 1648. On Sunday the match play portion took place with the top eight (8) ladies and top twenty-four (24) guys’ matching up to advance to the stepladder finals. There was a lot of movement during the course of match-play and it was very close all day long, especially on the ladies side with less than 80 pins seperating third and seventh place most of the day.

On the ladies side Hopkinson had jumped from third after qualifying to take the top spot in the stepladders. Along with her were Vollmer in second, Addileen Pointer (Highland, MI) in third and Sarah Lokker (New Blatimore, MI) in fourth. Vollmer met Lokker in the first match and it came down to the last frame as Vollmer defeated Lokker 211-209. Vollmer then took on Pointer in another close match and won that to advance to the finals 224-214. However, Vollmer’s hot hand cooled off in the title match as Hopkinson made her way to the championship circle for the second time in her career with a 184 – 157 victory. Hopkinson had one doubles title to her credit but this was her first singles title.

The guys had just as much excitement as the ladies with a number of bowlers making big moves, in both directions, during match-play. Jerome Penxa II (Romeo, MI) made the biggest move going from 16th after qualifying to end up in 3rd place. Aaron Lorincz (Belleville, MI), who won our last event in Lansing, MI, was 6th after qualifying but took over the top spot for match play. Joining Lorincz and Penxa II in the step-ladders were Van Peeren, Bryan Eaton (Wyoming, MI) and Erik Stanley (Warren, MI).

In what proved to be some of the closest scoring in recent memory, many of the step-ladder matches were not decided until the 10th frames were rolled. Stanley won the first two matches as he defeated Eaton 231-200 and then took out Penxa II 245-223 to advance to the semi-finals. However, Van Peeren was awaiting him and with a fill ball in the tenth, he took out Stanley 224-223 to advance to the finals.

Lorincz, who was lloking to be the first male back-to-back winner in a year and a half, was awaiting Van Peeren but winning two in a row is a tough task and Van Peeren ended the quest by winning the match and his first MJMA title 214-212.

Thanks to Turbo 2-N-1 we were able to award $5200.00 in scholarships to the 32 bowlers on Sunday with the top spots earning $500.00 on the ladies side and $750.00 on the guy’s side. We also awarded two more Junior Gold spots for this event and they went to Michael Van Peeren and Carrie Hopkinson.

I want to thank Lori Tessmer,Lou Marquez, Carolyn Dorin-Ballard and Laura Gdula for their support of the Michigan Junior Masters Association and for the expertise they brought to the clinic that they hosted. It was a rousing success and will set the standard for any future clinics we have.

Our next event is the annual Adult – Junior event held this year at Airport Lanes in Jackson, Michigan on January 9th and 10th, 2010. This event is one of the biggest draws we have each year and I am not sure who has more fun, the adults or the kids. We do have an entry limit of 90 teams so please get your entries in as early as possible for this fun event. We will take it easy on the adults as we wil only bowl a 6-game qualifier instead of an 8-game and the shot will not exactly be the tough stuff the kids normally bowl on.

The entry form for this event is located HERE or in the tournament office the day of the event. Don’t delay and take the chance of being locked out. Remember, we are filling events on a regular basis and I would expect this event to be no different. Rosters will be posted on the website beginning Sunday, January 3rd and will be updated as required.

If you have any questions, please contact Jerry Tarabek (you can also call 616-780-2095).

Thank you all for a wonderful event in Sterling Heights and I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.