AMES — One of the most satisfying feelings in sports is the ability to bowl a clean strike. Iowa State offers a bowling club that provides opportunities for both competitive bowlers and casual bowlers to get involved.

The Iowa State Bowling Club’s competitive teams for both men and women travel around the Midwest as members of the Great Lakes Bowling Conference (GLBC) and the Mid-Iowa Bowling Conference (MIBC) to compete in tournaments.  

Women’s travel team:

Cecelia Gilbert

Maria Tovar Velasquez

Margaret “Maggie” Goodwin

Madyson Arrington

Kali Ogg

Bethany Drury

Olivia Reyna 

Men’s travel team:

Nathen Zumbach

Matthew Robinson

Cristian Alvarez

Carter Sulzbach

Chase Sorenson

Daniel Murphy

Dawson Niichel

Isaac Kohls

Michael Griffioen

Nick Hingtgen 

“We’re looking at adding a junior varsity team on the men’s side and we’re hoping to take up to 10 bowlers on the women’s side,” Gilbert said. 

The club has the challenge of being run by the students themselves, which differs from regular opponents they face off against, who are sanctioned collegiate bowling teams around Iowa, such as Wartburg, Coe College and more. 

This gives a great opportunity to compete against high-level competition, mainly through the MIBC tournaments throughout the year. 

“It can be difficult to compete with sanctioned teams that have professional coaches and university funding,” Zumbach said. “But this past year, both teams held their own when it came to individual and team scores.” 

Past challenges included budgeting the team’s travel and expenses, which has become a learning opportunity. The club’s leadership has placed greater emphasis on managing the club’s finances and using those funds to develop life skills beyond college. 

“We are keeping up with our volunteering shifts that bring in the majority of the money that we spend,” Alvarez said. 

The club practices at Perfect Games in Ames weekly, at times determined as the semester begins. 

Iowa State club bowling is also big on having fun. During Halloween, they dress up in costumes while bowling in an annual tradition. As part of other traditions, the club also enjoys bowling with friends. This connectivity is huge for clubs in building potential lifelong friends over time. The general connectivity comes from just being together, outside of the bonding of bowling. 

For anyone who is interested should email [email protected] or Gilbert for more information.