Expert: Susie Minshew - 6/6/2009

Question
Are the lanes re-dressed between games in tournament single game match play - step ladder format or any other? Why or why not?

Answer
It depends on the tournament. For example, if squads of a tournament started at 9am, 12pm, 3pm, and 6pm, the tournament organizer could oil the lanes between every squad or between every other squad. It would be quite rare to have the lanes oiled only before the first squad time of the times I listed above. That would mean the bowlers on the 6pm squad got lanes that were really 'used up'.
In a tournament, you would want the venue to offer as equal a playing field as possible for the participants. That doesn't often happen in a tournament that lasts for months, like the USBC Championships. Try though they might to keep things equal, the nature of bowling and oiling and the differing styles of bowlers mean that the tournament is a luck-of-the-draw, luck-of-the-weekend event.
I have never heard of the lanes being oiled between matches of a stepladder final. With only two people bowling on the pair, re-oiling would not be necessary.