A funny thing has happened in the first three weeks of the HansonRealEstate.com Scratch League's summer season. The tougher lane conditions have lowered scores and the experienced bowlers have taken advantage. I know it's hard to imagine, but the top team in the league, Team 6, is captained by one of the two PBA cardholders. Oh, and by the way, the high series for week three was shot by the other. All of this has led me to conclude that, well, basically better bowlers bowl better.

Before you blast me for being master of the obvious, let me remind you that I'm a scientist by trade. And as such, I try not to make assumptions and instead rely on facts and figures to come to my conclusions. I'm not the only one, either; there was an article in Popular Science last year that described recent research conducted to confirm very basic hypotheses. For example, one study came to the conclusion that drivers who carry guns in their cars are more likely to suffer from road rage, while a second study found that too many meetings at work make you grumpy. Bottom line: next time you cut off a truck with an NRA sticker in the back window, you'd better hope the cell phone they're on isn't a conference call.

Week three of the league brought the start of positional round action for the summer. It also brought about a serious challenge for Team 6, led by Captain and longtime PBA cardholder Juergen Siemers. In the end, however, Top-

GradeConstruction.com, fresh off of a 51-point performance in week two, proved no match for Siemers et al. The leaders fired games of 604 and 609 on the tough conditions to demolish TopGradeConstruction.com by more than 50 pins a game on their way to a 28-0 sweep. Team 6 then went on to nearly repeat the feat against Team 2, which managed to save only two points in its defeat. When the smoke cleared, Team 6 had extended its lead to 31.5 points over now second-place Team 7. My conclusion, therefore, is that Team 6 had a successful night.

Meanwhile, the other current PBA member in the league, Clark Walmer, fired a league-high 846 series. Only a stumble in game three kept Clark from making a run at the second 900 series of the summer. Walmer opened with back-to-back 227s against Julie's Pampered Chef and finished with a 245 to help Kinder's Meats take 43.5 points on the night.

Now it might not be as groundbreaking as the revelations that smoking costs you money or that objects far away are tougher to see, but I would have to conclude that experienced bowlers are better suited to adapt to tough lane conditions. I know I'm going out on a limb with that one, but with 13 weeks and three other challenging oil patterns to come, I feel confident that the better bowlers will continue to bowl better. If you would like to challenge my conclusions, you can catch me at Harvest Park Bowl on Monday nights at 7:30. But please, with all the excitement sure to be generated by my findings, try and refrain from swallowing more than one magnet; apparently it can be bad for your health.