Well I am sad that I could not get my schedule to cooperate so that I could be in Columbus and actually be bowling in the open myself this year.
But I have been catching some video of the event and as expected the scores are a good 10 pins higher over all this year due to the shorter pattern used.
Also I was correct the 9 board appears to be the out of bounds only about 1% of balls missing outside of the 9 board will strike.
The leaders after day 2 are Kelly Kulick on the women's side and Jason Belmonte on the men's side.
With the shorter pattern this year I expect Kelly to lead most of the way and she should win the women's side. On the men's side? Well that's a tough one Pete Weber has a good chance to repeat but he will have his hands full as some of the power players will have a chance this year with the shorter pattern allowing them a few boards more mistake room.