Cameron Crowe began bowling the EYT when he was 13. Last week I touched on his story. His EYT story begins with many, many losses. Many don’t realize that because if you take a look at him now- he is crushing it on the lanes. That’s the story with many of my Elite Youth Tour bowlers. They learn how to win on this tour. 

I’m so proud of them all, and more and more people are starting to realize the connection of showing up every month at the EYT, and being ranked in the country.

Junior Gold is normally broadcast on TV, but this year it was not because of COVID cutbacks. So, this year it was live-streamed online instead. Nothing replaces youth bowling on TV, but I think live-streaming was great for more people tuning in from devices and it really got people talking about it. On almost every finals show, an Elite Youth bowler was competing. Seeing that, a lot more people began giving me shout-outs during the tournament. They were commenting on the success of the EYT bowlers at the event, congratulating us on what we’re doing and what I’ve been building. 

And my heart exploded.

The other week, Cameron won nationals with the older group (U20). And then the following week was the U15 division, U18, and U12 division. In the U12 division, Matteo Quintero won. Although he hasn’t been an EYT regular, he did make his way up from Tennessee to capture a few titles already. I’m super proud of him. In the U15 division, Landin Jordan has 20 EYT titles already.  I recently posted a picture on Instagram of when he was really young, when he won his first U12 title and he was just so tiny! Watching him win a National Title really touched me. Maybe it’s because I’ve been able to be a part of his journey. To nurture him, celebrate him, and watch him grow into the bowler that he is. And now he is NUMBER ONE IN THE COUNTRY! In the U15 girls division, Kayla Starr made the Junior Gold finals. Kayla Starr IS a SUPERSTAR. Not only am I proud of those who made the finals but I’m overwhelmingly proud of everyone who had the guts to step on the lanes with the best in the country. I saw a lot of you out there and you bowled with so much integrity and poise. 

It’s not a fluke when my EYT bowlers start winning at larger events. They show up every month. Every month they are bowling on harder patterns at my tournament.  As much as I wanted to build EYT as a community for young bowlers, and as I wrote about last week that’s its heartbeat, I also wanted EYT to prepare them for those moments in the bigger tournaments, and on Junior Team USA. Seeing how well my bowlers are doing on bigger platforms now really solidifies everything for me about why I built this.

Every weekend, when I was little, my family and I traveled out of town. Just like my EYT parents, my parents showed up for me and enabled my sister and me to bowl tours around the country. Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Illinois. Those tours were so influential to my career and showing up every month was so important to my growth as a bowler. Some events felt very professional. Dress codes, shirts tucked in, fines if you misadded your scoresheet. There was one tour in Michigan we competed on regularly where they would measure girls’ skirts to be sure they were “a cigarette pack above the knee.”  Rules, and high standards are what I wanted the EYT to be.  I wanted a dress code and rules that you had to follow like a professional event. 

I remember the first hard pattern I ever bowled on. It was at an MJMA in Michigan and the man who started the tour (Dan Ottman) announced that we wouldn’t be bowling on a house condition. He said the lanes would be harder as he planned on putting the oil out in a “special” way. One event he even got out an oil can and squirted the lanes by hand. 

I took the best of all the tours I bowled as a youth bowler, including the highly professional and difficult ones, and I put it all into how I very intentionally designed EYT. I thought, why not build a tour so that today’s youth can feel what I felt and also learn there so they can go on to do even bigger things?

In the beginning, the tour was built on hope. I thought, I’m going to build this and I hope people come. That whole “ if you build it, they will come” idea. And then I built it and they all came! Then they told their friends and then their friends came and then all of a sudden it was going strong, built on word of mouth. I didn’t advertise. In the beginning, I think people showed up just because I had credibility in the industry. They came because I was the one holding these tournaments and I had built a standard with my name. They knew me and they knew that whatever I was going to build would be done very professionally. Now, I feel like it has so much more credibility because we’ve held the tour on a consistent basis for 10 years, maintaining the standard that I set in the beginning. We’ve also given out over $250,000 in scholarships. I feel like it’s also grown to a point now where they’re not coming because of me anymore and they’re coming because they know it’s where the great bowlers are.

Aspiring champions are noticing that EYT bowlers are placing at national events. You can’t watch Junior Gold without seeing those EYT Champions shining bright. Also, they are representing so well at the Storm Youth Championships. Those bowlers on the outside looking in say to themselves, “I want to go where they are. I want to make sure that I am as good as them and I want to start bowling against them on a regular basis.” They think to themselves, “I’m going to show up and see how I rank amongst them so I can find out how good I really am.”

What happened at the Junior Gold this month is already helping to grow the Elite Youth Tour.. A lot of new names suddenly popped up on July’s roster.. As I was looking at the entries coming in, I kept noticing that there were a number of new names I didn’t recognize. I know they’ll love the EYT and look forward to seeing them grow into champions.

EYT is a really unique community of people who are interested in bowling and leadership development and it’s such a privilege to watch their journey.

If you are interested in donating to the Elite Youth Tour please do so HERE.