LEWISTON — Dominick Young turned 3 last month and he’s already an old hand at Wii bowling.
He played live action for the first time Saturday, dropping a 6-pound ball and watching it creep down the lane at Sparetime Recreation before slowly connecting with a handful of pins. High-fives all around.
He’d spurned his mom’s idea of using a metal ramp to make things easier, and faster.
“He didn’t like that, ‘That’s not how you bowl, Mommy,’” said Georgeann Gauthier of Lewiston.
Gauthier, fiance Rick Young and their son turned out Saturday to add to National Bowling Week’s world-record attempt for the most games bowled in one day.
The number to beat: 741,821.
When they stepped up to the lane under the game screen names Mommy, Dommy and Daddy, it was at least three down, 741,818 to go.
Sparetime Manager Tom Giberti said bowlers had been steady through the door, half coming for the record, half surprised to be given an official attempt certificate. The gorgeous day hadn’t helped. He was rooting for a cool night.
“Once the sun goes down, it should pick up tonight, but that’s the way the bowling industry is, weather-dependent,” Giberti said.
Chad Aube of Auburn turned out to try to break the record with his little sisters, Renee Cote, 16, and Ruby Cote, 13.
“I said I’d take them out because they kicked my butt on the Wii, so we’ll see how it goes,” he said.
Aube won the first warm-up game. By game two, everyone was getting better. The girls agreed it was cool to have a world record on the line.
Samantha Chambers and Dustin Holmes of South Paris came to the area to shop and decided to bowl, spur of the moment.
“This is my first time ever trying big-ball bowling,” Chambers said. “They’re heavy; it’s a lot different.”
Gauthier said she hadn’t bowled in eight or nine years. The bumpers on the lane, she joked, were coming in just as handy for Dominick as for her. Their one game of bowling turned into one hour.
“We’ll talk about this for the next year, year and a half, about how we went bowling,” she said.
kskelton@sunjournal.com
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- Dominick Young, 3, of Lewiston rolls a bowling ball at the Sparetime Recreation center in Lewiston on Saturday. Young was taking part in a nationwide challenge to set a new world record for the most games bowled in a day. Looking on are his mother, Georgeann Gauthier, left, and his father, Rick Young, far right.
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