Aura Paranormal

When I saw that the Paranormal Aura was coming at 2000, I was looking forward to see what this ball could do. I found to get the most out of my original Aura, I had to break the shine and then that ball came to life. 80° x 3 ¼ x 45° With this ball , I wanted a benchmark ball for when there is a lot of volume and/or longer patterns. My 2000 pin-down Versa-Max used to have this roll, but found it was just ok at reading these types of patterns. It excelled more on medium/normal volumes for reading the lanes. I planned on this being a Dull Versa-Max+, something with a similar shape/consistency, but trust it on the heavier/longer patterns. On a modified house shot, that played like a 42' Cheetah pattern, you had to get it to the gutter early, otherwise it would never hook-up. I started with this ball on the fresh and it gave me the shape I was looking for when drilling it. It wasn't necessarily the right ball for this pattern, but it was very smooth off the super dry on the right and didn't over react. One disappointing thing was that I thought the ball would hook a little more than it did when missing one or two in. Instead of 3-pinning, I would 3-7-9 or 3-7. On the 2012 USBC Master's Pattern, I wanted to get a basic feel for the pattern, and to do that, have to use my benchmark heavy oil ball, which is this ball. During practice, I noticed that there was a little bit of friction to the outside part of the lane, as long as you played pretty straight out there and didn't give it too much belly. I used this ball during the 10 minutes of practice and had a really nice look with this ball. However, a few frames into the first game, I noticed it was starting to check up a bit too early due to the surface, so I went with the 55° Paranormal and had a much better reaction. 55° x 4 7/8 x 15° My goal with this ball is to get a combination of the F in the Nexus f(P+F) and the S in the NeXXXus f(P+S). I am looking for a ball that I can trust to play a further inside line on the fresh when it is required (Shark, US Open) where the Nexus f(P+F) would be a bit to rolly, and the NeXXXus f(P+S) would project too long with wide shots and hook too much on shots that were inside of target. On the US Open Pattern (42'), during practice, I left a lot of 3-7s, which was kind of surprising, but I figured better in practice then during the game. Once the game started, the ball began to pick up better traction. However, I was finding that the ball was struggling to face up correctly. I ended up moving about 5-3 out and the ball began facing up the right way. I started a bit too deep, but thought the ball would traction a little better than it did. I ended up using this ball the entire night and had better ball reaction as the night went on (we move pairs after each game so each pair was essentially fresh). I stayed and practiced after league and I noticed that of my initial plan for laying this layout to get the F and S from the Nexus covers, I was getting the F no problem, but the S was lacking. Just to test out my theory, I went to my skid/snap Brawler and that ball made the turn how I was kind of expecting this ball to do. To try and get more of a reaction off the spot, I put Rough Buff on it. Will see how that helps with the backend reaction. On the 2012 USBC Master's Pattern, once the 80° Paranormal started hooking a bit too soon, I decided to go to this ball over the pin up Brawler, figuring the Brawler would be too clean this early in the day. With the Rough Buff on, this ball was the correct choice. I was able to move a couple in and throw it to the spot I burned in and this ball behaved properly. Where most other people needed a ball with surface to play the outside part of the lane (and even when moving in), I was able to stay w/ this ball. The ball got through the fronts, gained traction in the mid lane, and made a strong move to the pocket. After initially being disappointed with this ball's reaction at 2000, I am very pleased with it now that it has the proper surface for what I was looking to accomplish with this ball. Overall, I was very pleased with what I saw with this ball. The 80° ball gives me a look I haven't had in a long time; I'm really excited to use it on harder patterns to get a feel for what is out there. After applying the rough buff to the 55° ball, it started to react the way I wanted it to. It makes a strong sudden move off the spot and goes through the pins the right way. --The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer and not of Brunswick Corporation--