new members.
By Peter Barna
Located just one mile from Century City, there is a community of an exceptional group of healthy old people: the members of the Holmby Park Lawn Bowling Club.
For the not-so-young members of the local community, lawn bowls has become a fun recreation activity held several times a week at Holmby Park.
The club currently has 90 members – most are over 50 years old, but there is one member aged 100, one aged in their upper 90s, five over the age of 90, the majority in their 70s and 80s, and a few in their 50s and 60s.
“I am happy we bring the men out of their houses,” said club president Thomas Seres. “As you may know, in exercise classes in senior centers the man/woman ratio is about 1:10.”
Sessions take place a handful of times a week, from 11:30 am to 2 pm.
Seres said after practicing, members play 12 to 14 “ends” against other club members.
“Each end involves leaning or kneeling, apprising a billiard-ball target, bowling a 3-lb. solid plastic bowl toward it, straightening up, and repeating. They have three bowls per an end, then they walk over to the other end of the grassy field, about 40 yards, and repeat the three bowls, going the other way.”
Seres said there are competitions for small stakes as well as local and national awards.
“It is a pleasure to watch the psychic lift members get – especially when they win,” he said. “It’s a mild exercise, just what doctors usually – and often futilely – recommend.”
Holmby Park Lawn Bowling Club often hosts other clubs, bowling 12 “ends” before lunch and another 10 to 12 afterwards.
Local members also visit other clubs in Southern California from Santa Barbara to San Diego, even to Carmel.
“We usually carpool, leaving L.A. around 8 am,” Seres said. “In these games any 10 players have the combined age of 700 years. They return around 5 pm after spending the day at another club. Visiting clubs and hosts are always served lunch, usually made by members at home for 40 to 60 people; the cleaning up is all done by members.”
Seres said many members are married couples.
“Often when they lose their spouse, after a grieving period, they return to bowling for many years. Several new members, some after a contentious divorce, told me with some emotion how welcomed they felt after joining. Some say it’s like finding a new family. The club and the sport postpones, I dare say, death by many years. And those years are happy. How many years is for the medical profession to find out. This club and the others I know in California are ripe for aging research.”
Holmby Park Lawn Bowling Club is located at 646 Comstock Ave., Los Angeles.
For more information, call 310.273.7776 or visit www.losangeleslawnbowling.com.
