When a bowler says they "spared," they mean they knocked down the remaining pins with their second ball and finished the frame with all ten down. In other words, they made a spare. "I spared the 10 pin," "she spared every frame," and "he spared out" (got spares in every remaining frame) are all common at the lanes.
How a spare is scored
A spare is worth 10 points plus whatever you knock down with your next ball. If you spare in frame 3 and roll a 7 on the first ball of frame 4, frame 3 is worth 17. It's marked with a slash (/) in the second box of the frame.
That bonus is why sparing matters so much. A game of all spares with a 9 on every first ball scores 190. See how spares work for the full arithmetic, or try it on the score calculator.
Related phrases
- Open frame: the opposite of sparing. Pins are left standing after both balls.
- Clean game: a game with a strike or spare in every frame, no open frames.
- Fill ball: the extra ball in the tenth frame after a spare.
- Picked up / converted: other ways of saying you made the spare.
How to spare more often
- Use a spare system. Moving your feet a set number of boards for each pin takes guesswork out of it. The 3-6-9 system is the classic.
- Throw a straight ball at corner pins. A plastic spare ball ignores the oil and goes where you aim.
- Practice the common leaves. The 10 pin, 7 pin and 3-6-10 come up constantly. Our free Spare Challenge game drills ten classic leaves.
Most bowlers can raise their average faster by sparing more than by striking more. A bowler who converts nearly every single-pin spare will beat a streaky striker over a season.