Brian LeClair Leading PBA60 World Championship
Columbus, Ohio – Just over a month ago, Brian LeClair withdrew in the midst of competition at the USBC Super Senior Classic after straining his quad. He didn’t bowl for nearly three weeks and now he is leading qualifying at the PBA60 World Championship, the final event in Wayne Webb’s PBA60 World Series of Bowling.
He came into Sunday’s two rounds of round-robin match play in fifth place. The tall right-hander won all six of his matches to start off his day and added three more wins during the second round to add 270 bonus pins to his overall score. He was able to climb into first place at +813, holding a 173 pin advantage over Amleto Monacelli, who is second at +640. LeClair, Monacelli and Jack Jurek all posted the best match play records at 9-3 and they are sitting in the top three spots on the leaderboard.
“I was watching guys around me, and I was noticing when a ball got to a certain spot on the lane that it would react properly. On the fill ball in the first game, I moved to that spot, and it was a green light for the rest of the morning. I think I played the lanes totally different than anybody else this morning,” the 60-year-old LeClair said. “The first game tonight it was basically the same thing, but I think everybody saw the way I was playing them, and they tried it. I got a feeling on a couple of the pairs the people who tried it probably used too much surface and didn’t play them properly.”
On those pairs, LeClair saw his reaction go away but he kept battling. He was happy to see that look return at the end of the night.
“Luckily the last game, I noticed Amleto had bowled on that pair, and he was playing them like I was, so I moved back to that spot, and it worked,” said LeClair, who shot 259. “Any type of success I have had was playing to the right for the last three years. When I saw that this morning, I thought I would try it, and it worked, luckily for me. It feels great. It has been a long time since I have been up there.”
LeClair has won five senior titles, and the last one came at the 2019 PBA50 South Shore Open. “I am pretty much even keeled. I don’t get too optimistic or too far down. I have a feeling my shot might hold up even better tomorrow,” he said. “I am going to go pray and hope.”
Jurek, who is 10 pins behind Monacelli, made the biggest move of the day going from ninth to third. Behind Jurek is Chris Warren at +625 after he won five matches on the day. Just behind him in fifth is Parker Bohn III at +610. Bohn III won the PBA60 Webb Championship on Thursday and finished second at the PBA60 Roth Championship on Saturday.
The final six games of match play will begin at 11 a.m. Eastern on Monday. The top 5 will then bowl in the stepladder finals at 6 p.m. ET for the chance to win a major title.
You can watch the final day of the PBA60 WSOB on BowlTV.
PBA60 World Championship Match Play Standings (with bonus pins):
- Brian LeClair, 6,413 (+813)
- Amleto Monacelli, 6,240 (+640)
- Jack Jurek, 6,230 (+630)
- Chris Warren, 6,225 (+625)
- Parker Bohn III, 6,210 (+610)
- Pete Weber, 6,164 (+564)
- Lennie Boresch Jr., 6,092 (+492)
- John Burkett, 6,025 (+425)
- Don Breeden, 6,024 (+424)
- Larry Verble, 5,997 (+397)
- Bryan Goebel, 5,965 (+365)
- C K Moore, 5,933 (+333)
- Wayne Webb, 5,909 (+309)
- Bo Goergen, 5,871 (+271)
- Tom Carter, 5,761 (+161)
- Sam Maccarone, 5,755 (+155)
- Skip Pavone, 5,737 (+137)
- Robert Reed Sr., 5,580 (-20)