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Episodes 3 & 4: Bowen Kerins, part 1 & 2

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·22m 12s·analyzed·Nov 8, 2016
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TL;DR

Bowen Kerins on pinball mastery, Pinburgh growth, and competitive psychology.

Summary

Jeff Teolis interviews Bowen Kerins, one of the world's greatest pinball players and IFPA member #2, across two podcast segments. Topics include Bowen's 24-hour championship victory, his Patreon-supported tutorial video process, his role developing Pinburgh (now 700+ players), his PAPA championship wins, and his competitive philosophy emphasizing mental discipline and diverse machine mastery. Bowen discusses his appearance on 'Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,' his home collection (World Cup Soccer and Simpsons), and his advice for competitive improvement.

Key Claims

  • Bowen won the 24-hour championship in Connecticut on the broadcast date

    high confidence · Jeff opens: 'you just won the 24-hour championship in Connecticut. How hard was that to stay awake and even win?'

  • Pinburgh started in 2011 with 173 players in the first year and grew to 700 by recent years

    high confidence · Bowen: 'First year, we got 173 players...Then we got 273 players. Then we got 400 players...700 the last couple of years'

  • Pinburgh uses 280 different pinball machines for the tournament

    high confidence · Bowen: 'We now use 280 pinball machines in Pidberg. Almost all of them are different physical models.'

  • 2016 Pinburgh had more attendance than a Hillary Clinton rally held at the same venue

    high confidence · Jeff: 'This event was huge...there was also in the same convention center a Hillary Clinton rally, and Pinberg dwarfed it.' Bowen: 'That is correct. We had more people than the Clinton rally.'

  • Bowen won $32,000 on 'Who Wants to Be a Millionaire' after deliberating for five minutes on a question about Jack Benny vs W.C. Fields

    high confidence · Bowen discusses his appearance, stating he went for the question and was correct, with the five-minute deliberation being shown on air.

  • Bowen has won PAPA three times, with his most recent PAPA 16 victory including family present

    high confidence · Bowen: 'I've won Papa now three times, but this last one was the only one that I've been able to celebrate with my family.'

  • Bowen did not learn to nudge a machine until age 17

    high confidence · Bowen: 'I never even learned to nudge a machine until I was 17, and only by being exposed to other players who were doing those skills.'

Notable Quotes

  • “Your sentences, your paragraphs, all the things you try to say and do just start failing you a little bit.”

    Bowen Kerins @ Early in part 1 — Describes physical/mental degradation during the 24-hour championship tournament

  • “The risk-reward element in pinball is huge, and it can make the difference between winning and losing.”

    Bowen Kerins @ Mid part 1 — Core competitive philosophy and analytical approach to game strategy

  • “I think that pinball had a lot to do with my success on that show, believe it or not, because I was ready for a very competitive situation.”

    Bowen Kerins @ Part 1, 'Who Wants to Be a Millionaire' discussion — Connects pinball competitive experience to real-world competitive performance

  • “I will play the uppers or I'll play the downers in my headphones. If I feel like my energy level is right and my brain is on target and I'm not feeling nervous, then I tend to go without headphones.”

    Bowen Kerins @ Part 2 — Reveals pre-game mental preparation techniques using curated playlists

  • “The advice I have is to play events where you're playing against people who are better than you.”

    Bowen Kerins @ End of part 2 — Key advice for skill development in competitive pinball

Entities

Bowen KerinspersonJeff TeolispersonPinburgheventPAPA (Poppin' Amusement Parks Association)organizationReplayFXeventKeith ElwinpersonAdam BeckerpersonJim Belsitoperson

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Patreon-funded tutorial video series where community votes on game selection; each tutorial requires 10-20 games of filming to produce 10-30 minute instructional content

    high · Bowen: 'With Patreon now, the game is selected by the fans...depending on what game it is, we may have to film 10 or 20 games worth of play'

  • ?

    event_signal: Pinburgh tournament grew from 173 players (2011) to 700+ by 2016, becoming larger than PAPA headquarters could accommodate; moved to Pittsburgh Convention Center

    high · Bowen: 'First year, we got 173 players...400 players...by the fourth year it had outgrown the largest facility in the country...Now two years later we had it for two years at the Pittsburgh Convention Center'

  • ?

    community_signal: Pittsburgh established as significant pinball tournament hub with ReplayFX attracting thousands of attendees beyond Pinburgh competitors

    high · Bowen: 'There are way more people who come for ReplayFX than come for Pinberg...thousands of other people coming through to play the other free-playing machines, the concerts, the speakers'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Machine diversity is key test of true competitive mastery; winners must excel on electromechanicals, older machines, and modern Sterns across different playfield layouts

    high · Bowen: 'The winner of the event becomes someone who has diversified and understands how to play all areas. And you see the champions at Pinnberg...all of them are players who are experts on all areas'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Classic machines (pre-1985) valued for demanding shot-making skills; newer games like Game of Thrones and AC/DC praised for minimal shot count but excellent rules design

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.067

0:00
Time for another Pinball Profile. I'm your host, Jeff Teolas. To find out previous interviews and follow us on Facebook, go to Pinball Profile. We're also on Twitter, at Pinball Profile. Today we're talking to one of the greatest players in the world, Bowen Cairns. Hey Bowen, how are you doing? I'm recovering. You say that because, I know what you just did, you just won the 24-hour championship in Connecticut. How hard was that to stay awake and even win? It was really amazing to figure out how your body screws up in your mind over time. Your sentences, your paragraphs, all the things you try to say and do just start failing you a little bit. I hope 24 was one of the games you played. I mean, you basically were Jack Bauer of pinball.
0:49
Unfortunately, we did not have a 24, and it really makes me sad. But also it was Daylight Savings Time change day. So I thought we really should have had 25 hours, but every single person played the entire night. Nobody gave up. I'll be back in a few hours.
1:10
Everybody kept going. Nobody passed out either. Bowen, joining us on Pinball Profile right now. We've seen the videos for years on Papa TV. Now through Patreon, which you can subscribe to for a small monthly fee. What is the process of filming these video tutorials? One of my favorites, by the way, is the shadow. It's great how you show the different strategies and the points to go with each, but it's terrible because I can't do the proper one.
1:32
The process for making the tutorials is simpler than it seems. With Patreon now, the game is selected by the fans, and I have to learn sometimes a little bit about what I want to do during the game. So before we play, we have a plan of what we want to show, and then we have to make sure that that happens during the gameplay. So depending on what game it is, we may have to film 10 or 20 games worth of play. Sometimes we get it right the first time, believe it or not. And sometimes we film more than one game and show all the games, but we try to do it within one single game because we've noticed that people don't want to watch hour-plus-long tutorials. 10 minutes, 20 minutes, 30 minutes is best. And I'd say that it's tough to get everything across while still talking your way through the entire game. Well, and as a math wizard, does it come into play when you're calculating risky shots versus rewards? Actually, yes. That's the one place where an analytical mind has a big advantage. The risk-reward element in pinball is huge, and it can make the difference between winning and losing. When I was playing a 24-hour battle, that was the analytical side was the first thing to go.
Zach Sharpperson
Lymanperson
Doug Polkaperson
Simpsons Pinball Partygame
World Cup Soccergame
Flash Gordongame
Who Wants to Be a Millionaireevent
Nancy (Bowen's wife)person
ESPN Magazinemedia
California Extremeevent
Hillary Clintonperson

high · Bowen: 'a lot of amazing pinball machines were made before 1985, perhaps most of them...Recently, Game of Thrones has only a few shots, and yet it's still very satisfying'

  • ?

    community_signal: Bowen uses curated Spotify playlists ('uppers' for fast games, 'downers' for slow games) to regulate mental/physical pace during competitive play

    high · Bowen: 'I have two playlists that are called uppers and downers...depending on what game I'm playing, I will play the uppers or I'll play the downers in my headphones'

    • 2:50
    Like, don't shoot that, you moron. That was so stupid. But yes, as you're playing, you start to realize what it is you can do, what it is you can do repeatedly, what it is you're willing to take a risk on. And I think that's one aspect that's kept me really interested in pinball for 25 to 30 years now is being able to think through every new game, find out new information about old games that changed the way you think about the internet. Even games like Adam's Family. I play Adam's Family differently now than I did 10 years ago. Another math question, Bowen. How much percentage do you feel on newer games is needed for knowledge of the game rules versus actual flipper skills? Yeah, I think it's just very different from machine to machine. There are certain machines where the explanation of how to play the machine can be 30 seconds or less, like Hot Tip, great game. You can explain to somebody what to do within 30 seconds, and then they're off. In that case, a flipper skill definitely takes precedence. Even particular flipper skills at times can take precedence. Then you get to do more complicated games, and I love them, like Simpsons or Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones. And the explanation of how to play the game can take many pages of text or an hour-long video. And then to be able to take that into a live scenario where you have to make staff decisions, that is a place where I love it. I love having to make those strategic decisions on the fly. And I can definitely see tournaments that I've won and lost because of making good or bad decisions in those moments. This is Pinball Profile. I'm Jeff Teels. We're talking with Bowen Cairns, IFPA member number two of now 45,000 and growing. A former number one player in the world. And I've told you this before. I'd say you'd be challenging for the number one again. But for my favorite tourney, the Pinberg match play, you choose not to participate. That is a huge sacrifice for you personally to bring so many players like myself such great joy. Oh, thank you. It's an honor to be able to do that along with the crew at the Poppin' Replay Foundation. In maybe 2006, 2007, I started poking them a little bit, asking them about match play because they were one of the few places that had enough pinball machines that could actually pull off a match play of the size that they have now. For 2011, I got a chance to help run the very first pin merge. I said, well, we'll see what happens. We'll see what we get. We'll see if it grows and see if people like it. First year, we got 173 players. It was way bigger than we thought. Then we got 273 players. Then we got 400 players. And by the fourth year it had outgrown the largest facility in the country that hosts pinball tournaments the Pampa headquarters Now two years later we had it for two years at the Pittsburgh Convention Center along with the ReplayFX, which people don't quite understand about ReplayFX. There are way more people who come for ReplayFX than come for Pinberg. Even though if you're there for Pinberg, you spend so much time over there, you might not notice that there are thousands of other people coming through to play the other free-playing machines, the concerts, the speakers. And it's a big event for the city of Pittsburgh. That is one of the things I'm really excited for, is that you're getting exposure for signal and arcade games to a larger audience that would never have played. Let's put things into perspective for those who weren't at Pinberg last year in 2016. This event was huge, bigger than a football field in my opinion, and there was also in the same convention center a Hillary Clinton rally, and Pinberg dwarfed it. That is correct. We had more people than the Clinton rally. They were lining up for the rally. I saw some kids in the lineup area pointing out that, hey, there's this giant thing over there that I'd much rather be at.
    6:42
    So some families came over afterward. It was kind of a hilarious coincidence that those two things happened. We even had a costume contest at the time, and the organizers put up a poster promising that Dougie Kong could be running for president. And Dougie Kong is a far more capable leader, potentially, because he's been standing on the same platform for over 30 years. And finally for this segment, we're going to talk more with Bowen in a second. Who once said they'd like to see this on their epitaph? I'd rather be in Philadelphia. I'm going to have to take a 50-50 on this one. All right. Jack Benny or W.C. Fields, who is it? Oh, geez. Are you going to pay me $16,000? Well, here's the thing. This is the question you got on who wants to be a millionaire, and you did get it correct. Did you know the answer, or was it really a coin flip? Because you won $32,000 for it. I did not know the answer. It was better than a coin flip in that I had heard the phrase before. I actually thought the answer was Mark Twain. Thankfully, none of the choices were Mark Twain on that question. This was a place where I had $16,000 banked, and getting the next question right is $32,000 guaranteed. But getting it wrong meant losing $15,000 that was already in my bank. If I just say, I give up, goodbye. So sitting there and having to decide whether it was worth taking a 60%, 70% chance of getting it right versus taking the money and getting out. It took five minutes of thinking to make that choice. And afterwards, I was talking with Nancy, who's now my wife. We were just dating at the time. And my family, who was there, said, you know, sitting there, it took too long, and I didn't win that much money, and I'm sure they're just going to cut all that up. Another person on the same show won $125,000. They showed the whole thing. They showed all five minutes of me sitting there, not goofing off, but just sitting there debating, trying to weasel my way out, did not have to answer the question. And I went for it, and it was correct. So it was a big moment. I think that pinball had a lot to do with my success on that show, believe it or not, because I was ready for a very competitive situation. There were nine other people there who were trying to get on stage, and they were smarter than me. They had experience with Jeopardy. They were geniuses. But they were also talking about being on TV. They were talking about having the opportunity to win a million dollars. All for me, it was like, okay, I'm going to be asked to put Schwarzenegger in the right order. Then it happened, and I was able to do it faster than the others. So the instincts as well as the ability to compartmentalize the situational aspects, that's very large in competitive play. To be able to block your mind off from that you're playing for $10,000 or a trophy or that this is the moment where you must shoot the lock or die. Those are the things that over the years I've developed a skill at being able to block that out and just do the right thing. A true competitor. And once again, the math comes in. 1,000, 32,000. Well, I can't give you 32,000, but you'll come back for part two of Pinball Profile. This is part two of our Pinball Profile with Bowen Cairns. I'm Jeff Teolis. 2016, what a great year for you so far. Earlier you had two classic wins at PAPA to go along with your three previous PAPA championship wins. That was a good run, finishing top ten in all of the PAPA tournaments this year. Oh, thanks. It's hard to feel very happy about it, only because you always feel the disappointment of your losses. But I was fourth in the circuit final, and then first, fourth, and first in the three classics. So I had never made the final four in all three classics. Classics tournaments, usually at least up until about five years ago, were events that I did the worst in at PAPA. Well, and recently you were featured in ESPN, the magazine, along with other pinball greats. First, how great was that to be included in the magazine? And secondly, how glad were you that it wasn't the ESPN body issue? Well, it could have been the ESPN body issue. Yeah, I stand to lose a little, a lot. But it was very interesting being part of that shoot and interview. The photos they had us take were stand around, pretend you're playing the machine, pretend you're in the zone in the moment, just playing your best. Which is what all pinball players do. Of course. I think they were very impressed with how sporting it was I think they were not expecting to see a real competition and they did Well, I want to talk about Pinberg a little bit. You're the tournament director, and this tournament started off a few hundred and then 400 in 2014, 700 the last couple of years. I know you're shocked to see the growth. Do you see it getting even bigger? I do. Doug Polka is the official tournament director. I often make the only announcements. So many people assume I'm the tournament director, but Doug, who has run many events local in Pittsburgh, is the actual tournament director. I'm the assistant to the tournament director or assistant tournament director, depending on how important my job is. But I definitely think that it can grow, but the problem of making it grow any larger is the physical availability of machines. We now use 280 pinball machines in Pidberg. Almost all of them are different physical models. And the Papa Collection also has actively tried to only have one, two, or three of some machines, and then the ones that they don't use for the tournament, they use for the floor at ReplayFX. So there are lots of physical limits on the number of machines that are available to us. In order to grow the event, they would need to acquire more machines or loan machines from individuals, and then there are concerns about how good you can make them. I think that they've done an amazing job of having the games they use be in tip-top condition. I think that people recognize what an undertaking it is, but the detail level and the subtleties and the ways things are organized in order to make things go on time and continue is one of the parts that I have enjoyed greatly about developing this event and format and helping pop around it. No question, Bowen. There are so many great people behind this that make it really come across as seamless. Why I like this tournament the best, it's the head-to-head play, the variety of the games, and mainly that you're playing different era of games in each round. Do you think this is a better test to see who's the best than other tournaments that may only feature newer machines? I think it definitely exposes you to recognize first that a lot of amazing pinball machines were made before 1985, perhaps most of them. And this tournament does a good job of ensuring that whoever wins is going to be an expert at those areas of machines beyond the current sterns or anything produced with that matrix. For myself, I started getting better on initially on games like Earthshaker and Whirlwind and Funhaus, Add a Family, Elvira, games where shot making is the number one most important skill. I never even learned to nudge a machine until I was 17, and only by being exposed to other players who were doing those skills. You take that skill set to Target Pool, and you're going to get killed. Because Target Pool is all about nudging the machine and controlling the angles, understanding the different flipper size and what that means. That's a completely different skill set than being able to play on Funhaus. But Finberg is now going to reward the same player equally for killing Target Pool and for killing Funhaus. And you end up with players in the finals who you might not have initially thought of when you think of the best players in the world because you get players who are experts on older machines, on electromechanicals in particular. I think that then the winner of the event becomes someone who has diversified and understands how to play all areas. And you see the champions at Pinnberg. You see Keith Elwin, Adam Becker, Jim Belsito, Zach Sharp, and you recognize that all of them are players who are experts on all areas of the machine. What is your favorite game or maybe one that you've played the most? It's really hard to pick a single favorite machine because of the different area aspects. I think that one of the games I've grown in appreciation for over the years is Flash Gordon from Valley in the early 80s. Frankly, that game was intimidating. It crushed me and continues to be a really difficult game. I guess I'm finding that games where you have a difficulty with the mastery, or maybe it's impossible to master because the game is just that hard, those are the ones that I keep coming back to. The two games I have at home are World Cup Soccer and Simpsons Pinball Party. The World Cup in particular is an excellent game for both beginners and experts. There is enough to do that a person who's never even played pinball before can walk up and understand something to do and then can achieve it and feel a satisfaction in play. And then Simpsons, you can play for 45 minutes and still not see everything there is to do in that game. Two of the greatest games for sure. You know, I had a friend come over and play World Cup 94 at my place, and he said, that's only three shots. I said, whoa, whoa, whoa. Bolin said that final draw shot is maybe one of the hardest in all of pinball.
    16:01
    Guys, there's at least four shots on that game. Come on. But that's a testament to the quality of rules design also, that you can have a game that has relatively few shots, but still is very satisfying. So more recently, Game of Thrones has only a few shots, and yet it's still very satisfying. Even ACDC doesn't have that many shots, and yet the design and the rules are varied and interesting to the point where you recognize there's a lot to do in there. I've seen you sometimes with and without headphones. Do you use this to block out distractions? Do you prefer headphones or not Mostly I used headphones in situations where I feel nervous and I recognized that my nerves are keeping me from playing optimally The other times I use headphones is where I feel that my brain is either running a little slow or a little fast compared to what I want for the game I'm playing. What I mean by that is that some games encourage a very fast style of play like Shadow you mentioned. Other games encourage you to play much slower delivered pace and they can be older machines where they can even be games like as family that is a kind of a plodding methodical type of play compared to shadow where the ball is just flying all over the place so i have two playlists that are called uppers and downers and they have songs that are built for either making you get pumped up the type of things you would expect at a sports arena crowd to be played during timeouts or between innings and then the downers are like things you would fall asleep to So depending on what game I'm playing, I will play the uppers or I'll play the downers in my headphones. If I feel like my energy level is right and my brain is on target and I'm not feeling nervous, then I tend to go without headphones. So if you see me with headphones, it means I'm either nervous or I'm choosing to try and control how fast my pace is on a machine. Bowen, there's been a lot of victories in your career. I just wonder if there's one that's your favorite. It was an honor to win at Papa 16, mainly because my wife and son were there. I've won Papa now three times, but this last one was the only one that I've been able to celebrate with my family. Outside of Pinberg and Papa, is there a favorite tourney that you enjoy playing in? I had a wonderful time this past weekend at the 24-hour final battle in Connecticut. I can't pick out a single specific tournament I greatly enjoyed, mainly because the quality of the tournaments overall has increased vastly from between now and, I'd say, 10 years ago. I've had really good times playing at the IFBA Championship. I'm one of the organizers at California Extreme, so I should be saying that, but honestly, being an organizer and a player at the same time is very harrowing, and I tend not to have much fun while at that event. Finally, is there one tip outside of learning the rule set that you could give somebody to work on their skills? Yes. The advice I have is to play events where you're playing against people who are better than you. I think that some players, when they come to an event like Pinberg, they get intimidated, and then they end up losing because they're thinking about a lot of things that are outside their control. And until you play events where you're playing against the best, it's easy to bring your mind to those feelings where you're not playing pinball anymore. You're thinking about why someone else got three jackpots or how you absolutely must shoot the shot right now. All these are things that are outside your control, and they're the things that drive you to not play your best. The very first time I won Papa, I got lucky in that I had so little experience that I didn't know that I should have been nervous. and I basically lucked my way into winning the world championship. But I've tried to reset my brain to that level of naivete when it comes to playing in final rounds or playing for cash. Training your brain to do things naturally and without thought is very important to success. I think that's the type of thing that particular pro athletes do very well, like NBA shooters. They just don't think while they're shooting. They just go. Whether it's a free throw to win a championship game or the 90th shot they made in practice, they're trying to make those things feel exactly the same. And if you can train your brain to do that, great. But I don't think people can train their brains to do that without running through the gauntlet of experience. It's funny you say that about lucking into it. You know, the one big tournament I won was the Buffalo Pinball Summer Open Classics Tournament, and I squeaked into that. and everybody that was in was way better than me. So I thought, I've got nothing to lose. I'm just going to play, and it was a good mindset. Yeah, when I went to Papa Four, my plan was to play as best I could, but also to watch the best of the world, because I had been learning so much over the past year from meeting players and playing them in California that I wanted to see how Lyman played. I wanted to see how the best were. And then all of a sudden I made the finals, and I was beside them. My reaction to that was just like, all right, I'm going to win some cash. I'm going to just have a good time here. And that attitude is, I think it's hard to keep that attitude when you're at a tournament and you realize, oh, yeah, I was supposed to be nervous during that time. So anything I can do now to reduce the nerves or do something stupid or having my family with me has been a great joy. but you'll see me drinking slow-breeze or listening to dumb music. There are lots of ways, but they're all designed to bring back the joy that should be in pinball when competitive aspects are all pushing you to not be happy. Well, Bowen, thank you very much for doing this. It's been a pleasure to talk to you once again. Sure, absolutely. Thanks a lot, Jeff. This has been your Pinball Profile with Bowen Cairns. You can follow us on Facebook and Twitter at Pinball Profile. I'm Jeff Teolas.
    22:07
    Get down to life Well, all right