Squad 1 leader in Doubles at the 2015 Women's World Championships:
L-R Danielle McEwan and Kelly Kulick, United States

Team USA's Danielle McEwan and Kelly Kulick (left, r-l) averaged 236.92 to lead the Doubles qualifying at the Women's World Championships in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, after the 35 duos of Squad 1 have completed their six-game block on the short lane conditioning pattern (36 ft. Los Angeles).

With the 35 duos of Squad 2 yet to bowl the qualifying round, the Americans sit atop the leaderboard with 2843, including 1437 by Kulick and 1406 by McEwan. McEwan is currently second in All-Events with 4080, trailing her team mate Liz Johnson (4153) by 73 pins after 18 od 24 games.

McEwan/Kulick rolled games of 485, 485, 453, 433, 505 and 482 to lead Denmark's Mai Ginge Jensen and Britt Brøndsted (above, r-l) by 31 pins. The Danes finished their 2812 series (234.33) with 513 and 512 to leap into second place.

Brøndsted posted the field-best 1455 series, an average of 242.50, including high games of 279, 258 and 257, and Jensen added 1357.

There was a bigger gap between second and third place as Nadine Geissler and Birgit Pöppler (left, l-r) of Germany were 83 pins behind Denmark with 2729 (227.42). The Germany led the field after four games with 1815 (432, 459, 479 and 515), but fell behind due to 351 in game 5. They rebounded with 493 to move into third place.

The score to beat to make the cut to the top 4 for the medal round is 2693 or an average of 224.42 set by Malaysia's Natasha Roslan and Sin Li Jane (right, r-l). The other 31 doubles in squad 1 were eliminated.

After winning two gold, two silver and two bronze medals yesterday, the players from Korea and Singapore were in the center of interest at Khalifa International Bowling Center in Abu Dhabi.

New Hui Fen and Jazreel Tan (left, r-l) of Singapore missed the top 4 by eight pins in fifth place with 2686. Korea's Kim Jinsun and Baek Seungja (right, r-l) who were on the team that won the gold medal in Trios, were further nine pins behind in sixth place with 2677 with Sweden's Ida Andersson and Rebecka Larsen (below left, r-l) in seventh place with 2668.

Venezuela's Joan Gonzalez and Alicia Marcano (right, r-l) had a slow start into the event but made a late charge to finish in eighth place with 2622. in the fourth game, the duo missed the Championship record for one game (556 - Carolyn Dorin-Ballard, Kelly Kulick, USA, 2011) by just 10 pins posting the highest game of the squad with 546 (Gonzalez 277, Marcano 269).

Despite changing the lanes, Gonzalez (right) carried the momentum into the fifth game and reeled off twelve consecutive strikes for the first 300 game of the Championships and the 12th in the history of the World Championships.

There could not be a better place for an athlete to achieve perfection for the first time in the career than at a World Championship.

The top 4 have to sit and wait for the results of squad 2. The top four doubles at the end of the preliminaries will advance to the medal round which is scheduled to start on Thursday at 6 p.m. Gulf Standard Time (GST) with the semi-finals (No. 1 bowls No. 4 and No. 2 meets No. 3).

The winners will bowl for gold and silver while the losers both receive bronze.