Life in the fast lane

Seven women with seven straws sip a pink, sand - bucket-size cocktail. They nosh on Buffalo wings, nachos, and egg rolls. They can hardly hear one another over the pounding dance music. It's dark. They're wearing designer jeans and sleeveless blouses and . . . bowling shoes?

Welcome to Ladies Night at Kings Back Bay, a nightclub that puts a new spin on an old sport. Forget Pabst Blue Ribbon and Old Milwaukee. At Kings you drink white wine or a mojito while waiting for your turn to bowl at one of the 16 lanes. The dress code is more Marc Jacobs than Munsingwear, and instead of cheap orange plastic the club's decor features leather and polished wood. Think of it as ``The Big Lebowski" meets ``The Devil Wears Prada."

The girls are at Kings to celebrate South Boston native Colleen Hartnett's 26th birthday. They were planning to come to Kings anyway -- one of Hartnett's friends recommended it -- but when they heard the club offered free lane time to women every Tuesday night, it became an offer they couldn't refuse.

``It's something silly to watch your friends do," says Hartnett's friend Kate Barber, 25, also from South Boston. Barber, who wears white linen pants and a white top, looks like the nurse she is in real life. ``This is only my third time in about five years, as you can tell by my score." The computer screen by the ball return rack shows a ``3" next to Barber's name. She takes her bowling ball from the rack, hefts it in two hands, and walks awkwardly toward the lane, gathering speed as she nears the line and releases the ball. It rolls lazily down the middle of the lane, as everyone watches in expectation, and hits the topmost pin -- the ``king pin" -- with enough force to send all the rest flying into the pit: a strike.

``Hey!" everyone yells together. An ``X" appears on the computer screen in the slot for Barber's fourth frame.

Back at the snack table, Barber talks about the upcoming Professional Bowlers Association tour, which holds its first event of the 2006-07 season Oct. 22-29 in Wauwatosa, Wis. For the first time in the PBA's 48-year history, a woman, Kelly Kulick of Union, N.J., has won a full-season exemption, meaning that she's automatically qualified for each of the season's 20 events. She's the Danica Patrick of bowling.

``If Kulick were on TV, I'd probably watch," Barber says. ``I don't know a single [serious] female bowler." Barber admits she's never watched bowling on TV before. ``The closest I've come is watching [the 1996 film] `Kingpin.' "

``Kingpin" was about an Amish farm boy trying to win a bowling championship. It was almost as difficult for Kulick to crack the PBA elite. Only two other women have qualified for individual PBA events since the league began admitting women in 2004, and neither took home a first-place trophy. Kulick's aiming to be the first.

``It's a challenging game for women; the ball is so heavy," says Kwan Lee, who's bowling a ``string" -- bowling lingo for a single 10-frame game -- at Kings with her friend (Lee leads 67 to 54 in the ninth frame). Lee came to Kings to take advantage of Ladies Night. She says she wouldn't normally consider bowling on a Tuesday night.

``Who would want to do that?" she says, laughing. ``I have work in the morning!"

Like Barber, Lee says that having Kulick in the competition might change her negative attitude toward televised bowling.

Reached by telephone, Kulick said she supports promotions, such as Ladies Night, intended to bring more women into the sport. ``Professional bowling is still a male-dominated sport," Kulick says. ``On the recreational level, everyone competes -- men, women, children, families -- but the PBA is different. So I think anything that makes women feel more comfortable competing against men is good."

Kings started its Ladies Night a year ago to take advantage of what general manager Joshua Rossmeisl calls the growing popularity of bowling among women. Rossmeisl says birthday and bachelorette parties now constitute a big part of the club's business. ``If we don't get five to 10 bachelorette parties in a given week, I'm shocked," Rossmeisl says.

Kings plans to expand Ladies Night next month. Options under discussion include lane-side massages and tarot card readings, and hiring more male servers. ``We're basically going to offer some more services to break up the night, so it isn't just bowling," Rossmeisl says. He predicts it will be Kings' ``biggest promotion ever."

Even without masseuses or fortune tellers, the girls at Kings on Tuesday night seem to be enjoying themselves. Hartnett, the birthday girl, grabs her ball and heads to the lane. She wears a long white shirt and jeans. The speaker system blasts Rick James's ``Super Freak." Hartnett arcs her arm back, swings it forward, and releases the ball. About midway down the lane, the ball starts fading left. It nearly goes into the gutter but clips the left-most pin at the last moment.

``I got one!" Hartnett shouts triumphantly, then heads back to join her friends at the giant pink cocktail.

Michael Hardy can be reached at michael.hardy@globe.com.