VEAZIE – Like many bowlers, Derek Michaud began when he was young.

“I started when I was 8,” the 21-year-old said. “My dad took me, and I’ve been hooked ever since.”

But unlike most others, Michaud bowls with challenges – not simply the demands of improving his game, but with cerebral palsy and a visual impairment in his right eye.

He began with candlepins at the Bangor-Brewer Bowling Lanes. Then his dad took him to Heritage Bowling Center in Hermon, “for something different, to expand me a little bit.”

Initially, he said, he was “a little skeptical, I guess,” but, “we went, and it was a lot of fun. I loved it.” But Michaud sees no limitations to his bowling game.

“Work with what you’ve been given in life,” he said. “Make that work for you.”

For instance, because of his visual impairment, he stands as close to the foul line as possible, he explained, “so I can see the arrows in the lanes, and not work so much on an approach.”

The impediments do affect his bowling style, he said.

“I don’t have as much leg power because of my cerebral palsy,” Michaud said, so he uses a one-step approach to the lane instead of four or five steps. “If the cerebral palsy has any effect at all, it’s that I can’t really throw it as hard as I’d like. I throw with a backup spin to my ball.”

Despite the difficulties, he finds appeal in bowling, which he said “gives me the chance to meet a lot of people.

“I like the competition. I like to go out and win every tournament I can,” Michaud said. “I like the fact it’s something you got to work at. I have a goal I am working towards – to bowl in the Professional Bowling Association.”

He practices a lot to meet that goal – three times a week, starting with a three-game set, then a break, then another three-game set, for a total of up to four hours a day.

“I try to bowl as many games as I can,” Michaud said. Another goal is to bowl a perfect 300 game of all strikes.

“I’ve shot a 251,” he said. “It amazes me that I have cerebral palsy and I can bang out a 200 game.”

After Michaud finishes with the junior league this year at the Heritage, his plans are to go to adult leagues and bowl big tournaments.

“I am confident that I can compete at a high level,” he said, adding that he continues to improve his game.

He had the opportunity to see some of his heroes in action.

In 1999, he discovered the U.S. Open would be held in Milford, Conn. When he found out, he told his dad, “We’ve got to go, if at all possible. We looked into it, and we went.”

They drove down on a Friday, spent the night at his uncle’s, and drove to the center Saturday morning.

Some of the bowlers he met included Jason Couch, Marshall Holman, Pete Weber and Danny Wiseman.

“I talked to Jason Couch quite a bit,” he said.

Michaud introduced himself to Couch, saying that he was the “biggest PBA fan you’ll ever meet” and talked to the professionals like they were his best friends. He even got a couple of e-mail addresses.

A career highlight came in 1999. He had heard of Special Olympics candlepin bowling in the state, but he was more interested in Special Olympics tenpin bowling.

He talked to his Special Olympics coach, Carol Ryan, and asked if there was “any way I could find a tenpin tournament.”

She looked into it, and told him there was room for another tenpin bowler for the World Games in Raleigh, N.C.

The experience of practice, preliminaries and finals in a 21-game tournament made for a great time, Michaud said.

Like any other athlete, he’d like to have done better in the contest, and hopes to get the chance.

“If I ever get another chance to go to the World Games, I need to go, to redeem myself,” he said.