Five of the sixteen players in qualifying Squad 7 in the Norwegian Open scored 1340 and higher for their six games Wednesday at Veitvet Bowling Center in Oslo, Norway. Svein Åke Ek (pictured left) won his second consecutive squad with 1457 six-game total and an average of 242.83 en route to leap into second place in the overall qualifying standings.

The Norwegian U23 national team member had games of 225, 277, 229, 258 and 246 and was targeting to beat Ingunn Øien's 1466, but fell nine pins short due to an open - the only open in the series - in the 10th frame of game #6 (222). European Champions Cup winner Øien (right) has posted the tournament high in the very first squad.

Sverre Lund (left), co-owner of Veitvet Bowling Center started his series with a 270 game (double, gutter ball-spare, off the sheet) and tied the tournament high game thus far with 290 in game six en route to jump into fifth place with 1418.

Owe Hermann, all from Norway, was third in Squad 7 and improved his total to 1365 to move into 11th place. Close behind was Troels Schmidt (right), Denmark, who chalked up 1353 including a 290 in game #4 to overtake 12th place.

Next was Team Norway junior Simen Jensen, who currently sits in 13th place with 1340. As the experts in Norway expect the cutoff number close to 1350, Jensen will most probably give it another try.

The Norwegian Open 2007 is the 17th stop of the 2007 European Bowling Tour and one of the Tour's Challenger events. The tournament offers total prize money of 351.000 Norwegian Kronor, approximately 65,250 U.S. Dollar or 45.715 Euro. The winner will receive the 60.000 NOK top prize ($11,150/€7.815).

Qualifying continues on Thursday, Oct. 4, with Squads 8-10 at noon, 4.00 and 8.00 p.m. and runs through Saturday, October 6 with the final Squad 18 scheduled for 8 p.m. local time. (GMT +1). Qualifying will conclude with the one-game Desperado Squad around Midnight.

The top 40 players from the qualifying (cut is currently 1218) will automatically advance to the finals. They will be joined by the top four players from the first weekend (combined standings of squads 1-4) not among the top 40 and the top 4 from the Desperado Squad.

The top 12 earn two byes (cut: 1353), while players ranked 13-24 (cut: 1297) will bypass the first round. The first three rounds of the final consist of four games from scratch with half of the field advancing to the next round.

Once the field is cut to the top 12, players bowl two games from scratch to cut to the top 8, then the top four, who advance to the semi-finals (No. 1 vs. No. 4, No. 2 vs. No. 3). The winners of these one-game matches will bowl for the title and the 60.000 NOK top prize.

Bowlingdigital will cover the event live from Oslo commencing Friday, October 5 all the way through to the finals on Sunday, October 7.