Kacey Smith and his wife, Wannita, share a love for cricket.

He played in high school and in league cricket for Somerset Bridge and she loves to watch – preferring it to football.

Now the pair have poured their passion for the game into a business venture. In January they opened The Lab, a cricket simulator, on the ground floor of 2 Midsea Lane, Pembroke.

“Lab stands for learning about batting,” Mrs Smith explained.

The simulator has several purposes.

“It is for recreation, cricket play and training,” Mrs Smith said. “It can bowl at various speeds and bounces. We have different balls but not the real cricket balls, to protect the facility.”

There is even a virtual-reality option.

“The Lab is a family-friendly place,” Mrs Smith said. “So far, we have seen cricketers who are just learning to play, leading cricketers coming in for training and lots of young people.”

They hosted a birthday party for the first time last weekend.

The couple were inspired to start the Lab after visiting a cricket simulator in England.

“The place had food and beverages on offer,” Mr Smith said. “We came back to Bermuda and were thinking about the scope of cricket here.”

He said access to fields for cricket practice could be limited in Bermuda.

“Cricket in Bermuda is four months out of the year, whereas football is eight months,” he said. “There is only one place that is for cricket all-year around and that is at Bailey’s Bay.”

The simulator is meant to bridge the gap.

Set up with a computer to provide variation, the machine can bowl anywhere from 2mph to 85mph.

“On the field, the bowler is not always going to put the ball in the same place every time,” Mr Smith said. “This allows you to get that virtual training and gets you ready for a real game.”

The simulator allows the cricketer to hit the ball over and over again.

“Many great cricketers are hitting 500 to 1,000 balls a day,” Mr Smith said.

For the Smiths, the biggest challenge to setting up The Lab has been getting the word out to the masses.

They need to grow awareness quickly to keep the venture viable. "But we are remaining steadfast because we see the simulator’s value,” Mr Smith said.

“It’s good for training but also for entertainment value. People can come in with their friends, have a little knock and talk some trash,” he said.

The couple run The Lab in their spare time. Mr Smith works during the day at Tynes Bay Waste Treatment Facility and optometrist Mrs Smith runs Spexx clinic in Hamilton.

Mr Smith said that between running the business and working at his job, he did not have a lot of time to use the simulator himself.

“I get a session in here and there,” he said.

In a party situation, The Lab can arrange catering but they do not offer food and drink for normal sessions at the moment.

“In the future we would like to set up some kind of café,” Mr Smith said.

The simulator costs $25 per 30-minute block for a single person, and $90 for groups up to three.