Aquatic Billiards

This just found it's way onto my browser, and now I must present to you all, just in case you haven't seen it:

Easy Trickshot Video

Here's a short crappy vid of me shooting a 4-in-1 trickshot. Not the usual 4-in-a-row that most people start with though; this one is a little more challenging. But since I like to think I have a decent draw stroke, this is a lot of fun.

Great Safety Battle

This is one of the best safety battles I have ever seen.  It's during the 2nd rack of the match - and it is impressive.

The World Pool Masters = Alex Pagulayan vs Raj Hundal

Videotape Yourself For Analysis

Monday night XY and I hit up the pool hall, this time with my old video camera in tow.  We've been talking about videoing ourselves for a while to see what our strokes actually look like from a distance and whatnot.  I set it up in a corner and just left it there.  We played for about 2.5 hours with it running.  Although neither of us really played well, it was still informative to go back and watch it. 

Upon first viewing and after getting past the horror that is watching yourself, it became pretty informative.  It turns out, that despite my sincerest efforts my elbow is not perpendicular to the cue, it's about 5-10 degrees further away from my body then the butt-end of the cue is.  Although my stroke is pretty dang straight, I do want to fix this.  I wonder if this is the cause for those slight errors I continually make, when everything else looks and feels right.

I was nice to get a couple really nice shots on tape though.  This one which I have never tried before.  I didn't feel confident going the other ways to get on the 9 and this idea just came to me when I was looking at it.  I'm actually quite surprised I got it all the way around, but was very happy to watch my plan unfold. I'm not 100% on the exact positions shown here, but this is the general idea.  My draw stroke is pretty strong and because the balls were so close I didn't have to worry too much about deflections on the cue causing a problem.

A few racks later, after a long safety battle and a few missed attempts, I found myself at the table with this layout.  Again, relying on my strong draw skills, I got down, lined up and fired.  The cue ball took a hard right-turn and went right into the 9.  The right-english helped throw the 9 into the pocket and I was very happy. :)

 

 

At some point, I will video myself doing some drills and whatnot just for archival/reference sake - and at some further point in the future, I'll get one of those "Dazzle" things that will let me transfer the vids to the computer so I can upload them.

The first rack of the night was the most entertaining.  My first "Golden Break" in over 3 weeks, and it's on video. lol

I tried to study my break form as well, I'm getting good action on the balls and when I hit it properly the cueball is generally in the center-ish part of the table.  Too often though, I hit it with bottom and it comes flying back towards the corner pocket.  Doesn't scratch, but doesn't leave much of a shot either.  I'll continue to watch the tape and look for more little details to either fix or continue to work on.  

I will absolutely continue to video myself - and I think I will ask XY to hold the camera and move around the table to show all the angles of my stance and stroke to see everything that's going on.

For anyone that's reading this - do you do this and what has been your experience with it? Find it helpful? Harmful? Embarrassing?

So Much Pool To Watch!

So, I posted the other day how I've been watching the Mosconi Cup on youtube all week, last night I tried it on my PS3 and found that it works there too; albeit a little more pixelated on the bigger screen.  This morning, I find out that Simonis is providing a LIVE and FREE video stream for the Touring Stone Classic starting today, for the next 4 days!!  If anyone is interested, you can find it here: Touring Stone Stream (via AzBilliards.com)

Zen Pool and the Karen Corr Rail Drill

I finally got a chance to sit down and finish Zen Pool over the weekend.  I wish I would've picked this book up a few months ago.  In an earlier post I mentioned the video "How to play pool right" which is where I first learned about deflection; and while that was a big help, it would've been even better to have more of a diagram to study rather than a video.  This is only one reason I would have wanted this book earlier. 

The book starts off with a strong sequence of articles/chapters talking about the mental aspect of the game: how to spot when you are 'in the zone' and ways to push yourself there.  All those sections were beneficial to me. The author talks about needing to trust your stroke and how hard it is to get to that point.  How it's important when you're not playing well to fall back on your fundamentals to get through the tough times. However, his talk about fundamentals were vague - stance, stroke etc - were almost glossed over.  He did mention other resources for more in-depth review of those specifics, but I was personally hoping for more pool-related information (so I wouldn't have to go through multiple titles at once).  I could have also foregone the recaps of matches he watched which seemed almost like filler material to get the book to the required number of pages for print.  They are good examples (stories) of what he's talking about - but they seemed a bit out of place; breaking the flow of information.  It's just my opinion though. 

The book, I think, is a good book - especially for beginners and intermediates, but honestly anyone above intermediate probably won't get too much out of it - unless they have no mental game (which is unlikely as they've progressed to that stage somehow).  Still, I would recommend it for just about anyone, it's very affordable and even if you already know everything, it's an entertaining read.  I'm sorry Max, but I don't think it will awaken the master within by itself - but it will help nudge the master in the right direction.

---

The Karen Corr drill I posted about the other day...  I got to try it yesterday - almost all variations posted among those 6 videos.  Surprisingly, it didn't seem quite as hard as I thought it would be.  However - I also took advantage of the leniency given by the video.  Still - it was not easy and it did shine a spotlight on the deflection issue.  IMO, this is the best way to learn your own cue's deflection rates.  I learned more about how my cue deflects with different distances and speeds yesterday than I have for the 6 month's I've owned this stick.  I strongly recommend doing this.

How To Do a Rail Workout in Pocket Billiards on Howcast

If you can't ride the rail past the side pocket then when you get position off the the 3rd ball, just shoot the last three in the other corner - it allows to try deflection on the other side of the ball - theoretically the same - but a good exercise nonetheless.

Side note: the wind chill is 5(f) today - and overnight it'll drop to below zero.  Guess I'll have to start wrapping my cue case in a blanket to walk across the parking lot.

Lots of Pool Yesterday (jumps and tricks)

So, first up, the WBPA Tour Championships are being streamed live; and I watched some of that. Then I went to the pool hall where I played a lot of pool (too long actually).  Then later in the evening, XY suggested we go play since she was wanting to go, so we did.  Instead just being there the 3 hours I had originally said, we were there 5 hours.  I played reasonably well and hit balls with confidence, I'm learning to control my speed better when I have to put a lot of english on the ball.  Especially when I need to use low-right/left and draw back across the table 2 rails.  I'm gaining a lot of confidence in that shot specifically actually. Which is very nice.  The same with a lot of the cut shots I had so many problems with before.  I'm getting pretty happy with my playing.  Still don't run more than 5 balls consistently though.  Have to work on that.

I finally made a pretty good jump-shot yesterday too.  Here the curved line represents the jumping action:


I did learn a trickshot last night though.  I found an archive of layouts on cuetable.com and this was the only the one I could remember enough of to figure it out.  It's fun, for sure, and I make it every time. :)



Today is more live streaming. :)

Happy Friday the 13th!!

Eye of the Tiger - Stop It

Why is damn near every trick-shot video on youtube accompanied by Eye of the Tiger? Seriously - you aren't fighting some incredible david v goliath battle with your own pool table.

do.not.want.

Venom Trickshots - WTF?!

This is just... wow.  I mean okay, it's a video production, with I'm sure lots and lots of hours of outtakes - but just that some of these shots were ever made... I really wonder what the future of artistic pool holds. :)

AWESOME Trick Shots on a MINI table!

this is just sickening...



awesomely sickening! haha

Quick Update (Drill Videos + NO Pain)

I found Force Follow's website today and WOW is there some good info out there!  I've been watching his drill videos most of the afternoon. I tried a few of my own today and it went reasonably well.  When I get more time I'll build a CueTable diagram of what I was doing.

Secondly, after reading all the suggestions online yesterday about my shoulder pain, I tried to really focus on what I was doing with my left arm - and today NO PAIN!  So, key things to remember: Don't lean on the bridge arm with weight if at all possible.  Do NOT push yourself up off the table with the bridge arm still extended.  When considering a shot, do NOT lean on bridge arm while the elbow is locked.  DO put the bridge elbow down on the table as often as possible.  Take a note of your weight distribution, try shifting your weight between legs and your arm to see how it feels.  I played for 2 hours today and my shoulder didn't hurt at all. :)

3-Cushion Magic

I found Mike Massey's Blog and on there this video:


If you want to see some magic, watch it.  It's only 8 minutes and it's incredible. :)