Advice on technique

[JohnF14722]

Least I'm not the only crazy one! I'm not sure how to improve my timing

It's a difficult thing to explain to someone. Basically you need to accelerate the cue all the way through your action, but your point of maximum acceleration should be as you're hitting the cue ball. If you do this then the tip will be in contact with the cue ball for the longest amount of time and you'll get the most possible action on the cue ball for the pace you hit it at.
You could practice this by screwing long blues in, instead of hitting them hard, try to screw back by doing what I described and not whacking them. Hopefully you'll get a feel for it and then the challenge will be to try and time the ball nicely every shot!

[Dynamics]

It's a difficult thing to explain to someone. Basically you need to accelerate the cue all the way through your action, but your point of maximum acceleration should be as you're hitting the cue ball. If you do this then the tip will be in contact with the cue ball for the longest amount of time and you'll get the most possible action on the cue ball for the pace you hit it at.
You could practice this by screwing long blues in, instead of hitting them hard, try to screw back by doing what I described and not whacking them. Hopefully you'll get a feel for it and then the challenge will be to try and time the ball nicely every shot!

Its actually quite simple. Timing is just keeping the tip in contact with the white for as long as possible. Most people have similar length forearms so its not like we can say one tall person with huge arms will have greater cueing ability through the ball. The great players are not hugely tall and some are short eg ken Doherty. All timing is about is about starting to strike the white when the back arm is at 90 degrees (or near this) and then finishing into the chest maybe at a 45 degree angle. If you are starting the action with your arm rearward of 90 degrees and with quite a few inches gap at the neutral position of the distance between tip and white (before your backswing starts), it doesn't take a space scientist to realise that the tip will start to hit the white when you are way past 90 degrees and that therefore if you finish in the chest at 45 degrees, and this finishing in the chest is as far as you can go (it will be as the chest is in the way, except say dropping the arm / shoulder) you have timed the ball less well, since the cue will be in contact with the white less before you run out of space into the chest. That's why its so important to hit the white with the forearm at 90 degrees. It can be slightly back or forward of this, but not with a big gap from tip to the cue ball too. So whilst I don't think the back arm starting position is so critical in your case because you only start 5-10 degrees off 90, getting your bridge hand closer to the white and bending the bridge arm to compact up the stance, is, because it means you will time the shot better. But you may need to move your hand up the cue.

Timing means therefore you can do what you want with the white on those blues since it has been in contact with the white longer. The cue has more effect on the white. So for instance if you decide to stop the white where the blue is on those shots you are practising, as you will be hitting the ball longer, you need impart less screw. The power of the shot is decided by the backswing and follow through, not cue speed. In all shots the cue speed should be the same or nearly the same. This is what the pros do to get consistency. So you've actually got to go back all the way that you can on that blue on your backswing to impart the spin you need to stop the white near the blue with the way you aren't cueing as much through the white. This will introduce cocking the wrist, jerks, snatches by the way things can come out of alignment with one another, and through this longer action. It also can introduce thinking you've got to get more stun and stop the cue (because of the relatively shorter action), so you will come through with the cue faster than you need too. Its this keeping it compact in the action which will improve your game hugely.

People refer to hitting the ball hard , but its no such thing if the cue speed is always mostly the same and therefore you decide what action you want by the backswing and going through the white.

You should actually video the two cue actions and measure how much longer you will go through the white. Place reds where you are neutral to where you follow through. It will be considerably more.

You should work this all out in practise but Id say playing games and being under pressure and winning when it matters, is much more important in the amateur game than loads and loads of practise.

[tomwalker147]

It's a difficult thing to explain to someone. Basically you need to accelerate the cue all the way through your action, but your point of maximum acceleration should be as you're hitting the cue ball. If you do this then the tip will be in contact with the cue ball for the longest amount of time and you'll get the most possible action on the cue ball for the pace you hit it at.
You could practice this by screwing long blues in, instead of hitting them hard, try to screw back by doing what I described and not whacking them. Hopefully you'll get a feel for it and then the challenge will be to try and time the ball nicely every shot!

John this is literally spot on thank god somebody has summed this up in such succinct fashion

[tomwalker147]

Its actually quite simple. Timing is just keeping the tip in contact with the white for as long as possible. Most people have similar length forearms so its not like we can say one tall person with huge arms will have greater cueing ability through the ball. The great players are not hugely tall and some are short eg ken Doherty. All timing is about is about starting to strike the white when the back arm is at 90 degrees (or near this) and then finishing into the chest maybe at a 45 degree angle. If you are starting the action with your arm rearward of 90 degrees and with quite a few inches gap at the neutral position of the distance between tip and white (before your backswing starts), it doesn't take a space scientist to realise that the tip will start to hit the white when you are way past 90 degrees and that therefore if you finish in the chest at 45 degrees, and this finishing in the chest is as far as you can go (it will be as the chest is in the way, except say dropping the arm / shoulder) you have timed the ball less well, since the cue will be in contact with the white less before you run out of space into the chest. That's why its so important to hit the white with the forearm at 90 degrees. It can be slightly back or forward of this, but not with a big gap from tip to the cue ball too. So whilst I don't think the back arm starting position is so critical in your case because you only start 5-10 degrees off 90, getting your bridge hand closer to the white and bending the bridge arm to compact up the stance, is, because it means you will time the shot better. But you may need to move your hand up the cue.

Timing means therefore you can do what you want with the white on those blues since it has been in contact with the white longer. The cue has more effect on the white. So for instance if you decide to stop the white where the blue is on those shots you are practising, as you will be hitting the ball longer, you need impart less screw. The power of the shot is decided by the backswing and follow through, not cue speed. In all shots the cue speed should be the same or nearly the same. This is what the pros do to get consistency. So you've actually got to go back all the way that you can on that blue on your backswing to impart the spin you need to stop the white near the blue with the way you aren't cueing as much through the white. This will introduce cocking the wrist, jerks, snatches by the way things can come out of alignment with one another, and through this longer action. It also can introduce thinking you've got to get more stun and stop the cue (because of the relatively shorter action), so you will come through with the cue faster than you need too. Its this keeping it compact in the action which will improve your game hugely.

People refer to hitting the ball hard , but its no such thing if the cue speed is always mostly the same and therefore you decide what action you want by the backswing and going through the white.

You should actually video the two cue actions and measure how much longer you will go through the white. Place reds where you are neutral to where you follow through. It will be considerably more.

You should work this all out in practise but Id say playing games and being under pressure and winning when it matters, is much more important in the amateur game than loads and loads of practise.

Dynamics how are you as a player? You seem to have a lot of knowledge!

[Dynamics]

It could be confusing to the original poster Brad though, as brad is already accelerating the cue. But as we have seen he is running out of cue without dropping the elbow. And we know timing is keeping the tip in contact with the white longer, not just accelerating the cue.

Also if you say to someone their maximum acceleration should be as you hit the ball, clearly most players will perceive that as I think Brad will.

Quite how will Brad keep the same action to screw the blues in without hitting them hard (ie faster forward with cue) when its clear this can be achieved by keeping the tip in contact longer. If he doesn't hit them so hard he will not get the stun and screw over distance with less reaction on the white. This seems pretty obvious. And I think a technique change is needed to achieve that, without any doubt.

[Dynamics]

Yes playing the game for 20 years and just being reasonably intelligent and analysing stuff plus having been coached and spoken to lots of people on technique.

Ive made quite a number of breaks over 50, but I mainly get 30 ish breaks frequently nowadays as I don't play that much anymore and you need to play an awful lot to keep consistency in snooker. My last 50 ish break was just before xmas. This technique stuff is all pretty obvious. You just need to realise what is going on in a snooker swing. Also you don't need to be a good player to see what is going on.

[tomwalker147]

Yes playing the game for 20 years and just being reasonably intelligent and analysing stuff plus having been coached and spoken to lots of people on technique.

Ive made quite a number of breaks over 50, but I mainly get 30 ish breaks frequently nowadays as I don't play that much anymore and you need to play an awful lot to keep consistency in snooker. My last 50 ish break was just before xmas. This technique stuff is all pretty obvious. You just need to realise what is going on in a snooker swing. Also you don't need to be a good player to see what is going on.

Agreed that you don't need to be brilliant to know your stuff. Mourinho was never a brilliant footballer but has become a brilliant manager.
To be completely honest alot of the technical aspects go straight over my head, I look at my own game and if I miss I can usually correct it by walking into the shot and staying down on the shot after the strike.
My worry is that players who are just starting out jump into the technical aspects before trying to work the game out for themselves, they get hung up on small nuances and don't progress despite putting in hours and hours.

Bradley to me looks relatively sound technically, he just needs to stop whacking the ball. I don't 100% know what the definition of 'timing' is but I know when i've timed something well by the sound of the strike, how it felt and the result I achieved on the shot. It's something I can see and feel but not necessarily describe.

My advice to Bradley would be to stand behind the shot, pick a spot on the object ball, get down on the shot, play it, stay down until the balls come to a stop. I'd be willing to bet that a marked improvement would be made without the need to go into too much depth on whether his wrist is in the right place etc. Having a consistent pre shot routine far outweighs the need to be 100% technically sound because quite simply only a handful of people in the world are technically perfect (including the pros).

Brad sort out your pre shot routine, make sure it's the same on every shot and then let me know how much you've improved because I'm sure you will.

[Dynamics]

Agreed that you don't need to be brilliant to know your stuff. Mourinho was never a brilliant footballer but has become a brilliant manager.
To be completely honest alot of the technical aspects go straight over my head, I look at my own game and if I miss I can usually correct it by walking into the shot and staying down on the shot after the strike.
My worry is that players who are just starting out jump into the technical aspects before trying to work the game out for themselves, they get hung up on small nuances and don't progress despite putting in hours and hours.

Bradley to me looks relatively sound technically, he just needs to stop whacking the ball. I don't 100% know what the definition of 'timing' is but I know when i've timed something well by the sound of the strike, how it felt and the result I achieved on the shot. It's something I can see and feel but not necessarily describe.

My advice to Bradley would be to stand behind the shot, pick a spot on the object ball, get down on the shot, play it, stay down until the balls come to a stop. I'd be willing to bet that a marked improvement would be made without the need to go into too much depth on whether his wrist is in the right place etc. Having a consistent pre shot routine far outweighs the need to be 100% technically sound because quite simply only a handful of people in the world are technically perfect (including the pros).

Brad sort out your pre shot routine, make sure it's the same on every shot and then let me know how much you've improved because I'm sure you will.

I somewhat agree with what you are saying about not over analysing, but you need to know what is happening and to do this you have to analyse things. If you just think I have to hit this softer without any consideration for say ; "Am I sub consciously hitting it faster through the ball to get the same spin effect?" rather than longer striking to the ball and not so fast through and more accurate, to get the same positional outcome, you have to ask these question. You say "don't whack the ball" but what does this actually mean to use the same current technique, to get the same result and stopping the ball dead. Have you thought it could be happening unintentionally because of the technique. That he maybe needs to speed through to stop the white. So therefore how can he avoid that? How can the ball stop being 'wacked'. To be honest I don't think he is hitting it too hard, its more do so with the compactness of the swing to improve, and going across the shot by a long swing more likely with the length of action. Because I think his cueing looks very good and would be better over a more compact action.

I don't think Brad needs to go into depth where the wrist is, but it would be interesting to me to see, in his current configuration what is happening to always miss the ball to the right of the pocket which seems a fairly common thing. It could be the wrist. But more importantly does shortening the action and getting the hand up close to the white mean any possible effects of the wrist in bringing the cue out of alignment are less pronounced. Snooker is about getting small improvements for big gains in playing. Mark Selby is known to have moved his bridge hand closer in and his break building improved overnight (according to Willie Thorne who owned the club Selby used to play in).

So we aren't talking about being as good as the pros, we are talking about doing things that can help an improvement. I found my grip has had a profound effect on my accuracy at times.

I also don't think if you are making 50's and 60's like Brad is, you are just starting out. You therefore need to look at technique to get more out. But its important to say what you are actually trying in technique changes, can be small things like moving your hand in close to the white, or just remembering the position you hold the cue and remembering the positon of the cue arm (and keeping the tip just off the ball), to improve something major like timing.

[Bradley129]

Agreed that you don't need to be brilliant to know your stuff. Mourinho was never a brilliant footballer but has become a brilliant manager.
To be completely honest alot of the technical aspects go straight over my head, I look at my own game and if I miss I can usually correct it by walking into the shot and staying down on the shot after the strike.
My worry is that players who are just starting out jump into the technical aspects before trying to work the game out for themselves, they get hung up on small nuances and don't progress despite putting in hours and hours.

Bradley to me looks relatively sound technically, he just needs to stop whacking the ball. I don't 100% know what the definition of 'timing' is but I know when i've timed something well by the sound of the strike, how it felt and the result I achieved on the shot. It's something I can see and feel but not necessarily describe.

My advice to Bradley would be to stand behind the shot, pick a spot on the object ball, get down on the shot, play it, stay down until the balls come to a stop. I'd be willing to bet that a marked improvement would be made without the need to go into too much depth on whether his wrist is in the right place etc. Having a consistent pre shot routine far outweighs the need to be 100% technically sound because quite simply only a handful of people in the world are technically perfect (including the pros).

Brad sort out your pre shot routine, make sure it's the same on every shot and then let me know how much you've improved because I'm sure you will.

Yes I will try to sort out my pre shot routine as it varies from time to time consequently proving my form to be inconsistent. Really appreciate the comments and the help and i'm going to record myself more and show everyone what my current cueing looks like.

[Bradley129]

I somewhat agree with what you are saying about not over analysing, but you need to know what is happening and to do this you have to analyse things. If you just think I have to hit this softer without any consideration for say ; "Am I sub consciously hitting it faster through the ball to get the same spin effect?" rather than longer striking to the ball and not so fast through and more accurate, to get the same positional outcome, you have to ask these question. You say "don't whack the ball" but what does this actually mean to use the same current technique, to get the same result and stopping the ball dead. Have you thought it could be happening unintentionally because of the technique. That he maybe needs to speed through to stop the white. So therefore how can he avoid that? How can the ball stop being 'wacked'. To be honest I don't think he is hitting it too hard, its more do so with the compactness of the swing to improve, and going across the shot by a long swing more likely with the length of action. Because I think his cueing looks very good and would be better over a more compact action.

I don't think Brad needs to go into depth where the wrist is, but it would be interesting to me to see, in his current configuration what is happening to always miss the ball to the right of the pocket which seems a fairly common thing. It could be the wrist. But more importantly does shortening the action and getting the hand up close to the white mean any possible effects of the wrist in bringing the cue out of alignment are less pronounced. Snooker is about getting small improvements for big gains in playing. Mark Selby is known to have moved his bridge hand closer in and his break building improved overnight (according to Willie Thorne who owned the club Selby used to play in).

So we aren't talking about being as good as the pros, we are talking about doing things that can help an improvement. I found my grip has had a profound effect on my accuracy at times.

I also don't think if you are making 50's and 60's like Brad is, you are just starting out. You therefore need to look at technique to get more out. But its important to say what you are actually trying in technique changes, can be small things like moving your hand in close to the white, or just remembering the position you hold the cue and remembering the positon of the cue arm (and keeping the tip just off the ball), to improve something major like timing.

I will try to film and give you a better understanding, just don't quite always get the chance to film because I feel too awkward doing it at a local club. The breaks that I make are affected by my concentration from my autism, it makes it hard to not get excited of which in the last few weeks trying new mental techniques to aid concentration and get into that magical bubble. I often get too excited and miss on the shot or too nervous.

When I cue through the ball my forearm hits my bod within 2" of striking the ball, I would say my forearm is about 95 degrees but nothing more so for me it's impossible to get my forearm to 45 degrees as you've mentioned.


My reasoning behind why I missed in that video to the RHS was due to the face that when I was dropping my elbow I was dropping it around my body so cueing across it as I'm striking the ball.

[Bradley129]

So practising cueing on my kitchen counter (not able to play until friday), and when my cue is 90 degrees my cue can only got 1-2" until I hit my chest. When playing a power shot Dynamics, how do I finish at the chest without bruising my ribcage. I was at the crucible watching Hawkins, while his cue tip is super close to the white his arm is slightly out of the 90 degrees and from looking he always finishes before the chest, at first it looks like he snatches at the cue but I guess that is just his grip closing. Do you have any thoughts on that? When playing on friday I'm going to ask my friend to film 3-4 videos of me from certain angles using my phone to have a look at what it looks like.

[jonny66]

If you drop your elbow after the strike you can get the cue through further without beating yourself up. But the best advice on this thread is stop hitting the ball so hard, hitting the ball hard is not a good thing and IMO the best way to learn how to play with power is to not play with power. Get your timing right and see what you can do without power, walk before you run etc...

[Bradley129]

If you drop your elbow after the strike you can get the cue through further without beating yourself up. But the best advice on this thread is stop hitting the ball so hard, hitting the ball hard is not a good thing and IMO the best way to learn how to play with power is to not play with power. Get your timing right and see what you can do without power, walk before you run etc...

When I meant power I just meant like anything more than 5/10 in terms of power. But I do understand what you're saying. I don't always hit the ball hard just that one time.

[Bradley129]

Hi everyone, excuse the audio I was playing at the end of our university session at Star Snooker Academy, I'd brought my camera to film and I'd just won the snooker tournament for the society with hitting a 51 and potting really well so I thought i'd film myself playing some straight shots and see what is different. I noticed that in the match my backswing was slower and I was focussing on which part of the ball I was hitting as soon as I was pulling the cue back.

This is the grip from behind, I just want to check that there are no major flaws with my technique, struggling to generate spin/pace without destroying my chest so for power shots and long balls I hit a part of my chest which is lower down my body.

This video is a side view of me potting long blues, the first one was a soft shot and I got however I missed the next pot and i'm not quite sure why, maybe a slight misalignment, I accidentally played it with more power than the previous one.

Can anyone give advice to help me time the ball better so I can generate the spin on a semi consistent basis.

Thank you everyone!