left,left,left !

[rovnos]

hi all,
can anyone help me ? i've not long started playing again after a long lay-off and the other day got the chance of a couple of hours practice to work on a couple of things. The problems i've found are 1) when cueing up and down the spots the cue ball comes back about a balls width on the left from the brown spot. 2) When playing long pots, im missing most pots about a balls width to the left as well. Tried aiming a balls width to the right of the pocket to see what happened and potted most shots . 3) I've just realised that im left eye dominent and wondered if wearing glasses by day then contacts to play snooker whether this has affected my aiming ? Im not expecting instant fixes but any thoughts and opinions that i could experiment with would be very welcome.

Thanks.

[GeordieDS]

That's a strange one because if you are hitting the ball ever so slightly on the left side then you should be missing pots to the right not left.
My dominant eye is my right but i play snooker with my left hand (although i am right handed for everything else) so what i did was just hit the ball up and down the spots until i could do it quite easily,then i new where the centre of the cue ball was and it improved my game a lot.

Good luck with the practise.

[snookerdad]

Playing with left hand side will push the cue-ball to the right which in turn will push the object ball to the left.

You are either not hitting the centre of the cue-ball or cueing across.

If someone stands behind the black spot, they'll be able to see which it is.

Tim Dunkley (World Snooker coach)

[rovnos]

thanks for the reply snookerdad. If im cueing across the ball, and i think that is most likely, what are the possible causes and how do i best rectify them ? I know it's perhaps difficult to say without seeing someone but just some general thoughts that i could think about would be of interest. thanks.

[Terry Davidson]

rovnos:

Although you asked Tim, here's my 2 cents worth. The large majority of right-handed players who are not top amateurs or pros will usually cue across the cueball right-to-left and end up hitting the cueball just left of centre and applying unintentional left hand side, and this certainly seems to be your problem.

Since I had the same flaw and am also a Master Coach who has video analysis equipment this problem was really peeing me off as I just couldn't stop it. After some intense analysis I discovered 2 very important things. The first was I was lifting my head very slightly on the BACKSWING which causes the cue to go off-line and my theory is the brain sees this and over-compensates during the more dynamic delivery. I solved this problem by slowing my backswing right down and also concentrating on keeping the damned chin on the cue and not allowing my upper body to move.

This solution really improved my long potting but I was still hitting slightly right-to-left. I then discovered (after a lot more video analysis of my grip hand using a high speed camera at 120 frames per second) that my grip hand, the back 3 fingers were coming onto the butt early in my delivery and further analysis revealed I was not only decelerating through the cueball but I was also taking the butt off line by doing this. The proof was in watching the chevrons on my cue, which on a harder shot were turning almost a full quarter turn. disgusting!!!

So then I wrapped my back 2 fingers with tape and up into my palm and that turned out to not be too smart as the butt of the cue was banging against them on delivery and it was PAINFUL!!! So then I tried gripping the very end of the cue with the back two fingers bent up into my palm and this was much, much better but was still a little awkward as I had a lot of cue over my bridge.

So, going back to basic grip theory, I tried gripping the cue at my normal place just using the thumb and forefinger (which is what I teach) but the big difference being I kept the back 3 fingers completely off the cue throughout the backswing and delivery and was stopping the cue using only my forefinger and thumb. To my absolute surprise when I did some more detailed video analysis frame-by-frame I discovered the cue was going absolutely straight, the chevrons were't turning at all and I could hammer the cueball for 5 lengths of the table and still have it stay within 1 ball width of the centre spots when shooting the spots.

To condense a bit...try gripping your cue with JUST the forefinger and thumb with the back 3 fingers just lightly touching the butt in the address position and MAINTAIN that same grip throughout the backswing and delivery and just use the forefing and thumb to stop the cue and DO NOT allow the back 3 fingers to grip the butt at all. (If you look closely you will see Ronnie doing this with his back TWO fingers).

It worked for me so perhaps it will work for you and maybe a lot more players

Terry

[rovnos]

Thank you for you post Terry. I don't get the chance to get to the club as often as i would like so just took a short vid of myself at home just feathering in position. The two things that really stood out was my grip which you have spoken about (and i will be trying your suggestions thank you) and also how i was lifting the butt on the end of the backswing. Also realised that i really need to slow everything down a bit.

[alabadi]

rovnos:

I then discovered (after a lot more video analysis of my grip hand using a high speed camera at 120 frames per second) that my grip hand, the back 3 fingers were coming onto the butt early in my delivery and further analysis revealed I was not only decelerating through the cueball but I was also taking the butt off line by doing this. The proof was in watching the chevrons on my cue, which on a harder shot were turning almost a full quarter turn. disgusting!!!

This is exactly what i am doing, i know its my grip because i have filmed it.

So then I wrapped my back 2 fingers with tape and up into my palm and that turned out to not be too smart as the butt of the cue was banging against them on delivery and it was PAINFUL!!! So then I tried gripping the very end of the cue with the back two fingers bent up into my palm and this was much, much better but was still a little awkward as I had a lot of cue over my bridge.

tried the same thing, was awkward, grip hand and bridge had too much distance between them and couldn't settle down on the shot, it caused the tip to move around.

So I tried gripping the cue at my normal place just using the thumb and forefinger (which is what I teach) but the big difference being I kept the back 3 fingers completely off the cue throughout the backswing and delivery and was stopping the cue using only my forefinger and thumb. To my absolute surprise when I did some more detailed video analysis frame-by-frame I discovered the cue was going absolutely straight, the chevrons were't turning at all

.

i have tried this and got some success, i am still trying to get use to it so success has been up and down, however, i can tell that i am cueing straighter because the chevrons are not turning and i have managed more long pots than i usually get. i think that this is the solution to my problem and i will continue to practice this until its second nature.

Alabbadi

[rovnos]

have you tried just curling up the small (pinkie) finger above the butt ? I have noy tried this yet butit 'feels' like it could work. You can have your third and fourth finger hangind down but because your small finger is curled up it almost feels like a full grip (sort of).