Aiming / alignment down the stick or more "on top"?

Imac007

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Several years ago I did some trap shooting. I am right handed but left eye dominant eye. It is considered a bad idea to close an eye while shooting since we need both eyes to create a three dimensional cognitive image. My solution was to hood my left eye enough to cause the right eye to do the sighting. Occasionally I would miss a clay target by a mile. When that happened I was suddenly aware that I had sighted with my left eye directly through the sight to the target. It also meant I was seeing the side of the barrel and the gun barrel was actually pointing left of target. When using a side on stance, the same thing sometimes happened to my pool stroke. I got fixated on precise tip contact on the ball but lost the shaft perspective. I decided to overhaul my stance.

Riley cues makes a sighting aid call SightRight. It consists of a two level visual aid. It duplicates my barrel sighting perspective. A sighting window is imbedded in the cue. When you are sighting directly over the window a single line about 1/4" wide is visible. A closer look reveals that the line exists on two levels. The part closest to the player runs straight down the cue and the second half of the line drops about 1/4” before continuing along the same path. If viewed from the side the upper level line will appear further away from the viewer than the lower layer. The side perspective reveals the three dimensional line arrangement as a broken line. Sighting from directly over the line both lines align appearing as one continuous line.

However, we already have a reference for aiming, the shot line. The second line that has to align with the cue in a straight line is the vertical line that extends from the apex of the ball to the point where the cue ball touches the bed of the table. It may well explain the practice by many pros who address the bottom of the ball during the feathering phase prior to the final stroke. During my overhaul, the shot line represented my primary reference. Once I see the line I stand behind it with my right foot directly in line with the shot. Lowering my head slightly I position myself so I feel I am looking directly down the line. I step forward with my right foot staying on line and keeping my head over the line. The head now leads forward into the shot. This forces the left foot to also move forward allowing the upper body to move the cue and bridge hand onto the shot line. Space permitting the bridge hand lands short of its final position and slides forward with the head moving in concert with the bridge hand into position. At this point the back anchor foot, the cue, bridge and head are positioned directly over the target line. I feel square to the line and over into the shot with everything aligned. Despite all the rhetoric about dominant eye, the mind’s image is a cognitive construction. You will be properly positioned when you feel that you are sighting from directly above and down the target line.

My overhaul was built around that premise. I use an open bridge on most shots. Some awkward shots along the rail need a loop bridge to avoid awkward cueing angles. Also deep screw and massè shots are best done with a loop for control. The best way to keep the head on line is to focus on the collision area. Moving the head towards the striking zone with the right foot also pointing there keeps you in the groove. Positioning the bridge forces you to move your eyes back and forth fine tuning the cue and the bridge vee position. Once the bridge and cue are aligned the bridge hand needs to become solid by gripping the cloth.

The short answer to your query of positioning the head is that it needs to lead the body in positioning everything else to deliver the cue down the target line.
 
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paultex

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Several years ago I did some trap shooting. I am right handed but left eye dominant eye. It is considered a bad idea to close an eye while shooting since we need both eyes to create a three dimensional cognitive image. My solution was to hood my left eye enough to cause the right eye to do the sighting. Occasionally I would miss a clay target by a mile. When that happened I was suddenly aware that I had sighted with my left eye directly through the sight to the target. It also meant I was seeing the side of the barrel and the gun barrel was actually pointing left of target. When using a side on stance, the same thing sometimes happened to my pool stroke. I got fixated on precise tip contact on the ball but lost the shaft perspective. I decided to overhaul my stance.

Riley cues makes a sighting aid call SightRight. It consists of a two level visual aid. It duplicates my barrel sighting perspective. A sighting window is imbedded in the cue. When you are sighting directly over the window a single line about 1/4" wide is visible. A closer look reveals that the line exists on two levels. The part closest to the player runs straight down the cue and the second half of the line drops about 1/4” before continuing along the same path. If viewed from the side the upper level line will appear further away from the viewer than the lower layer. The side perspective reveals the three dimensional line arrangement as a broken line. Sighting from directly over the line both lines align appearing as one continuous line.

However, we already have a reference for aiming, the shot line. During my overhaul, the shot line represents the primary reference. Once I see the line I stand behind it with my right foot directly in line with the shot. Lowering my head slightly I position myself so I feel I am looking directly down the line. I step forward with my right foot staying on line and keeping my head over the line. The head now leads forward into the shot. This forces the left foot to also move forward allowing the upper body to move the cue and bridge hand onto the shot line. Space permitting the bridge hand lands short of its final position and slides forward with the head moving in concert with the bridge hand into position. At this point the back anchor foot, the cue, bridge and head are positioned directly over the target line. I feel square to the line and over into the shot with everything aligned. Despite all the rhetoric about dominant eye, the mind’s image is a cognitive construction. You will be properly positioned when you feel that you are sighting from directly above and down the target line.

My overhaul was built around that premise. I use an open bridge on most shots. Some awkward shots along the rail need a loop bridge to avoid awkward cueing angles. Also deep screw and massè shots are best done with a loop for control. The best way to keep the head on line is to focus on the collision area. Moving the head towards the striking zone with the right foot also pointing there keeps you in the groove. Positioning the bridge forces you to move your eyes back and forth fine tuning the cue and the bridge vee position. Once the bridge and cue are aligned the bridge hand needs to become solid by gripping the cloth.

The short answer to your query of positioning the head is that it needs to lead the body in positioning everything else to deliver the cue down the target line.

This is all very well said.

Sometimes or many times, the transition from stand up to address, double crosses the visual alignment. That "sometimes", I calculated to a minimum of 30% failure rate and even more for those who do not know how to "spin" the cueball out of the misalignment and the more they improve on this, the more twist of the cueball gets more and more engrained into the mental programming, which is a road that leads to extreme limitations, despite high ball pocketing success, but no where near a truly high level.

You are spot on about tip at center but stick pointing left of shotline. The correct visual in that physical misalignment, will visually look like what I describe as a lightning bolt. The riley aid you described proves that when you said the two lines are offset.

This particular visual is hard to trust and hard to dial in but can be understood I guess. I sometimes do but I try to achieve in what you describe as the correct sequence for alignment, and when it's done, everything smooths out, particularly the stroke feel as well. It feels freed up and fluid.

The opposite of what you described in your gun target shooting is left side of the table for right handed players, left eye dominant, and back or blind cuts to the left, especially when jacking up the cue stick. The left eye is dominating the stand up visual unbeknownst to most players and then the transition to address gets the right eye into play and this produces a physical alignment that will hit annoyingly thick and miss badly and is in fact producing a "outside in" angle attack of tip to cb.

Ironically, the outside in, is one of the hardest strokes to produce for a right handed left eye dominant player. Ironically, it can be produced at will if people understand this sequence and does have tremendous value for certain shot requirements.

I personally try to understand it all and incorporate it into my aproach and methods. I believe these things are key to 100% alignment awareness and to achieve any spin on any shot angle, no matter how awkward for various shots that most, even pros, do not bother to attempt, YET, retain the visual of shooting at what you see.

In other words, the visual should always appear down the line with any maximum spin instead of visual compensation that I know, some players to aim a full ball left or right of target, to compensate for sqwirt in effect. That should be mastered as well because sometimes you need to get around a obstacle, but the sqwirtless side of the equation needs to be mastered as well.

I haven't personally mastered all this 100% and I probably never will I think but not sure just yet, but I do know I've come a long way in development, when looking at certain shots that people stare at and determine a shot is being blocked by a obstacle, when in fact, I look at it and say "naw, that ball goes in all day" and they laugh and say "what????"....... but then continue to stare because I probably touched on their subconscious mind that knows I'm right.

People subconsciously figure out they are being conned by something if they are consciously made aware of it, even if it appears impossible to their perceptions.

Thanks dude, good post, especially your technique sequence to get in line. I assume you play snooker too or primarily possibly.
 

Imac007

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I have an alternate process alignment method I use for those having trouble with bringing the cue and bridge hand across the body and placing it on line without losing the target line. This involves roughly the same start but I handle the cue differently. Slot the cue into the bridge hand vee and make sure it is moving freely, not sticking. Find the target line from directly behind it. Step the right foot onto the line and let your head shift so you feel you are looking directly down the line. Bring the slotted cue vertically in front and superimpose it on the line. Now both the head and cue move down and ahead into the shot. The left foot naturally finds a balanced landing place slightly ahead and about shoulder width away from the right foot in the process. This is effective when faced with a short bridging position like near a cushion or over a ball. These are times when our sense of the cue direction is more like sighting a pistol/derringer than sighting a long gun. You still may have to use a shorter grip but feel the entirety of the cue alignment in the air and a simple lowering of the cue onto the shot line. Your confidence and knowledge of where it is pointing can feed into more successful execution. Once you know with certainty that the cue is online, the cueing arm and grip lose the feeling of needing to micro adjust.

On days when my natural habitual taking of stance and execution are off I use one or both methods as a coping mechanism to bring me back into stroke. When using a method it eventually becomes habitual, not a conscious process. I only make it conscious if feedback tells me my fundamentals are off. (Don’t fix it if it isn’t broken). I let the shot tell me which method to use consciously. I sometimes get down with one then get up and get down with the other to see which gives me a better sense of success with the shot.
 
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