What is feel aiming?

lfigueroa said:
Joey, here, let me take a crack at explaining this:

Take a piece of paper and wad it up nice and tight. Locate your trash basket, maybe 9' away. Throw the wadded up piece of paper into the basket.

Now I'm guessing that if you have a normal amount of hand-eye coordination, after a few tries you're going to be able to toss the wadded up paper into the basket pretty consistently. After a few hours of practice, I'd even go so far as to say that you could do it at near and farther distances, maybe bounce it in off a wall or piece of furniture, throw it with top hand flip, or even over your shoulder, and rarely miss. After sufficient practice I'd say that anything within the original 9' range you're going to own and would bet money you could make five out of five.

So is that any of that guessing? I mean, certainly you are aiming somehow, yet you feel totally confident that you are going to be able to toss the wadded ball of paper into the hole.

Now, for those individuals having difficulty putting the wadded paper into the trash can, and are frustrated with their results, I will be coming out with a DVD that will provide you with a precise, systematic method of aiming the wadded up paper. It will give you a Pre-Toss and Toss Routine and will involve lining up the edge of the wadded up piece of paper with various edges of the trash can and pivoting your body, for a can't miss aiming system. I will be charging $40 (plus shipping) for this one and half hour DVD. Oh yes, I will also be coming out with another DVD -- this one will teach you what your dominant eye is and how to ensure you toss the wadded piece of paper lined up properly with the right (or left) eye. This one will be $80.

Hope that helps :-)

Lou Figueroa
Click to expand...

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to lfigueroa again.
 
for me it's total visualization of the shot while in the standing position, to include the object ball going in the pocket, the natural path of the cue ball after contact, and distance cue ball needs to travel for the next shot. then get to the creative side of my brain, get my head and eyes properly aligned and put a good stroke on the ball. no talking to myself while down on the shot, to avoid negative thoughts. and just let the shot happen. just my 2-cents on the subject.
 
I can see that pool and sex do have one other thing in common.
Aiming by feel is the same as initiating sex in the dark. Hope you hit the right hole.
 
lfigueroa said:
Joey, here, let me take a crack at explaining this:

Take a piece of paper and wad it up nice and tight. Locate your trash basket, maybe 9' away. Throw the wadded up piece of paper into the basket.

Now I'm guessing that if you have a normal amount of hand-eye coordination, after a few tries you're going to be able to toss the wadded up paper into the basket pretty consistently. After a few hours of practice, I'd even go so far as to say that you could do it at near and farther distances, maybe bounce it in off a wall or piece of furniture, throw it with top hand flip, or even over your shoulder, and rarely miss. After sufficient practice I'd say that anything within the original 9' range you're going to own and would bet money you could make five out of five.

So is that any of that guessing? I mean, certainly you are aiming somehow, yet you feel totally confident that you are going to be able to toss the wadded ball of paper into the hole.

Now, for those individuals having difficulty putting the wadded paper into the trash can, and are frustrated with their results, I will be coming out with a DVD that will provide you with a precise, systematic method of aiming the wadded up paper. It will give you a Pre-Toss and Toss Routine and will involve lining up the edge of the wadded up piece of paper with various edges of the trash can and pivoting your body, for a can't miss aiming system. I will be charging $40 (plus shipping) for this one and half hour DVD. Oh yes, I will also be coming out with another DVD -- this one will teach you what your dominant eye is and how to ensure you toss the wadded piece of paper lined up properly with the right (or left) eye. This one will be $80.

Hope that helps :-)

Lou Figueroa
Click to expand...

Yep. http://forums.azbilliards.com/showpost.php?p=2876287&postcount=34
 
use the force luke

hand eye and athletecism. no different than what your mind and body go through when performing any other task. could be throwing a baseball, hitting a golf ball, or bringing a cup or fork to your mouth, you visualize something happening and your body reacts accordingly. if you miss, practice the shot over to ingrain it into your memory.
 
Some good ideas and explanations already. Here's my crack at it, a little long but bear with me:

I saw a scientific special once on sports and aiming. It covered basketball, rifle shooting (sniper stuff), and even pool, I believe Johnny Archer was even the demo shooter. It was moderately interesting, but I still remember the basketball portion. I play a lot of sports well, basketball is NOT one of them, bad childhood experiences with ball hogs probably to blame...

Anyway, they showed a pro player shooting a difficult shot, well beyond 3-point range, and mapped out the factors involved in making it - speed, distance, trajectory, etc. I don't remember the details but it was amazing how only a very small percentage of change in any of the variables would cause a miss. And of course the player was pretty accurate with the shot.

How did he learn to shoot that shot, or any of the other countless others from almost infinite positions on the court? He didn't use a system, he shot thousands and thousands of shots and adjusted based on each result, his brain calibrating along the way. Since he probably played when he was younger, he also had to constantly adjust as he got taller, stronger, etc. And even if he could shoot every shot perfectly from many different positions, like a robot could be calibrated to do, in a real game he has to subconciously adjust for his own momentum into or away from the shot, alter the trajectory to get around an outstretched hand, etc. Call it experience, repetition, feel, etc., but this is how most top athletes play most sports at a high level. So why can't feel or visual aim be used to knock a ball that's not moving into a hole twice as wide a few feet away?

We are lucky enough to play a sport that is geometric in nature (remember Donald Duck?) and is also played from a static starting position, which allows us to be able to preplan each of our shots, usually looking 2 or 3 shots ahead to make sure we get on the proper side of the ball to get to the next and the next etc., all the while potentially using systems to be able to zero in on a shot or bank or kick. Try using a system to hit a tennis ball 50mph to a 3 foot square area 70 feet away over a 3 foot net while on the run...

No matter how we arrive at our aim point though, we also have to use our experience and knowledge to know how to adjust as needed for speed, english, interference, table conditions, etc. That's why in my opinion no system will ever be perfect, at most they can be guidelines, maybe very strong guidelines, that allow our brain to calibrate faster than the hit-a-million-balls method that most have have used. The aiming systems also give someone a frame of reference to approach a shot the same way everytime and this consistency can certainly breed confidence which is huge when you are about to pull the trigger.

One last example from the 3-cushion world. There are players out there who claim they play by feel alone, and others who you can watch and see counting diamonds and figuring out everything in their heads. Once I played for a while I started trying to learn as many systems as I could to help make the shots easier and increase my average, and I probably know 30 or 40 diamond systems easy. But I reached a point where I lost my ability to deviate from these systems, and if the balls were in a weird spot I didn't know what to do because I had lost my "feel". So I went back to using the systems as guidelines and not being so robotic about it and for me at least it made me a better and more creative player.

Scott
 
lfigueroa said:
Joey, here, let me take a crack at explaining this:

Take a piece of paper and wad it up nice and tight. Locate your trash basket, maybe 9' away. Throw the wadded up piece of paper into the basket.

Now I'm guessing that if you have a normal amount of hand-eye coordination, after a few tries you're going to be able to toss the wadded up paper into the basket pretty consistently. After a few hours of practice, I'd even go so far as to say that you could do it at near and farther distances, maybe bounce it in off a wall or piece of furniture, throw it with top hand flip, or even over your shoulder, and rarely miss. After sufficient practice I'd say that anything within the original 9' range you're going to own and would bet money you could make five out of five.

So is that any of that guessing? I mean, certainly you are aiming somehow, yet you feel totally confident that you are going to be able to toss the wadded ball of paper into the hole.

Now, for those individuals having difficulty putting the wadded paper into the trash can, and are frustrated with their results, I will be coming out with a DVD that will provide you with a precise, systematic method of aiming the wadded up paper. It will give you a Pre-Toss and Toss Routine and will involve lining up the edge of the wadded up piece of paper with various edges of the trash can and pivoting your body, for a can't miss aiming system. I will be charging $40 (plus shipping) for this one and half hour DVD. Oh yes, I will also be coming out with another DVD -- this one will teach you what your dominant eye is and how to ensure you toss the wadded piece of paper lined up properly with the right (or left) eye. This one will be $80.

Hope that helps :-)

Lou Figueroa
Click to expand...

Cute?, as usual. You can't even finish writing a book, so don't start talking about a video. You ain't got it in ya. :wink:

But seriously, do you think Feel Aiming can be taught?

JoeyA
 
lfigueroa said:
Joey, here, let me take a crack at explaining this:

Take a piece of paper and wad it up nice and tight. Locate your trash basket, maybe 9' away. Throw the wadded up piece of paper into the basket.

Now I'm guessing that if you have a normal amount of hand-eye coordination, after a few tries you're going to be able to toss the wadded up paper into the basket pretty consistently. After a few hours of practice, I'd even go so far as to say that you could do it at near and farther distances, maybe bounce it in off a wall or piece of furniture, throw it with top hand flip, or even over your shoulder, and rarely miss. After sufficient practice I'd say that anything within the original 9' range you're going to own and would bet money you could make five out of five.

So is that any of that guessing? I mean, certainly you are aiming somehow, yet you feel totally confident that you are going to be able to toss the wadded ball of paper into the hole.

Now, for those individuals having difficulty putting the wadded paper into the trash can, and are frustrated with their results, I will be coming out with a DVD that will provide you with a precise, systematic method of aiming the wadded up paper. It will give you a Pre-Toss and Toss Routine and will involve lining up the edge of the wadded up piece of paper with various edges of the trash can and pivoting your body, for a can't miss aiming system. I will be charging $40 (plus shipping) for this one and half hour DVD. Oh yes, I will also be coming out with another DVD -- this one will teach you what your dominant eye is and how to ensure you toss the wadded piece of paper lined up properly with the right (or left) eye. This one will be $80.

Hope that helps :-)

Lou Figueroa
Click to expand...

Best post at AZB so far. Ever :D
 
I bet Jesse bowman shoots everything by feel. It take some people 1000 shots to learn 1 shot, and it takes some people 2 shots to learn a shot. I believe all the aim systems do is just get u lined up before u get down on a shot.
It would take 15 min. a shot if someone would try to calculate mathematically the amount of deflection/swerve/skid u would have when u hit a ball at slow med hard at a short to long distance.
When you’re practicing certain shots and u cant under stand whets going on. Then u get onto dr Dave’s web page and find out what u need to be looking at.
All in all once u learn what’s going on its all feel. If your stroke is straight.
 
JoeyA said:
Cute?, as usual. You can't even finish writing a book, so don't start talking about a video. You ain't got it in ya. :wink:

But seriously, do you think Feel Aiming can be taught?

JoeyA
Click to expand...


You made my wife laugh out loud when I read your response (we had talked about this thread over dinner).

I think, off the top of me head, that feel cannot be taught.

BUT, feel becomes instinctive WHEN (and only when) you have created a good solid PSR and follow it religiously. That is what makes the feel part possible and in fact automatic.

I will freely confess that when I am on a bad PSR, or am not doing it properly, or have only a portion of the components of a good PSR, I have looked at the table, gotten into shooting position, and prayed I'd get the ball close to the pocket and land the CB somewhere on the right half of the table so I wouldn't look like a total goober. (I'm entering the US Open 1Pocket tournament -- how bouts you :-)

OTOH, when I am firing on all cylinders and am able to utilize whatever it is that I think is ideal, I can almost literally see that the ball is going into the hole and I can feel -- almost see -- the exact path the CB is going to take. I can play soft, I can muscle the ball in, I can feather my position to the point where I am hitting whatever side of another object ball I want to to nudge it into position.

The trick is to get to the set up that allows that to happen and that is one of the reasons I think the pre shot and shot routine portion of Stan's DVD is the most useful of anything on it and exactly why some guys see an improvement. The rest -- lines, edges, center, aim points, and pivots -- have nothing to do with it.

Lou Figueroa
 
lfigueroa said:
You made my wife laugh out loud when I read your response (we had talked about this thread over dinner).

I think, off the top of me head, that feel cannot be taught.

BUT, feel becomes instinctive WHEN (and only when) you have created a good solid PSR and follow it religiously. That is what makes the feel part possible and in fact automatic.

I will freely confess that when I am on a bad PSR, or am not doing it properly, or have only a portion of the components of a good PSR, I have looked at the table, gotten into shooting position, and prayed I'd get the ball close to the pocket and land the CB somewhere on the right half of the table so I wouldn't look like a total goober. (I'm entering the US Open 1Pocket tournament -- how bouts you :-)

OTOH, when I am firing on all cylinders and am able to utilize whatever it is that I think is ideal, I can almost literally see that the ball is going into the hole and I can feel -- almost see -- the exact path the CB is going to take. I can play soft, I can muscle the ball in, I can feather my position to the point where I am hitting whatever side of another object ball I want to to nudge it into position.

The trick is to get to the set up that allows that to happen and that is one of the reasons I think the pre shot and shot routine portion of Stan's DVD is the most useful of anything on it and exactly why some guys see an improvement. The rest -- lines, edges, center, aim points, and pivots -- have nothing to do with it.

Lou Figueroa
Click to expand...

Guess your wife got a kick out of knowing their are other people that doubt your tenacity in cranking out that book of yours. Glad it tickled her funny bone.

U.S. Open One Pocket is looking good for me. Haven't signed up yet but will try to do so soon.

You've watched Stan's video a couple of times, right?

Have you tried making the shots using CTE/Pro One as Stan shows in the video?

Are you able to make the vast majority of shots using CTE/Pro One?

Thanks,
JoeyA
 
  • Like
Reactions: "T"
JoeyA said:
Guess your wife got a kick out of knowing their are other people that doubt your tenacity in cranking out that book of yours. Glad it tickled her funny bone.

U.S. Open One Pocket is looking good for me. Haven't signed up yet but will try to do so soon.

You've watched Stan's video a couple of times, right?

Have you tried making the shots using CTE/Pro One as Stan shows in the video?

Are you able to make the vast majority of shots using CTE/Pro One?

Thanks,
JoeyA
Click to expand...


Yes, I tried making the shots using the systems

The easy shots seemed to go OK, but when it came to the longer shots with more extreme angles I found it was pretty much a crap shoot and after a few misses had to make intuitive adjustments.

But the real kicker was when I tried to make the tougher shots and play position -- say a draw shot off the side rail with english to go across the table and pull the cue ball back up off the rail. Those shots were pure disaster because of the damn pivot. When I went to a bigger stroke, my alignment, while we could argue whether it was there as far as aiming is concerned, was out the window as far as my stroking arm and my cue -- because they were no longer traveling on the nice, straight, clean path that I've worked so hard to create over the years.

Oh yes: and congratulations on your most excellent showing at the Bar Table event. Nice one!

Lou Figueroa
 
Last edited:
JoeyA said:
For those who use it, what is "FEEL AIMING"?

Thanks,
JoeyA
Click to expand...
We all aim by feel to an extent in the real world where the phenomena of friction/throw and squirt/swerve exist.

Shoot a cut shot in with center ball. Then shoot the same shot with outside. Then with inside. Then shoot all three shots with varying speeds and distances. I don't think there is a system on earth that can systematically tell you how to exactly adjust your aim to pocket each shot for every playing condition.

So even if you happen to stumble upon the holy grail of aiming systems where you are absolutely guaranteed to have the aim line through the idealized ghost ball, once you try to deviate away from center ball or include friction into the equation, then there will always be some "feel" component when shooting.
 
Touch your nose with your finger and you are coordinating two moving objects in three dimensional space. How do you do that?

I think that “feel aiming” is about gaining experience and allowing the mind to control the phenomena. You cannot tell someone how to ride a bicycle. It is something you have to learn through body learning. All the words won’t do it. However, we can set up aids to assist one learn.

I think it is unfortunate when players do not allow themselves to learn where the front of the cue ball is on every shot. They do not allow themselves to learn to “see” angles nor do they learn from the experience of simply watching how two balls react when various kinds of spin are used.

All of these things require closely observed experiences in which we learn how hand, eye, and muscle interact to produce an outcome. With sufficient experience one can learn to “thread a needle,” see that a shot will or will not go, and can “see” that a particular position can or cannot be obtained.

When playing pool we call it “feel” when riding a bike we call it “balance.” It is all different types of non-verbal body learning, nothing mystical just something that cannot be communicated in words.

No systems player can tell us the exact amount of power, exact cut angle or relative spin they place on a cue ball. The permissible error on some shots is so small that such numbers would have to be related in thousands of an inch, 100th of oz of power. And if they could tell us these things they would not be able to tell us how to calibrate the muscles or determine the relative angles for many shots. Someone stated before. It is all feel.
 
Last edited:
JoeW said:
Touch your nose with your finger and you are coordinating two moving objects in three dimensional space. How do you do that?

I think that “feel aiming” is about gaining experience and allowing the mind to control the phenomena. You cannot tell someone how to ride a bicycle. It is something you have to learn through body learning. All the words won’t do it. However, we can set up aids to assist one learn.

I think it is unfortunate when players do not allow themselves to learn where the front of the cue ball is on every shot. They do not allow themselves to learn to “see” angles nor do they learn from the experience of simply watching how two balls react when various kinds of spin are used.

All of these things require closely observed experiences in which we learn how hand, eye, and muscle interact to produce an outcome. With sufficient experience one can learn to “thread a needle,” see that a shot will or will not go, and can “see” that a particular position can or cannot be obtained.

When playing pool we call it “feel” when riding a bike we call it “balance.” It is all different types of non-verbal body learning, nothing mystical just something that cannot be communicated in words.
Click to expand...


Sometimes, when I'm practicing, and say am trying to get one-rail position for a 14.1 break ball, I will be down on the shot, checking out the position of my cue tip on the cue ball and carefully modulating my speed with warm up strokes and the other side of my brain takes over and silently forces me to pull the trigger before I've completed my checklist. It's like, "Come on, shoot the damn shot -- you know it, just shoot it." And I do and it comes out perfect. More and more I find myself letting my brain go silent and just letting "the other half" lead the way. Which I think brings up another problem with all these aiming systems, which is all the chatter it creates in your brain.

Lou Figueroa
 
lfigueroa said:
Which I think brings up another problem with all these aiming systems, which is all the chatter it creates in your brain.

Lou Figueroa
Click to expand...

I very much agree and think that a substantial amount of learning to play well is about larning to quiet the vebalizations. This allows the brain to function better. Newbies should have it well planted in their brain.

Think in words while standing.
Stop thinking in words when you are down on the shot.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top