Long stroke vs. short stroke?

[Sloppy Pockets]

It's amazing and sad that in this day an age, with all the testing that has been done on the subject, that so many on here, especially long term members, have no clue as to the actual science involved.

Sorry to make you sad, Neil, but science is a process, not an absolute truth. I used to be involved in research, so I have seen it happen every day. Yesterday's minister of indisputable scientific truth becomes today's laughing stock.

I'm not ignorant of the work that has been done (so far) by the likes of Dr. Dave, Bob Jewett and Mike Page, and I have followed it all with the simple college physics background I have and it all makes perfect sense. Then I watch a top player doing things that simply don't seem possible and all that faith in scientific "knowledge" goes out the window. Even Dr. Dave admits he got it wrong regarding cue speed and squirt, but just today I've read several posts that are based on his old conclusions that have now been "proven" wrong. Who knows, maybe he was right in the first place?

Not everything in nature can be modeled after F=ma, or even differential and integral calculus. Engineers are constantly up against the wall of multiple variables in their designs, and must resort to differential equations to account for all of these things.

I have yet to see a single study that incorporates all of the possible variables within a single billiard shot. Cloth type and condition, cushions, ball weights, cue mass, balance and weight distribution, acceleration rate, stroke length, final velocity, follow through, tip type and shape, chalk type, ball condition, temperature, relative humidity... the list of possibilities can go on indefinitely.

In the meantime, I'll continue to hit the balls the way I always have and try to hit many more in the future. Pay attention to the results, and let my body work out the "physics" over time. As long as most of them go in the hole and I plant the rock anywhere near where I intended it to be, I'm happy leaving science out of this beautiful art form.

 

[Scott Lee]

Yeah, I know! I was j/k ya! LOL It was directed at Pat too! He's holdin' out as a "teetotaler"! j/k Pat!

scott
i drank the cool aid
i saw the light(s)
im playing better...:smile:

I know you are, and I'm proud for you. I also know it's only been a few months, and I can't wait to see how much easier and repeatable it gets for you in a year! Keep getting out there and "testing" yourself!

scott i think we said the same thing just in different languages....
i said death grip= less acceleration
you said relaxed grip= better timing

...or we can just stick with what Mosconi said..."A death grip, on the butt end of the cue, tends to deaden the action on the cueball." That pretty much sums it up! LOL

Scott Lee
http://poolknowledge.com

 

[Sloppy Pockets]

I don't think you should try to emphasize it to get more cue speed (or you might counteract the positive effect).

And I agree 100% with this. That's why I never tell my students to "snap the wrist" at the end of their casting stroke. Surely they would just slam the fly line down into the water. Instead, I trick them into doing it the correct way by telling them to grip a little tighter at the end of the stroke and their distance and loop control improves the minute they incorporate this into their stroke.

BTW, I have also studied the physics of the fly casting stoke in depth, but I never bring these things up in my teaching. What would be the point if I get them the results they are looking for merely by using visualization?

 

[Scott Lee]

Sloppy Pockets...I would agree with your last two paragraphs well. It would be impossible to create such a database, because of the infinite variables (not the least of which is the weather!). As far as learning by trial & error, there's certainly nothing wrong with that. What we do is try and help the student "figure out" some basic ways to measure improvement, using their own "natural" process (kind of what you do, but more directed and defined, with a bigger head start!). The end result is many people achieve a higher proportial rate of play, that stays with them, as a habit.

Scott Lee
http://poolknowledge.com

Sorry to make you sad, Neil, but science is a process, not an absolute truth. I used to be involved in research, so I have seen it happen every day. Yesterday's minister of indisputable scientific truth becomes today's laughing stock.

I'm not ignorant of the work that has been done (so far) by the likes of Dr. Dave, Bob Jewett and Mike Page,and many more before them, including Corialis hundreds of years ago and I have followed it all with the simple college physics background I have and it all makes perfect sense. Then I watch a top player doing things that simply don't seem possible and all that faith in scientific "knowledge" goes out the window. The problem is that the top player cannot explain why things happen (or if they do, it's fundamentally 'wrong'). The more likelihood is that there is a perfect explaination for "doing things that simply don't seem possible" (like what, for instance?) There is nothing in any pool stroke that cannot be defined, explained and measured. You just have to have the tools. Even Dr. Dave admits he got it wrong regarding cue speed and squirt, but just today I've read several posts that are based on his old conclusions that have now been "proven" wrong. Who knows, maybe he was right in the first place?

Not everything in nature can be modeled after F=ma, or even differential and integral calculus. Engineers are constantly up against the wall of multiple variables in their designs, and must resort to differential equations to account for all of these things.

I have yet to see a single study that incorporates all of the possible variables within a single billiard shot. Cloth type and condition, cushions, ball weights, cue mass, balance and weight distribution, acceleration rate, stroke length, final velocity, follow through, tip type and shape, chalk type, ball condition, temperature, relative humidity... the list of possibilities can go on indefinitely.

In the meantime, I'll continue to hit the balls the way I always have and try to hit many more in the future. Pay attention to the results, and let my body work out the "physics" over time. As long as most of them go in the hole and I plant the rock anywhere near where I intended it to be, I'm happy leaving science out of this beautiful art form.

 

[JoeW]

I think that we grip the cue stick lightly to maintain a straight stroke. A tighter grip leads to more power when this is needed. It makes sense that when you add the power of the arm muscle to the sped of the cue you will transfer more energy.

I have met more than one carpenter with a sledgehammer break; the big guys who can scatter the balls with what looks like little effort. He often has very strong hands from his work in carpentry or lifting cement blocks all day long.

Power and accuracy are tradeoffs for the rest of us.

 

[dr_dave]

Try hitting that draw shot with a tight/death grip and force-following through. I'll bet you'll lift that cue ball up off the table, and you never touched the table surface! The reason why this happens is that with the tight/death grip, you're minimizing the natural deflection of the cue tip away from the cue ball, and instead the cue tip is forcing the cue ball upwards.

Sean,

I have to agree with PJ on this one. The grip has no direct effect on the action of the CB. All the cue ball "cares" about is the hit, not what creates the hit. The important variables of the "hit" are cue speed, tip contact point, and the angle of the cue (left/right and up/down).

If you use a tight grip to hit the CB in the exact same way as with a light grip (i.e., same cue speed, tip contact point, and cue angle), the CB will respond in the same way.

Now, grip and stroke technique obviously have a lot to do with how the cue is actually delivered to the ball. You might think you are delivery the cue the same way with a tight grip, but this might not be the case.

This reminds me of a big argument I had with Tom Ross several years ago. He thought the "type of stroke" made a difference on a particular shot he was demonstrating to me. He was totally convinced he was using the same speed and tip position with both stroke types, and yet he was getting two totally different results (which he could replicate consistently with his two "stroke types"). After using a Jim Rempe ball (with chalk mark evidence) and my high-speed video camera, I finally convinced him that the two stroke "types" were creating different "hits" on the CB. On one of the strokes, he was dropping his elbow a little more creating a higher tip position even though we was sure he was not. For more info, see Tom Ross' April '08 and August '08 BD articles. I think the same sort of thing explains the differences in opinion in this thread.

Technique is important to create the desired cue speed, tip contact point, and cue angle; and if you change your technique, it will affect the outcome of the shot, but only if the cue speed, tip contact point, and/or cue angle are different as a result of the technique changes.

FYI, for more information on why grip, stroke acceleration, and follow through have no direct effect on the action of the CB, see the following:

effects of light vs. tight grip
stroke acceleration
follow through​

Regards,
Dave

 

[mantis99]

I would suggest that there is one difference. With a long strike you will Ted to develop more cue speed, thus creating more CB speed and more spin if hitting off center. For example, I lengthen my stroke for longer draw shots to more easily develop cue speed to create more spin.

 

[Scott Lee]

My bridge length stays the same, whether I am drawing the CB a foot or 20 feet. I also have the same start and finish position...for my body and my cue.

Scott Lee
http://poolknowledge.com

I would suggest that there is one difference. With a long strike you will Ted to develop more cue speed, thus creating more CB speed and more spin if hitting off center. For example, I lengthen my stroke for longer draw shots to more easily develop cue speed to create more spin.

 

[dr_dave]

Velocity, tip/CB contact point and angle of attack. Not grip pressure. As knowledgable a player as Freddy The Beard even thinks a tight grip helps to "tighten up" some banks - he's wrong too.

I think Freddy also suggests in one of his DVDs that cue twisting during the stroke is also required to make certain banks "go," but that obviously is not the case (per the explanation in my stroke swoop and cue twist video).

Now, Freddy obviously uses this techniques quite well, and they apparently help him personally achieve the speeds, tip positions, angles, and control that allow him to make those shots. It might not be the best advice for everybody, but it certainly works for him.

Just because Freddy is an awesome banker doesn't mean that all of his advice is useful to other people; although, much of it is.

Regards,
Dave

 

[JoeW]

Lets say that a player can lift 100 pounds with his arm. This means he can deliver 100 pounds of energy to the cue ball.

During the usual light grip the player uses 20 oz of arm power to swing and deliver a cue stick to the pool ball.

During the break shot he is capable of using 20 pounds of arm power added to the usual stroke for a fast hard break. Of course he must grip the cue stick tighter to deliver this much energy.

A skilled player (such as a pro) can deliver 80 pounds of arm power added to the speed of the cue stick and that is why he has a 28 mph break. To deliver this much energy he must grip the stick tighter just to transfer the energy.

In general it seems that a tighter grip is needed to deliver higher amounts of energy. And some people can do it.

 

[Neil]

Sorry to make you sad, Neil, but science is a process, not an absolute truth. I used to be involved in research, so I have seen it happen every day. Yesterday's minister of indisputable scientific truth becomes today's laughing stock.

I'm not ignorant of the work that has been done (so far) by the likes of Dr. Dave, Bob Jewett and Mike Page, and I have followed it all with the simple college physics background I have and it all makes perfect sense. Then I watch a top player doing things that simply don't seem possible and all that faith in scientific "knowledge" goes out the window. Even Dr. Dave admits he got it wrong regarding cue speed and squirt, but just today I've read several posts that are based on his old conclusions that have now been "proven" wrong. Who knows, maybe he was right in the first place?

Not everything in nature can be modeled after F=ma, or even differential and integral calculus. Engineers are constantly up against the wall of multiple variables in their designs, and must resort to differential equations to account for all of these things.

I have yet to see a single study that incorporates all of the possible variables within a single billiard shot. Cloth type and condition, cushions, ball weights, cue mass, balance and weight distribution, acceleration rate, stroke length, final velocity, follow through, tip type and shape, chalk type, ball condition, temperature, relative humidity... the list of possibilities can go on indefinitely.

In the meantime, I'll continue to hit the balls the way I always have and try to hit many more in the future. Pay attention to the results, and let my body work out the "physics" over time. As long as most of them go in the hole and I plant the rock anywhere near where I intended it to be, I'm happy leaving science out of this beautiful art form.

Can you describe for me an example of "things top players do that seems impossible"?

 

[CreeDo]

Good to see you again Neil.

Physics sometimes is more complex than it looks on the surface, but pool players tend to wildly overthink what's happening on a hit. Often common sense is enough to get what's happening.

The cue tip hits the ball at a certain location, speed, and angle.

Different tricks you can do with your muscles alter that location, speed, or angle when the tip hits the ball. And that's all that's happening.

Leinen, I normally agree with your posts, but I think your death grip example is off. If the location, speed, and angle don't change... then I believe your draw doesn't change either, regardless of the grip.

Wood is flexible, but it's not so sensitive and flexible that a firm grip on the back end will affect the amount of flex or 'give' of a shaft that's 40 inches away (made from an entirely separate piece of wood).

All that's happening when you death grip is... your four fingers, instead of 'giving way' a little as you swing forward, are staying rigid. As your arm swings in an arc, the hand is travelling both forward and upward. Those rigid fingers are carrying the stick in that upward direction, whereas loose fingers will allow the weight of it to keep it on level horizontal line.

Carrying the stick upwards = tip swings upwards too, so reduced draw. Whether you can get a 'scooping' action and lift the ball this way is something I'll play around with.

A wrist snap might add some speed to a ball but that's it. It doesn't somehow make special bonus spin when you hit the exact same place on the cue ball. Any extra spin is the result of hitting the contact point a bit harder. You can get the same thing without special wrist snaps by just doing your usual stroke, a little bit harder.

PGH: If you hadn't already guessed, I'm in the camp that believes there's no physics advantage to long vs. short stroke. You hit the cue ball at a certain speed, it doesn't care where your bridge happened to be during the swing, or how far you allowed your tip to glide forward after it left the tip.

I have found a shorter bridge helps me cinch shots, but the downside is that when I need to generate some power and I don't have enough room to pull back for a long stroke... I tend to spaz out trying to get the tip moving fast enough, and the result is less accurate than if I had just used a sensible bridge length.

 

[Scott Lee]

Not true Joe. You can deliver just as much "energy" (pounds I think you called it) using only the weight of the cue and timing. A tight grip is not necessary. I have something (a training tool) in development that will prove this in the future...a measurable, pressure-sensitive pool cue. It will open a lot of people's eyes!

Scott Lee
http://poolknowledge.com

In general it seems that a tighter grip is needed to deliver higher amounts of energy. And some people can do it.

 

[Tony_in_MD]

Are you saying that a shorter stroke is less accurate?

There are many reasons that we miss a shot even if we "think" we follow the same routine.

Short vs long......look at Allen Hopkins, or Earl two very different players, each very accurate.

You are what you practice, when you get out of your comfort zone, you miss.

I don't need to see my warm-up strokes to know if they are are straight or not, you have to develop some feel in your stroking arm and hand.

Try setting up on shots then stroking and shooting with your eyes closed, can you see your cue with your eyes closed?

See we all go down on a shot, do warm up, then hit, we miss!! why
We aim the same, follow same routine, we follow through, only variable that we do not know and cannot see for sure is how our arms are lined up and how are they going to move. By long arm swing warm up, you actually free your mussels and allows them to be in line, this is the reason shots where CB near rail are missed often.

 

[JoeW]

The transfer of energy problem could be addressed fairly easily.

If it is simply the speed of the cue stick then the player should be able to throw the cue stick at the cue ball and release their hand before impact. A device could be used to measure the amount of energy transferred rather than a cue ball.

If the extra arm muscle and hand are used to transfer energy then the measurement should be much higher when the player maintains their grip through impact.

My bet is that a tightly held cue stick delivers more energy.

The same thing happens with a hammer. You deliver more force with a tightly held hammer than by throwing the hammer at the nail. This can be measured by the depth the nail goes into the wood. I think I'll go try it.

 

[sfleinen]

Folks:

I don't know how it happened, but for some reason, in some of these replies, folks seem to be getting the impression that I somehow "advocate" a tight grip, or that I'm somehow advocating the use of a death grip to intentionally use in a game to manipulate the action on a cue ball.

NEWS FLASH: I'm not. Yes, that simple. I'm not. If it really needs to be said, I use a relaxed cradle as my grip of choice -- for all shots.

What I tried to say, albeit unsucessfully because I didn't bullet-proof the verbiage, is related to experiments with a homemade "pool robot" I did sometime back, using a straight maple shaft on a cue (no LD or laminated shafts). It was a simple device, with a spring piston, that I fashioned from spare parts. The part of the device that "held" the cue simply had a rubber-coated cradle that the butt of the cue rested in. It also had an optional top piece that I could screw onto the "cradle" to act as a clamp, to prevent any kind of recoil-type of movement in the cue after contact with the cue ball.

When I didn't use the clamp, and just left the cue resting in the cradle, the spring piston "delivered" the cue normally, and I'd got the expected reaction from the cue ball -- including draw. However, when I installed the clamp and tightened it down, I got an unexpected result on draw shots -- the cue ball actually was lifted in the air during delivery, and because the force it delivered was very consistent, I was actually able to consistently "launch" the cue ball straight into a pocket without ever touching the table -- almost like a jump shot, except that the cue tip never touched the table, and the machine wasn't cueing downwards into the cue ball *at all*. Mind you, the "levelness" of the cue never changed, the contact point on the cue ball never changed, and the force didn't change either.

I found that I could actually do the same thing with a very tight grip and a powerful stroke from my own arm, albeit not with the predictability or "accuracy" that the machine could.

In fact, come to think of it, I seem to recall a thread created by Barioni Cues, whereby Bob Jewett himself warned John (Barioni) that he may have unexpected results like this if he tightened the "grip hand" clamp down too much, preventing the natural recoil force on the cue, and he may even get a double-hit or bizarre miscues on what should normally be within safe miscue limits:

http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?p=3436553#post3436553
http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?p=3439478#post3439478
http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?p=3449296#post3449296
http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?p=3450005#post3450005

Thoughts?
-Sean

 

[naji]

Are you saying that a shorter stroke is less accurate?

There are many reasons that we miss a shot even if we "think" we follow the same routine.

Short vs long......look at Allen Hopkins, or Earl two very different players, each very accurate.

You are what you practice, when you get out of your comfort zone, you miss.

I don't need to see my warm-up strokes to know if they are are straight or not, you have to develop some feel in your stroking arm and hand.

Try setting up on shots then stroking and shooting with your eyes closed, can you see your cue with your eyes closed?

I am saying warm up strokes to be long to line up the aim, bridge long, ones you pause and ready to fire very short pull, followed by follow through is most accurate for slow shots (table being good) and long shots or thin cuts, faster shots requires longer pull, so as the shot requires you pull accordingly. I think Alex P pulls short on hard shots.

 

[Tony_in_MD]

Huh????

Sorry, I am missing the point.

I am saying warm up strokes to be long to line up the aim, bridge long, ones you pause and ready to fire very short pull, followed by follow through is most accurate for slow shots (table being good) and long shots or thin cuts, faster shots requires longer pull, so as the shot requires you pull accordingly. I think Alex P pulls short on hard shots.

 

[JoeW]

Admittedly this is not a very good test. However, it does support my hypothesis.

Without going into all the details, I found that when I had a tight grip the nail went into the wood about ½” farther than when I threw the hammer. The nail went 30 - 40% farther into the wood. And I am not a carpenter !

I can conclude that there was more transfer of energy with a tighter grip. Different conditions would yield different results.

I should add that I tried to use the same speed that I would use on a break shot. This isn’t really possible as I was swinging the hammer from over my shoulder. But you get the idea. I did not swing as hard as I could on either shot but did swing with what felt like the same speed and power I would use on a break shot.

It occurs to me that the nail would have gone farther into the wood if I had used a two pound sledge rather than my usual carpenter’s hammer. There must be some tradeoff here too. But it seems that a heavier cue would yield a more powerful break up to a point.

 

[RRfireblade]

Admittedly this is not a very good test. However, it does support my hypothesis.

Without going into all the details, I found that when I had a tight grip the nail went into the wood about ½” farther than when I threw the hammer. The nail went 30 - 40% farther into the wood. And I am not a carpenter !

I can conclude that there was more transfer of energy with a tighter grip. Different conditions would yield different results.

The main difference is going to he that in one case, you are adding your arm mass the the mass of the cue/hammer which would result in more energy transfer.

The test would be your tight grip strike and then throwing a hammer equal in weight to the hammer and the part of your arm that was in motion.