Breaking, Break speed and efficiency

Dukes_Lounge

Dukes_Lounge

The rookie
Hey guys,
So, I'm working on my breaks. So far, 80% (this past week anyways) of the time, I will pocket a ball on the break. (I aim dead centre of the apex ball, my cue ball is half way between the centre of the table and the rail, on the headstring)
My highest break speed is 16MPH, but generally I'm only doing 12-14 MPH, which is pretty weak.
However, I feel like I'm already putting my whole body into the break. I weigh just under 130 pounds, so when I try to break hard, most of my energy comes from pivoting my hips and into my shoulder to get a solid 15mph+ hit.... Or else just my arm alone, then I'm doing 12's....

Now, I do understand that it's not the power of the break, but the efficiency, that makes a good break (e.g. Pocketing balls and/or getting into a good position)

.... BUT COME ON!!!! there are some of you lovely people who have break speeds of 25-35MPH!!!!

I WANT THAT!!! Just to amuse myself, haha :p

So, my question is, how do I work towards getting closer to a 20MPH Break?

Btw, I'm using the house cue, which weighs roughly 17oz

Thanks :)
 
Last edited:
Dukes_Lounge said:
Hey guys,
So, I'm working on my breaks. So far, 80% (this past week anyways) of the time, I will pocket a ball on the break. (I aim dead centre of the apex ball, my cue ball is half way between the centre of the table and the rail, on the headstring)
My highest break speed is 16MPH, but generally I'm only doing 12-14 MPH, which is pretty weak.
However, I feel like I'm already putting my whole body into the break. I weigh just under 130 pounds, so when I try to break hard, most of my energy comes from pivoting my hips and into my shoulder to get a solid 15mph+ hit.... Or else just my arm alone, then I'm doing 12's....

Now, I do understand that it's not the power of the break, but the efficiency, that makes a good break (e.g. Pocketing balls and/or getting into a good position)

.... BUT COME ON!!!! there are some of you lovely people who have break speeds of 25-35MPH!!!!

I WANT THAT!!! Just to amuse myself, haha :p

So, my question is, how do I work towards getting closer to a 20MPH Break?

Btw, I'm using the house cue, which weighs roughly 17oz

Thanks :)
Click to expand...

This may help. Takes a lot of practice.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW1tsONEI_U

John
 
Doesn't matter how much you weigh. I've seen big guys with soft breaks and smaller guys completely rip into a rack.

Timing is key; no good turning your hips into it, lunging, throwing your shoulder forward and snapping your wrist if its all out of sync.

Try different stances - closer more upright and further back when down low.

The wrist movement is the easiest way to add extra mph to a break, given that you don't have any wrist movement already. CJ promotes the "hammer" style wrist movement and it works great on the break, and pushes the cue down into your bridge slightly to help the cue from leaving the bridge hand. A quick search on here will give you a full explanation of the movement.

As with a golf swing, you want to start to move into the shot and turn your hips slightly before any arm/ shoulder movement. Then the shoulder should drive the cue forward and contact should be made whilst the shoulder and hips are still turning and moving toward the CB. This is much easier said than done, and I only do this when I try to completely destroy a rack. Don't normally have a hip turn until after contact, just a transfer of weight from balanced to forward.

Imagine trying to uppercut someone (violence is wrong, kids!) with just movement in your elbow; now imagine with just movement in the shoulder. The latter produces far more force. This is how I choose to break. Little to no elbow movement, but instead using the shoulder.

If you can control the CB on a legal break, get a decent spread and make a ball then it doesn't matter how hard you break. But if you really want to gain MPH then practice is the only way. That's the only way to fine tune your timing.

Good Luck,
 
Pidge said:
Doesn't matter how much you weigh. I've seen big guys with soft breaks and smaller guys completely rip into a rack.

Timing is key; no good turning your hips into it, lunging, throwing your shoulder forward and snapping your wrist if its all out of sync.

Try different stances - closer more upright and further back when down low.

The wrist movement is the easiest way to add extra mph to a break, given that you don't have any wrist movement already. CJ promotes the "hammer" style wrist movement and it works great on the break, and pushes the cue down into your bridge slightly to help the cue from leaving the bridge hand. A quick search on here will give you a full explanation of the movement.

As with a golf swing, you want to start to move into the shot and turn your hips slightly before any arm/ shoulder movement. Then the shoulder should drive the cue forward and contact should be made whilst the shoulder and hips are still turning and moving toward the CB. This is much easier said than done, and I only do this when I try to completely destroy a rack. Don't normally have a hip turn until after contact, just a transfer of weight from balanced to forward.

Imagine trying to uppercut someone (violence is wrong, kids!) with just movement in your elbow; now imagine with just movement in the shoulder. The latter produces far more force. This is how I choose to break. Little to no elbow movement, but instead using the shoulder.

If you can control the CB on a legal break, get a decent spread and make a ball then it doesn't matter how hard you break. But if you really want to gain MPH then practice is the only way. That's the only way to fine tune your timing.

Good Luck,
Click to expand...

Cheers for the info :)
I'll definitely give CJ's hammer technique a go, as well as a bit of wrist.
I used to play a bit if golf, and do a bit of martial arts, not to mention my competitive ballroom dancing obsession that lasted a few years ... So transfer of weight, hip movement and timing is something that comes pretty naturally to me.
...but just putting that into pool is a whole different ball game, no pun.

In saying that, I've been cycling through different bridge hands; closed bridge is when I tend to push the cue downwards into the table , and the rail grab; which makes me swing the cue up after impact.. Not sure which one is better ... Yet.
 
Timing is the key. Body lift, hip swing, shoulder turn and wrist snap all add to the speed of the break, but it takes lots of practice to be accurate and time everything properly.
 
All the body movement you are doing might actually be decreasing your break speed if all the different parts are not coordinating well. Try breaking just as if you were shooting a normal shot at a very high speed (minimal body movement). You should be able to hit 15+ just doing that. If you can't you should probably focus on doing some strength training before anything else. Once you get that down, THEN add in hip rotation, wrist snap, leg kick, etc.
 
Masayoshi said:
All the body movement you are doing might actually be decreasing your break speed if all the different parts are not coordinating well. Try breaking just as if you were shooting a normal shot at a very high speed (minimal body movement). You should be able to hit 15+ just doing that. If you can't you should probably focus on doing some strength training before anything else. Once you get that down, THEN add in hip rotation, wrist snap, leg kick, etc.
Click to expand...

Thank you! Some really good pointers there.

I'll have to film myself breaking and post it up for you guys to spot me.
 
I struggled with break speed for a long time, I finally bit the bullet and went to an instructor (Tony Marcino)... glad I did. He had tons of tips and I ended up with a whole new breaking method. Now instead of "I try as hard as I can and maybe sometimes I hit 20" it's "I can hit 20+ at will".

Control is still poor but I practice it religiously and have resisted any urge to revert to bad habits.

I'll copy and paste some of the tips I got, hope they help you.


Before, I used my normal stroke with no body movement for my break, all arm action. Breaks were 17.5-18 mph.
Accuracy was ok but I never made a f&*$#%ing ball. Some instructors may recommend this way of breaking,
less moving parts is usually a good thing. But the speed just isn't there.

- Get your tip right up next to the cue ball when you line up, there shouldn't be an inch of air between the tip and the ball when you're at your neutral state (forearm going straight up and down). More like 1mm of air.

- Choke up on the back hand, like to the front of the wrap (YMMV) ...so that your new "neutral" has the forearm bent forward a fair bit instead of in a typical relaxed position where it's just up-and-down.

This is actually contrary to the popular idea that you should move it back.

The reason for this is hard to put on paper but basically, you're gonna lunge forward. When your forward swing naturally reaches the ball... if you had your back hand at its normal position, you're gonna make contact before the forearm managed to get forward enough. It won't be vertical, it will still be angled back a little. If you could imagine yourself frozen at the moment of impact like this... To get it vertical, your hand would have to move forward without the stick moving forward. So that's what you're going to do before you even start breaking.

- Some people talk about the lunge as if there's no twisting, you just launch off your back foot. Others talk about rotating the hips into it like a punch. There's some good info in joe tucker's racking secrets II about this. He really should call it breaking secrets.

Anyway, I think no rotation is a lot more logical for guys like us. So basically, bend your back leg and kind of hunker down a bit. Then as you swing, you're going to stand up, and push forward off that back leg... creating the lunge. You can let the tip come up or drive it down into the table, whatever is more comfortable. Focus on finishing with the tip WAAAAY forward. Like almost try for the center spot.

With your grip forward you're gonna feel like you really have some extra leverage on the cue and can demolish whitey, you just need to get your body in a position where you aren't impacting too soon (forearm back a bit from the vertical plane) or too late (forearm starting to bend forward and lose energy). All of which is another way of saying timing.

Let me know if any of this works out for you. If I could boil it down to one revelation, it's choking up the back hand, which is the opposite of what I grew up learning.
 
The key to developing a good break is by keeping things simple. Start by performing medium-speed breaks. Your arm and hands should be fairly loose and you should be hitting the cue-ball fairly center. Because you'll be moving your arm quite a bit, you'll want to give it some space so you'll need to stand a little higher than you would on a normal shot. Do this about a dozen times.

After that, continue staying as loose as possible but add a little speed. You'll need to do this without gripping the cue tighter or tensing your arm. The end result should be like a whip. Your arm and cue should be synchronized in such a way that everything comes together neatly with maximum velocity at the point of impact.

Btw, I average about a 24mph break and have exceeded 28mph. I'm also 155 lbs.
 
CreeDo said:
I struggled with break speed for a long time, I finally bit the bullet and went to an instructor (Tony Marcino)... glad I did. He had tons of tips and I ended up with a whole new breaking method. Now instead of "I try as hard as I can and maybe sometimes I hit 20" it's "I can hit 20+ at will".

Control is still poor but I practice it religiously and have resisted any urge to revert to bad habits.

I'll copy and paste some of the tips I got, hope they help you.


Before, I used my normal stroke with no body movement for my break, all arm action. Breaks were 17.5-18 mph.
Accuracy was ok but I never made a f&*$#%ing ball. Some instructors may recommend this way of breaking,
less moving parts is usually a good thing. But the speed just isn't there.

- Get your tip right up next to the cue ball when you line up, there shouldn't be an inch of air between the tip and the ball when you're at your neutral state (forearm going straight up and down). More like 1mm of air.

- Choke up on the back hand, like to the front of the wrap (YMMV) ...so that your new "neutral" has the forearm bent forward a fair bit instead of in a typical relaxed position where it's just up-and-down.

This is actually contrary to the popular idea that you should move it back.

The reason for this is hard to put on paper but basically, you're gonna lunge forward. When your forward swing naturally reaches the ball... if you had your back hand at its normal position, you're gonna make contact before the forearm managed to get forward enough. It won't be vertical, it will still be angled back a little. If you could imagine yourself frozen at the moment of impact like this... To get it vertical, your hand would have to move forward without the stick moving forward. So that's what you're going to do before you even start breaking.

- Some people talk about the lunge as if there's no twisting, you just launch off your back foot. Others talk about rotating the hips into it like a punch. There's some good info in joe tucker's racking secrets II about this. He really should call it breaking secrets.

Anyway, I think no rotation is a lot more logical for guys like us. So basically, bend your back leg and kind of hunker down a bit. Then as you swing, you're going to stand up, and push forward off that back leg... creating the lunge. You can let the tip come up or drive it down into the table, whatever is more comfortable. Focus on finishing with the tip WAAAAY forward. Like almost try for the center spot.

With your grip forward you're gonna feel like you really have some extra leverage on the cue and can demolish whitey, you just need to get your body in a position where you aren't impacting too soon (forearm back a bit from the vertical plane) or too late (forearm starting to bend forward and lose energy). All of which is another way of saying timing.

Let me know if any of this works out for you. If I could boil it down to one revelation, it's choking up the back hand, which is the opposite of what I grew up learning.
Click to expand...
Choking up on the grip is a very good point that I forgot to mention! Good advice Creedo.

You feel more compact and powerful in the set position, and gives a more accurate hit on the CB IMO, especially with a lunge and rise.

Practice it in slow motion at a table with just a CB and no rack. Notice how the forearm starts with the wrist ahead of the elbow, but as you lunge and rise up, the elbow catches the wrist up and contact with the CB will be (or alteast what I aim for) when the elbow and wrist are aligned vertically. I can't achieve this with just a rise, I need a lunge also.

On a side note; if you are to try this place the tip at the CB when standing with the arm by your side, then whilst standing place your bridge arm then get down on the shot. As you get down your footwork will naturally shuffle and get into a comfortable position so it teaches you how far back to stand.
 
What type of stroke do you use normally? Pendulum, piston, piston J, what?

I agree with Pidge that the wrist is the best way to add a bit of cue speed. The wrist can act in way as to multiply the other factors. When I say multiply a mean fractionally, like 1.2 or 1.4 as an example.

Since you are only 130, I would experiment with lighter cues if I were you, unless that 130 is all muscle.

My normal stroke is a piston type stroke. I hold the cue a bit farther back than normal for the break when I want to bust them & am not really trying to control the break.

Good Luck & Best Wishes,
Rick
 
Thank Creedo.

Timing, timing, timing, practice, practice, practice.

Remember that it is an athletic move.

:)



CreeDo said:
I struggled with break speed for a long time, I finally bit the bullet and went to an instructor (Tony Marcino)... glad I did. He had tons of tips and I ended up with a whole new breaking method. Now instead of "I try as hard as I can and maybe sometimes I hit 20" it's "I can hit 20+ at will".

Control is still poor but I practice it religiously and have resisted any urge to revert to bad habits.

I'll copy and paste some of the tips I got, hope they help you.


Before, I used my normal stroke with no body movement for my break, all arm action. Breaks were 17.5-18 mph.
Accuracy was ok but I never made a f&*$#%ing ball. Some instructors may recommend this way of breaking,
less moving parts is usually a good thing. But the speed just isn't there.

- Get your tip right up next to the cue ball when you line up, there shouldn't be an inch of air between the tip and the ball when you're at your neutral state (forearm going straight up and down). More like 1mm of air.

- Choke up on the back hand, like to the front of the wrap (YMMV) ...so that your new "neutral" has the forearm bent forward a fair bit instead of in a typical relaxed position where it's just up-and-down.

This is actually contrary to the popular idea that you should move it back.

The reason for this is hard to put on paper but basically, you're gonna lunge forward. When your forward swing naturally reaches the ball... if you had your back hand at its normal position, you're gonna make contact before the forearm managed to get forward enough. It won't be vertical, it will still be angled back a little. If you could imagine yourself frozen at the moment of impact like this... To get it vertical, your hand would have to move forward without the stick moving forward. So that's what you're going to do before you even start breaking.

- Some people talk about the lunge as if there's no twisting, you just launch off your back foot. Others talk about rotating the hips into it like a punch. There's some good info in joe tucker's racking secrets II about this. He really should call it breaking secrets.

Anyway, I think no rotation is a lot more logical for guys like us. So basically, bend your back leg and kind of hunker down a bit. Then as you swing, you're going to stand up, and push forward off that back leg... creating the lunge. You can let the tip come up or drive it down into the table, whatever is more comfortable. Focus on finishing with the tip WAAAAY forward. Like almost try for the center spot.

With your grip forward you're gonna feel like you really have some extra leverage on the cue and can demolish whitey, you just need to get your body in a position where you aren't impacting too soon (forearm back a bit from the vertical plane) or too late (forearm starting to bend forward and lose energy). All of which is another way of saying timing.

Let me know if any of this works out for you. If I could boil it down to one revelation, it's choking up the back hand, which is the opposite of what I grew up learning.
Click to expand...
 
victorl said:
Timing is the key. Body lift, hip swing, shoulder turn and wrist snap all add to the speed of the break, but it takes lots of practice to be accurate and time everything properly.
Click to expand...

victorl is quite right. And the good thing is that you'll know when you've done it right: it's not just the speed...it will feel "right."

The Power Break started working for me when I realized that I needed to choke up on the cue and stand closer to the table to get the body rotation to work the way it's supposed to.

I grip the cue about 10 inches from the butt-end (estimate; I've never really measured it) compared to my normal stroke grip of 2-3 inches from the end. I place the tip of the cue 1/4" from the cue ball, stand facing the CB with my grip hand at my hip. This tells me where my right foot should be (under my right hand).

After I step into my stance with my left foot I feel like I'm crowding the table. And I would be crowding it if I were making a normal, elbow/forearm stroke. But this isn't a normal stroke...you're going to "stand up" and rotate your torso and shoulder to develop power, and for that you need to stand close to the table. It will feel odd the first 100 times you do it.
 
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