Kinda missing the point, you can hit the ball at recheck where you hit! Personally, I have the Rempe ball, I don't think you can do better
All you have to do is take aim and hit the ball "somewhere" and recheck your hit. If you aimed right ------>~<-- or right -->~<------- or whatever, you know you're ok! If not, better figure it out
I never "measured" my English! I just looked for consistency on both sides! If I put the cueball on the spot and hit the end rail with a quarter tip English and it scratches one rail to my right with right, it better do the same to the left! Before the Rempe ball , I couldn't figure out how "off" I was, but after
and then I worked at to where both my left and right are fairly identical. A lot of work, but we'll well we'll worth it!
Good luck
Eli
Hmm, I suppose in that regard you have a point, if you consider this important. Wouldn't the result of the shot simply tell you if you contacted the CB correctly, and where you hit it?
I can't imagine a stroke getting corrected in this manner however. How the hell hard are you smashing that CB that you couldn't stroke accurately through it?
By the time you check, and reset the damned training ball, your brain forgot what the hell just happened ... LOL, You're better off stroking through a bottle opening to achieve muscle memory.
IMO cuing the CB along side the table's long rail paying attention to keeping your stick as parallel to the line of the cushion rail as possible would be better than aiming at a target on the CB.
In fact, this practice ball is all too full of conscious thought.
Even placing the CB on the spot with a ball on either side of it about 1/4 inch apart, and shooting the CB up table trying to get it back between the two balls is FAR better to practice to hit the CB where you intend.
Once you can do that, and once you can raise and lower your bridge hand keeping the cue parallel to the table's surface, aligning for englishes should be simple parallel shifts.
Which brings up a point, my opinion, but I think staying away from that backhand and fronthand english crap, and rather aligning and stroking straight through the CB is a more sane, accurate and repeatable way to play.
Everyone plays differently though so ... hey ... whatever. Cupping your bridge hand, lowering and raising the cue stick while maintaining the cue parallel to the table bed is important to make second nature.
A loose backhand grip and accelerated smooth follow through should go farther in allowing you to execute the shot you have already envisioned in your mind.
Too mechanical an approach .... to me ... would seem to stymie improvement rather than lend itself to feel, and feel is what this game is all about.
