Fun practice drills

K

KissedOut

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I was working on my stroke, just banking one ball around the table looking for consistency and I "discovered"/"invented" a practice drill that I am really enjoying.

It is very simple - I use only the 2 cue balls, leaving the red off the table. Then I simply try to hit one of the cue balls so that it hits at least 3 rails before striking the other cue ball. Kind of like a 3-cushion carom without the actual carom. It is excellent practice for bank shots plus it is helping me learn the angles around the table better. I even played a 5-point game with another fella, doing this, and it was a lot of fun.

I definitely think I am going to incorporate this into my practice and maybe even use it as a warm-up routine.

Anyone have any 3C practice routines or drill they use that you would like to share?
 
I have personally observed Efren so this very thing in between rounds at the US open 9 ball. He only used one CB though with another OB.

If it is good enough for him.........



KissedOut said:
I was working on my stroke, just banking one ball around the table looking for consistency and I "discovered"/"invented" a practice drill that I am really enjoying.

It is very simple - I use only the 2 cue balls, leaving the red off the table. Then I simply try to hit one of the cue balls so that it hits at least 3 rails before striking the other cue ball. Kind of like a 3-cushion carom without the actual carom. It is excellent practice for bank shots plus it is helping me learn the angles around the table better. I even played a 5-point game with another fella, doing this, and it was a lot of fun.

I definitely think I am going to incorporate this into my practice and maybe even use it as a warm-up routine.

Anyone have any 3C practice routines or drill they use that you would like to share?
Click to expand...
 
Tony_in_MD said:
I have personally observed Efren so this very thing in between rounds at the US open 9 ball. He only used one CB though with another OB.

If it is good enough for him.........
Click to expand...

That is why I said "discovered"/"invented". I figured I was not the first one to do this. It is encouraging that such a well rounded player as Efren does it.

I had once heard that Semih Sayginer did something similar for practice, but he would hit the first ball, then 3 or more cushions, and then make the billiard with the ball he had hit first. That is crazy. When someone does it inadvertently in a game we call it a Sameh billiard.
 
KissedOut said:
That is why I said "discovered"/"invented". I figured I was not the first one to do this. It is encouraging that such a well rounded player as Efren does it.

I had once heard that Semih Sayginer did something similar for practice, but he would hit the first ball, then 3 or more cushions, and then make the billiard with the ball he had hit first. That is crazy. When someone does it inadvertently in a game we call it a Sameh billiard.
Click to expand...

We used to play this as a game in the UC Berkeley Student Union (back when they provided recreation for the members), and we called it uniards (as a parallel word to bi-lliards. I think the scoring rule is that your cue ball has to make at least three cushion contacts before hitting the object ball for the second time.
 
Suggested practice drills from Bill Smith/Mr3Cushion.
For Novice players (0.200-0.500) players banking the CB around 3 cushions or more to a single OB is a good drill to start with.
For higher Novice-Intermediate (0.500-0.750) players, same drill as above but with ALL 3 balls on the table.

For Intermediate-A (0.750-1.000) players, start out by ALWAYS shooting with the SAME CB. What ever your average is in this grouping try to maintain that average for 25 point games. IE; 1.000 player make 25 points in 25 innings, after 5 successful attempts, then 25 points in 20 innings and then 25 in 15 innings! When yo can achieve the 25/15 innings results on a regular basis, you can play with anyone in this country.

And lastly for the ELITE World class, (1.30-?), the practice method that the Old Time players, Johnny Layton, Willie Hoppe, Jake Shaffer Jr. would practice to warm up for World tournaments.
This game played against an opponent is, 'Pin Billiards!' It's played with a 3" skittle, (small bowling pin). The game is to 5 points, the object, NOT to ever knock the skittle down! If you DO knock it down, the player looses ALL their points! And that player starts from 0 again!

His mentor and BEST friend Ernie Presto, introduced the game to Him. He claims this game will improve, accuracy, CB and OB speed to a whole other level!
The best Bill ever did was run, 4 n out, 5 n out from the break and 5 n out from the break again for a total of 14 in a row!
 
Last edited:
shayne87 said:
Suggested practice drills from Bill Smith/Mr3Cushion.
For Novice players (0.200-0.500) players banking the CB around 3 cushions or more to a single OB is a good drill to start with.
For higher Novice-Intermediate (0.500-0.750) players, same drill as above but with ALL 3 balls on the table.

For Intermediate-A (0.750-1.000) players, start out by ALWAYS shooting with the SAME CB. What ever your average is in this grouping try to maintain that average for 25 point games. IE; 1.000 player make 25 points in 25 innings, after 5 successful attempts, then 25 points in 20 innings and then 25 in 15 innings! When yo can achieve the 25/15 innings results on a regular basis, you can play with anyone in this country.

And lastly for the ELITE World class, (1.30-?), the practice method that the Old Time players, Johnny Layton, Willie Hoppe, Jake Shaffer Jr. would practice to warm up for World tournaments.
This game played against an opponent is, 'Pin Billiards!' It's played with a 3" skittle, (small bowling pin). The game is to 5 points, the object, NOT to ever knock the skittle down! If you DO knock it down, the player looses ALL their points! And that player starts from 0 again!

His mentor and BEST friend Ernie Presto, introduced the game to Him. He claims this game will improve, accuracy, CB and OB speed to a whole other level!
The best Bill ever did was run, 4 n out, 5 n out from the break and 5 n out from the break again for a total of 14 in a row!
Click to expand...

Hey, thanks for posting these. I hope someday to get to the point of using some of the more advanced ones. But at this point I am using even simpler drills.

One that have been using involves just one ball. I put it on the center of the 3 spots we break from and then try to shoot it at the center diamond on the far short rail and back. It is a simple idea but I am working on sighting the shot, lining up and getting down on the ball and shooting straight with center ball. I go through the hole PSR I am trying to develop each time.

This drill works on it all, as far as I can see. I put a piece of chalk on the far rail by the diamond so I could see it better when I am down on the shot. If I hit the spot exactly the chalk pops off the rail onto the table, so I can tell I lined up and shot accurately. But then if the ball comes back to the right or left it tells me I had unintentional English on it, i.e., it didn't hit where I thought I hit on the cue ball. I have to pop the chalk off AND have the ball roll back over the spot I shot it from to be successful.

Then I can mix in speed control, hit it at lag speed, multiple lengths of the table, etc. The 5 dots on a fully marked billiard table can really be useful in coming up with drills as they give you a standard line along which the cue should travel, plus almost unlimited speed targets when we mix in the number of lengths of the table you are trying to hit it before ending at a particular spot.

I've even done it across the table using the 3 spots in the breakoff area. There I am trying to aim accurately, hit the CB in the center, and control the speed to get the cue ball to actually stop, after a set number of times across, on one of the dots.

Usually in the past I have found drills a little boring, but I like these, I think they have some value for someone like me, trying to develop a stroke after 40 years of herky jerky twitches. I'm sure other people have done similar things before so I do not claim originality, just that it seems to be helping me.

Between these 2 version of that drill and the 2-ball drill I described above I can practice useful stuff for quite a while without becoming bored or losing mental focus.
 
Bob Jewett said:
We used to play this as a game in the UC Berkeley Student Union (back when they provided recreation for the members), and we called it uniards (as a parallel word to bi-lliards. I think the scoring rule is that your cue ball has to make at least three cushion contacts before hitting the object ball for the second time.
Click to expand...

In our game we now call those Sameh billiards.

I wish I had known about 3C in my college days. Our student union only had pool tables.
 
KissedOut said:
I was working on my stroke, just banking one ball around the table looking for consistency and I "discovered"/"invented" a practice drill that I am really enjoying.

It is very simple - I use only the 2 cue balls, leaving the red off the table.
Click to expand...

Sounds good to me. I would like to get some 3c experience to help with 1P. This would be a good practical drill.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top