Yesterday I had the experience of spending a bit of time with a former World Champion Player/Instructor. I spent 200 bucks for a three hour session with C.J. Wiley. I went into this experience and came out of it with an open mind.
Overall I would say it was money well spent. I did learn a few things about the game, and he showed me a couple of drills that I feel will help me in my future development. I knew going in that I had a penchant for lining up differently on successive shots and he picked up on this immediately. He had me shoot an angled cut into the side pocket, watched what I was doing and said "that looked actually pretty good" then proceeded to show me how to do it right.
Now, I am not a person that will learn something immediately. I tried lining up and doing what he was saying, how he was telling me to do it about 15 times before I finally told him, "Don't worry, I will work on this at home and it will take me 3 weeks, but I will get it." We then moved on to a stroke trainer that it seems CJ is using to show stroke motion and the snapping of the wrist to facilitate acceleration upon contact with the Cue ball, and it also seemed to appropriately coincide with a firmer grip that he likes to use. Using a Slip Stroke, this was hard for me to do without letting go of my cue and letting it fly across the room, but we managed to get through it.
CJ then opened up an app on his phone to analyze my shot tempo from aiming to stroke release, I had no issues here so we moved on to 8 ball strategy. I won't go into the nuts and bolts of that portion but will note that I found it quite similar to some of the advice that I have seen Mike Sigel give in some of his instructional videos...it doesn't surprise me that two world champions could have similar reasoning when figuring out a rack of 8 ball.
So we played about 10-15 racks of 8 ball, he occasionally missing a shot as not to completely annihilate me. I won a couple of racks, but could see how his wheels were turning when he was at the table, quite an experience.
We moved on to 9 ball and just played about a dozen racks before exchanging some pleasantries and a little theory before I headed home. I had mentioned to CJ that the local tournament I played in had a pretty sizable 10 ball break and run contest, he asked how much and I told him it was up to 2300 for the week (nobody won it that night either) but he said he would see me there.
I got to the tournament right around 8 pm and CJ came walking in the door right after I did. We ended up playing our first matches right next to each other, me barely eking out a win against a player that was less able than me, and him beating the lights out of a player that doesn't lose a whole lot. Well, you know what that means, the next round (round 2) it was little ole me against a world Champion that I had the nerve to invite to the tournament...it went about as you are all expecting, he got up quick, I barely won the second rack to tie it 1-1 then he closed it out with a 1-9 combo and a 4-9 combo...but hey, I won a rack.
I stayed around to finally watch CJ double-dip the guy that had beat him out for the hill in a really good match and shook his hand and thanked him for his time that day.
All said, I waited a day to do this post, some of it due to the newness of the experience, and some of it to see if my mind would change about the experience in the waning hours. It has, to a degree, I initially thought "he didn't really teach me much", and granted, he didn't, a few hours really isn't enough time to do so. However I did take two or three things that I am going to work hard on and reassess my overall results in a few weeks to a month. So after all, I have to say, it was worth my time, and it was worth the money, to shoot the shit, and the balls with a world Champion that CAN definitely instruct...I may go back for an hour here or there, but that will depend on how my game progresses, I am sure it will be 6 months before lessons cross my mind again, and CJ Wiley will definitely be on the short list if I choose to go that route again.
Overall I would say it was money well spent. I did learn a few things about the game, and he showed me a couple of drills that I feel will help me in my future development. I knew going in that I had a penchant for lining up differently on successive shots and he picked up on this immediately. He had me shoot an angled cut into the side pocket, watched what I was doing and said "that looked actually pretty good" then proceeded to show me how to do it right.
Now, I am not a person that will learn something immediately. I tried lining up and doing what he was saying, how he was telling me to do it about 15 times before I finally told him, "Don't worry, I will work on this at home and it will take me 3 weeks, but I will get it." We then moved on to a stroke trainer that it seems CJ is using to show stroke motion and the snapping of the wrist to facilitate acceleration upon contact with the Cue ball, and it also seemed to appropriately coincide with a firmer grip that he likes to use. Using a Slip Stroke, this was hard for me to do without letting go of my cue and letting it fly across the room, but we managed to get through it.
CJ then opened up an app on his phone to analyze my shot tempo from aiming to stroke release, I had no issues here so we moved on to 8 ball strategy. I won't go into the nuts and bolts of that portion but will note that I found it quite similar to some of the advice that I have seen Mike Sigel give in some of his instructional videos...it doesn't surprise me that two world champions could have similar reasoning when figuring out a rack of 8 ball.
So we played about 10-15 racks of 8 ball, he occasionally missing a shot as not to completely annihilate me. I won a couple of racks, but could see how his wheels were turning when he was at the table, quite an experience.
We moved on to 9 ball and just played about a dozen racks before exchanging some pleasantries and a little theory before I headed home. I had mentioned to CJ that the local tournament I played in had a pretty sizable 10 ball break and run contest, he asked how much and I told him it was up to 2300 for the week (nobody won it that night either) but he said he would see me there.
I got to the tournament right around 8 pm and CJ came walking in the door right after I did. We ended up playing our first matches right next to each other, me barely eking out a win against a player that was less able than me, and him beating the lights out of a player that doesn't lose a whole lot. Well, you know what that means, the next round (round 2) it was little ole me against a world Champion that I had the nerve to invite to the tournament...it went about as you are all expecting, he got up quick, I barely won the second rack to tie it 1-1 then he closed it out with a 1-9 combo and a 4-9 combo...but hey, I won a rack.
I stayed around to finally watch CJ double-dip the guy that had beat him out for the hill in a really good match and shook his hand and thanked him for his time that day.
All said, I waited a day to do this post, some of it due to the newness of the experience, and some of it to see if my mind would change about the experience in the waning hours. It has, to a degree, I initially thought "he didn't really teach me much", and granted, he didn't, a few hours really isn't enough time to do so. However I did take two or three things that I am going to work hard on and reassess my overall results in a few weeks to a month. So after all, I have to say, it was worth my time, and it was worth the money, to shoot the shit, and the balls with a world Champion that CAN definitely instruct...I may go back for an hour here or there, but that will depend on how my game progresses, I am sure it will be 6 months before lessons cross my mind again, and CJ Wiley will definitely be on the short list if I choose to go that route again.
