In match adjusting
Well it’s back to league play. Last night was a test after over 6 months away from play. Part of my game is about adjusting at the table.
Before tinkering my first check was to make sure I was looking directly down the cue. I needed to make sure I was seeing equal amounts of both sides of the shaft.
The first thing that kicks in are the 3 principles that Jimmy White and Ronnie O’Sullivan espouse.
Step into the shot, cue straight and stay down.
Following that format failed to put me in stroke.
Breaking that process down farther, stepping into the shot only works if the shot line is on the mark. I use parallel aiming. So I located the parallel line through both balls and found my contact point to contact point line. A parallel shift to center ball sets the ghost ball line. Any necessary adjustments are applied setting the cue line. Stepping on that line improved shooting.
Troubleshooting farther had me questioning whether I was moving my body to the cue or pulling the cue to my body. Once it was sure I was keeping the shot line my primary organization reference, I turned to straight stroking. With a walled stroke I was confident that the cue running beside my chest to my bridge would run straight unless my cueing arm folding at the elbow skewed the travel. I checked that my shoulder was over the line, no problem. So lined up and cue moving straight, what could be the problem?
That left my grip and stroke. If everything is lined up, the subconscious mind shouldn’t feel a need to adjust. Just like Ronnie talked about during the WCS, it’s all about the stroke. Finally I had an area I could check. I allow a squeeze in my grip to adjust automatically. That allows my finger tips to add to feel and the sideways pinch avoids a fisted curl. I had to return to the earlier passive mindset.
Starting from a passive cue hold, is my subconscious tempted to adjust? The answer was no, however, my hand hold was already in a ready position. That meant it was anticipating having to act. A final adjustment was to relax my cueing arm and hand, AND ADD TRUST TO THE EQUATION. A deep in breath, a shoulder shrug and drop and ready to go.
Next was focus. It needed to be outward on achieving a result. When I add trust, the stroke can return to the subconscious. The conscious mind thinks in parts. The whole shot is a patterned assembly in the subconscious bridging unconscious resources and conscious intentions. Find the shot. Feel the shot and trust it to happen.
Finally the cue was going through and producing the desired outcomes. It only took about 6½ games into an 8 game set to polish some rust off, after 6 months away. Not bad.
In-match adjusting is often the domain of the expert. The non-expert is more likely to retreat into old ways, their comfort zone, when faced with a miss or two. Well intentioned changes to any part of mechanics are soon discarded in favour of the old ways, that feel more familiar.
Hopefully this process will help others develop that skill.
It’s nearly a month since I was back to league. Our league has 4 man teams. I captain a team of 7. I sat out 2 weeks and a bye captured another. Decided to devote an hour and a half to ready for my Monday matches. Started by simply getting a feel for my cue and straight cueing. Diagonal single ball stroke into the pocket, stopping to check that follow through points into the pocket. Progressed then to align and shoot, eyes closed, then open, checking for cue pointing into pocket.
Read my previous in match adjustments. My focus today will be on aiming, body to cue and passive stroke hand sense.
Next came the Effren table spread. Played an 8 ball version. Ball in hand, choice of high or low. Had to reshoot one shot, missed position, not shot. Second spread I focused on making sure, during setup that I put the cue on line, stepped to the line then my body moves to the cue, retaining line integrity. During this run, I started to look at the balls in clusters. There are usually two or three balls in an area such as one end. The total pattern is usually a cluster with a transition ball that moves me to the next two or three balls. The final ball in that pattern needs to transition into the final pattern leading to an opportunity to finish. The early planning stage starts here and makes its way back to the first ball.
Next miss I missed a shot with a higher difficulty level. Rather than retry I took a break. I had set up my phone on a tripod nearby to record. Looking at the missed shot, I noticed it wasn’t a shooting error on that shot. It was a slight miss two shots earlier. Ran too far on position. That made the next shot a touch harder and position harder too. Basically the way most issues like this snowball into a miss. Reset the earlier setup and ran out the balls this time.
Break practice. I had watched the fada video log On YouTube. He has one on breaking with Siming Chen. I used her suggestions and basically, only a couple dry breaks, this session.
Next a break, followed by game play. Two games like that.
Set up a 7 ball finishing drill. Three stripes, 3 solids and the black. Thrown on table. Ball in hand, choice of set. The idea is that the player should be able to get out. On a miss, switch to the other group. Once again the intention should be to finish.
My ride arrived. Feel ready for Monday. Opponents were in 1st place ahead of us, last time I played, so need my A game.
Saturday, my debrief day. With the video plus my notes, I now have a prematch strategy.
