Any more pool "secrets"?
- Thread starter nrhoades
- Start date
Nate, there is just so much to learn that as long as you keep playing you will continue to learn the secrets of the game -- you've just scratched the surface. But it would appear you have just the right perspective and are keeping your eyes and mind wide open. Never lose that and the secrets will continue to open up for you.
Lou Figueroa
Here is another new way you can learn to develop your game, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130539349665&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT
tested and approved by many coaches and professional players.
The secret is that there is no secret. Don't let anybody tell you or sell you something that claims to be one.
The truth is that you have to work your asss off... remain in the learning process... and when given the opportunity to make excuses - take personal responsibility... and when you feel like quitting - postpone it for a year, and just go back to working your asss off.
If you adopt that type of work ethic, in due time you'll pass it along to someone else that needs to hear that.
The truth is that you have to work your asss off... remain in the learning process... and when given the opportunity to make excuses - take personal responsibility... and when you feel like quitting - postpone it for a year, and just go back to working your asss off.
If you adopt that type of work ethic, in due time you'll pass it along to someone else that needs to hear that.
Focus on a smooth transition between backswing and foreswing...your only thought should be on delivering a high quality stroke.
That's what some guy named Mark Wilson said, anyway.
That's what some guy named Mark Wilson said, anyway.
I played pool for a long time looking for "The Secret." I knew that if I could just discover The Secret I would play great pool. For the longest time, I thought The Secret might be a certain grip, a certain bridge, a particular approach to the table, maybe just the right head height or position over the cue. But The Secret always eluded me.
Now I've come to understand that The Secret, as a single entity, doesn't really exist. Instead I've learned that success at pool is contingent on at least four general principles.
Lou's First Principle of Pool
Playing great pool is the result of reliably reproducing the same mechanical setup every time you approach the table. In turn, the same mechanics will produce the same stroke each time you shoot. You can't learn to play great pool if your mechanics are different each time you setup. It's not a certain grip or head height, it's a process that starts with how you hold your pool cue and ends with your final shooting position. The problem with concentrating on and changing one particular element in the process is that, if you're not paying attention, you can easily alter something else, and change your results. Or, if you're not setting up in a consistent manner, there's no way to directly attribute any improvement to a particular modification, like a higher or lower head position. We've all had those sessions when, for a brief moment in time, we thought to ourselves "I'm ready for the tour." Balls go in from everywhere and we effortlessly move the cue ball around the table with astounding position. It's because, I believe, we all have a great stroke inside us. But, we don't do things the same every day, or even from shot to shot. The Secret, such as it applies to a great stroke, is to find the process that creates those great results and repeat them consistently.
Lou's Second Principle of Pool
Great pool is a result of setting up and executing your stroke with great precision. Perhaps many of you have seen the poster "View of a Cue" which is basically a foot and a half cue ball overlaid with graph lines that breaks the cue ball down into something like a 120 spots. The Secret is not about hitting the cue ball low, or high, or to the side -- it's about consciously choosing one of those 120 spots and shooting at it with the right speed and elevation to produce exactly the results you want.
Lou's Third Principle of Pool
Good pool players learn by hypothesizing on each and every shot. Each and every shot you've got to guess what's going to happen with the object ball and cue ball. After all, this is a game of hypothesis. You look at the shot and hypothesize that if you hit the ball at a certain point, with a certain spin, with a certain speed, one ball will go in the pocket and the other will land on a given spot on the table for another shot. You get down and shoot and test your hypothesis. If a player thinks they already know exactly what's going to happen on any given shot, they should immediately waltz over to the billiard table, or just throw a couple of balls on a pool table, and try a little straight rail. Many players may be shocked to discover what they don't know.
Then, you must pay attention and see if your results matched your hypothesis. And, if they didn't, how they differed. I believe being a good pool player is a lot like being a good card player. It takes a good memory. You've got to be paying attention, every time you shoot, both before and after. Did you over cut the ball? Under cut it? Did the cue ball draw more or less than you anticipated? Was the cue ball's angle off the cushion wider or narrower than you predicted. The Secret is to then remember for the next time.
The next time the shot comes up, you recall the previous outcome, adjust accordingly, and observe the results vs. your new theory. Then it just becomes a matter of increased refinement. Doing this in a practice session speeds up the learning cycle because you don't have to wait for any given shot to come up again (after all, some shots may only come up once a session, or even once a week).
Once you've got that, I think you eventually get to the point of "feeling" the shots by paying attention, using each shot to learn. IOW, using each shot as an experiment for which you first hypothesize about the expected results. Something like: the last time I shot this shot the cue ball didn't take as wide an angle off the rail as I anticipated. So I'll cheat the pocket; use more english: use more speed; hit lower on the cue ball; whatever, and try and get that wider angle.
Just as a side note, I believe memory also affects how we view our improvement, or lack of it. Unless you're keeping records (a good idea, but frankly, how many of us are that anal?) it's difficult to accurately remember how well you played a week, month, or year ago. And, as you progress, it becomes harder and harder to objectively appreciate any progress you might have made because of your own continually rising expectations. There was a point at which I felt I was playing well when I got my banks close. Now, it's more like I'm having a bad day if they all don't go (OK, almost all of them). I've forgotten my old expectations.
Your perception about how well you're playing can also be impacted by who you're playing and selective memory. If you're playing a run out player and you scratch in the side and then he puts a four-pack on you, you're likely to feel that you played poorly, berating yourself about the scratch in the side, long after the match is over. If you're playing a weaker player and win 9-2, you probably won't even remember that same scratch in the side and might even feel you played exceptionally well.
Lastly, on this subject, I don't believe I've ever met a pool player who didn't "use to play better." I think that that's more a case of colored memory, fondly recalling being in dead stroke sometime, long ago, and somehow believing it was a constant state of affairs. I wish...
Lou's Fourth Principle of Pool
I think any player can make the cue travel on a perfectly straight track several different ways. Put another way, you can produce a perfectly straight stroke using a wide variety of stroke mechanics -- different stances, bridges, grips, head heights, crooked or bent bridge arms, grip arm alignments, etc. But it has to be a straight (or even crooked stroke for that matter) that produces the desired/expected results for your hypothesis. I think that's part of The Secret.
Sooo, I guess you have to find the setup that makes the balls do what you expect them to do and then be able to reliably reproduce that setup on every shot. If you expect the ball to come straight backwards on a draw shot, and it goes sideways, you have no basis upon which to learn. If you want and expect the cue ball to track perfectly straight on a follow shot and it goes sideways on you, the same problem exists. So your starting point has to be there.
Then, several thousands and thousands of shots later, viola! You don't even have to think about making the ball. That’s the true secret to pool
Lou Figueroa
Last edited:
the biggest secret in pool is that you need to be able to hit the center axis of the cb at all speeds (from very hard to soft). the exact center with no spin. a good lesson would comprise of somebody showing you a good shot to do this, and saying come back to me in a week until you get it (or imrove greatly). this will make it so you hit the cb accurately, no matter where you aim, and is really the lifeblood of a good pool game. notice you dont need a 2 hours lesson to get this, you need to practice.
the other secret, i would say except for 2 cases, you probably dont need lessons (except for the one minute lesson above, or a good, concise book on pool). id say the 2 cases would be if you have hit a brick wall and cant go anywhere no matter what you try, or you are in a downswing (or slump). so in essence, "getsome" is correct, but you just need to put thought in your practice and learn from your mistakes under pressure.
Last edited:
I played pool for a long time looking for "The Secret." I knew that if I could just discover The Secret I would play great pool. For the longest time, I thought The Secret might be a certain grip, a certain bridge, a particular approach to the table, maybe just the right head height or position over the cue. But The Secret always eluded me.
Now I've come to understand that The Secret, as a single entity, doesn't really exist. Instead I've learned that success at pool is contingent on at least four general principles.
Lou's First Principle of Pool
Playing great pool is the result of reliably reproducing the same mechanical setup every time you approach the table. In turn, the same mechanics will produce the same stroke each time you shoot. You can't learn to play great pool if your mechanics are different each time you setup. It's not a certain grip or head height, it's a process that starts with how you hold your pool cue and ends with your final shooting position. The problem with concentrating on and changing one particular element in the process is that, if you're not paying attention, you can easily alter something else, and change your results. Or, if you're not setting up in a consistent manner, there's no way to directly attribute any improvement to a particular modification, like a higher or lower head position. We've all had those sessions when, for a brief moment in time, we thought to ourselves "I'm ready for the tour." Balls go in from everywhere and we effortlessly move the cue ball around the table with astounding position. It's because, I believe, we all have a great stroke inside us. But, we don't do things the same every day, or even from shot to shot. The Secret, such as it applies to a great stroke, is to find the process that creates those great results and repeat them consistently.
Lou's Second Principle of Pool
Great pool is a result of setting up and executing your stroke with great precision. Perhaps many of you have seen the poster "View of a Cue" which is basically a foot and a half cue ball overlaid with graph lines that breaks the cue ball down into something like a 120 spots. The Secret is not about hitting the cue ball low, or high, or to the side -- it's about consciously choosing one of those 120 spots and shooting at it with the right speed and elevation to produce exactly the results you want.
Lou's Third Principle of Pool
Good pool players learn by hypothesizing on each and every shot. Each and every shot you've got to guess what's going to happen with the object ball and cue ball. After all, this is a game of hypothesis. You look at the shot and hypothesize that if you hit the ball at a certain point, with a certain spin, with a certain speed, one ball will go in the pocket and the other will land on a given spot on the table for another shot. You get down and shoot and test your hypothesis. If a player thinks they know exactly what's going to happen on any given shot, they should immediately waltz over to the billiard table, or just throw a couple of balls on a pool table, and try a little straight rail. Many players may be shocked to discover what they don't know.
Then, you must pay attention and see if your results matched your hypothesis. And, if they didn't, how they differed. I believe being a good pool player is a lot like being a good card player. It takes a good memory. You've got to be paying attention, every time you shoot, both before and after. Did you over cut the ball? Under cut it? Did the cue ball draw more or less than you anticipated? Was the cue ball's angle off the cushion wider or narrower than you predicted. The Secret is to then remember for the next time
The next time the shot comes up, you recall the previous outcome, adjust accordingly, and observe the results vs. your new theory. Then it just becomes a matter of increased refinement. Doing this in a practice session speeds up the learning cycle because you don't have to wait for any given shot to come up again (after all, some shots may only come up once a session, or even once a week).
Once you've got that, I think you eventually get to the point of "feeling" the shots by paying attention, using each shot to learn. IOW, using each shot as an experiment for which you first hypothesize about the expected results. You shoot the shot and then compare your results to your hypothesis. Then, the next time the same shot comes up, you develop a new hypothesis based upon your previous experiment. Something like: the last time I shot this shot the cue ball didn't take as wide an angle off the rail as I anticipated. So I'll cheat the pocket; use more english: use more speed; hit lower on the cue ball; whatever, and try and get that wider angle.
Just as a side note, I believe memory also affects how we view our improvement, or lack of it. Unless you're keeping records (a good idea, but frankly, how many of us are that anal?) it's difficult to accurately remember how well you played a week, month, or year ago. And, as you progress, it becomes harder and harder to objectively appreciate any progress you might have made because of your own continually rising expectations. There was a point at which I felt I was playing well when I got my banks close. Now, it's more like I'm having a bad day if they all don't go (OK, almost all of them). I've forgotten my old expectations.
Your perception about how well you're playing can also be impacted by who you're playing and selective memory. If you're playing a run out player and you scratch in the side and then he puts a four-pack on you, you're likely to feel that you played poorly, berating yourself about the scratch in the side, long after the match is over. If you're playing a weaker player and win 9-2, you probably won't even remember that same scratch in the side and might even feel you played exceptionally well.
Lastly, on this subject, I don't believe I've ever met a pool player who didn't "use to play better." I think that that's more a case of colored memory, fondly recalling being in dead stroke sometime, long ago, and somehow believing it was a constant state of affairs. I wish...
Lou's Fourth Principle of Pool
I think any player can make the cue travel on a perfectly straight track several different ways. Put another way, you can produce a perfectly straight stroke using a wide variety of stroke mechanics -- different stances, bridges, grips, head heights, crooked or bent bridge arms, grip arm alignments, etc. But it has to be a straight (or even crooked stroke for that matter) that produces the desired/expected results for your hypothesis. I think that's part of The Secret.
Sooo, I guess you have to find the setup that makes the balls do what you expect them to do and then be able to reliably reproduce that setup on every shot. If you expect the ball to come straight backwards on a draw shot, and it goes sideways, you have no basis upon which to learn. If you want and expect the cue ball to track perfectly straight on a follow shot and it goes sideways on you, the same problem exists. So your starting point has to be there.
Then, several thousands and thousands of shots later, viola! You don't even have to think about making the ball. That’s the true secret to pool
Lou Figueroa
those are all good principles Lou. I think if you can have "FUN" while playing it makes the rest easier to accomplish. Many players will focus too much on specific things and as a result stop having fun playing pool.
The billiards games/sport has so much depth, you will never learn it all; however there will be plateau times where you must keep searching - as you are.
I did not see anywhere in your list...the mental side!
That's the biggest baddy of them all.
Here's another good one...shot selection...
Enjoy :grin-square:
I think this is one of those "secrets". Especially shot selection. I'm watching the accu-stats gameshow thingy and this is the biggest issue. It's not that they aren't getting the cue ball where they want it (though there is that), they choose positional routes that make things more difficult in the long run. Stopping the cue ball, when they should have rolled forward and taken a steeper cut.
I think it's beneficial for any player to watch the pros and try to mimic their shot selections, because they are always trying to maximize their room for error.
Also, choosing when to play safe is also important as well. The Shane Van Boening vs. Corey Deuel TAR match is a clinic on proper 10 ball shot selection by SVB.
Last edited: