Bending Over vs. Bending Knees
- Thread starter nrhoades
- Start date
Locking the knees maximizes stress on the lower back and hamstrings. It is for the young and/or flexible only.
...and short (not 6'3" like myself).
I'm almost complete with the "master copy" of my stroke, from which everything will be a carbon copy. I'm eager to get my master copy perfect.
I think a lot depends on your body size, height, and weight.
TX Poolnut <---Captain Obvious
TX Poolnut <---Captain Obvious
height weight and size come into it as does age and conditioning.
in the lod days where the marathon matches took place it was funny how stances would change going into 36th hour. But those days are gone forever now!!!
I agree, if we're only talking about straight legs versus bent knees. Now, if we start to bring into the conversation the *alignment* of those knees (i.e. whether they face into, or 45-degrees [or some angle thereof] away from the shot), that's an entirely different conversation altogether. In that respect, I do believe there's a big difference between "your foot goes 'exactly' here, and both your foot and knee face 'exactly' this way," and "just put your foot on the shot line, turn it 45-degrees or thereabouts, and that's sufficient." Big difference between the two!
I agree. Anything that is uncomfortable over the long haul is not good. (Save for at the outset, as when someone who'd never tried a snooker stance before and feels the typical pull in the calf muscle that goes away with practice/adoption of the stance.) Any body position that, over the course of time, continually "tells you" that this hurts no matter how often you do it (i.e. way past the muscle's initial "I've never done this before, so I'm not used to it" feeling), is not good.
I DISAGREE with this. This is the wrong analogy to use, on all counts. Boxers use bent knees for mobility (i.e. the ability to duck, spring, bounce, etc.), not for "solid"/immovability reasons. Weight lifters use bent knees for injury avoidance reasons (i.e. not placing the knees in a position where too much weight "pops that locked knee backwards or sideways"), not for "solid"/immovability reasons. These are not the reasons why a pool player should or should not use bent knees. The idea of a pool stance is to be comfortable, yet immovable / non-flimsy -- that latter part being key.
This Del Hill video describes it quite nicely:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=gSK4w_9S_x0
This actually goes back to the first point above, about alignment of the joints such that there's no sideways motion to introduce "yaw" in the cue delivery.
Hope this helps,
-Sean
Anyone who thinks that bending at the knees is wrong or for older persons should watch SVB for a minute or two!!!
Maniac
Isn't he like ...28?
Not to get too off topic but your lower body is absolutely moving when throwing any punch outside of a jab. Your legs are bent in an athletic position so they can initiate the weight shift into a thrown punch. Thats where all your power comes from....In virtually every sport too btw.
Practically no relation to pool at all. The legs are mearly to act as a base to allow the upper body to ideally be completely static. All they need to do is be comfortable and keep your upper body in good balance.
With the tables at different hieghts bending at the knees is the only logical way to go.
If the table is too low or lower than most you are bending too far at the waist or spreading the legs too far apart when your not bending at the knees.
When you bend too far it puts strain on the neck bending it back up to see the shot.
I played in the VNEA Master Team Final in 1998. We beat a team called Cabellas with Tony Watson. Mike Painter and 3 other really good players .
One side of the room had floor drains so the floor was lower on one end than the other. I was well aware of this being a problem for alot of players especially ones that didn't bend at the knees with the thought of adjusting to the right hieght.
Everyone played kind of bad. it was kind of on account of the floor.
One guy played real good. Ran out every time and won all his games with a score of 43 to 3.
We didn't have to play the last round.
I guess i don't have to tell who that was?
I played for years on the road. All the tables were at different heights. If you didn't adjust at the knees your upper body would get into positions that it wasn't quite comfortable with. Then all of a sudden the balls start not going in the hole.
I've seen players also that played for years and they had trouble with one of their knees. I'm not sure but it might have been from having the knee locked in the same spot.
My opinion is to bend at the knees to adjust to the height of the table.
Have a great day Geno.........
If the table is too low or lower than most you are bending too far at the waist or spreading the legs too far apart when your not bending at the knees.
When you bend too far it puts strain on the neck bending it back up to see the shot.
I played in the VNEA Master Team Final in 1998. We beat a team called Cabellas with Tony Watson. Mike Painter and 3 other really good players .
One side of the room had floor drains so the floor was lower on one end than the other. I was well aware of this being a problem for alot of players especially ones that didn't bend at the knees with the thought of adjusting to the right hieght.
Everyone played kind of bad. it was kind of on account of the floor.
One guy played real good. Ran out every time and won all his games with a score of 43 to 3.
We didn't have to play the last round.
I guess i don't have to tell who that was?
I played for years on the road. All the tables were at different heights. If you didn't adjust at the knees your upper body would get into positions that it wasn't quite comfortable with. Then all of a sudden the balls start not going in the hole.
I've seen players also that played for years and they had trouble with one of their knees. I'm not sure but it might have been from having the knee locked in the same spot.
My opinion is to bend at the knees to adjust to the height of the table.
Have a great day Geno.........
Is there anybody that can tell me that they can play for 5 hours straight without feeling a little soreness in their back or neck by the end? I just did tonight, and I tried all different positions... none of which didn't generate some muscle strain. But this may be expected because one is moving around, like any sport.
It is actually worse to feel pain in the back of your neck, cause if you do, it means that you are distributing your weight a bit more forward than you must. Your balance point must be between your legs around your waist/lower torso and you must not lean forward towards the shot while you form your stance as this may place too much weight on your bridge hand and this is not good. When you are taking your practice strokes, you must feel no strain on your bridge hand or your neck, cause if you do, it means that your center of balance is a bit more forward than it is needed. If you watch the pros, as they bend over to their stance, their head remains on the same vertical plane. (or it goes forward very little)
Watch Stalev: >>link<<.
Watch Hohmann: >><link2<
As they go down on their shot, their head doesn't drop forward.
Hohmann especially has textbook fundamentals. He bends his back knee a bit as well.
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In Hammerthrow,one of the track & and field events, the ball and chain is released with brutal power while the legs are in motion. The same way with discuss throw,shot put and javellin throw.
u can also see the same motion of the legs in Hubcap Hurling in the Redneck olympics in Dublin, GA.
Legs are not planted/anchored in any of the above mentioned events.
shooting sports
Shooting firearms of various types once endorsed styles that involved a locked knee "for stability". Those styles have died a well deserved death because flexed knees are more stable. My opinion, the only reason a locked knee works at all in pool is because we have more than two anchor points. We always have at least the bridge and often are braced off of the table also.
Easy enough to put the stability of the locked knee to the test, play a little one handed jack-up. Since we are primarily interested in stability rather than maximum accuracy, try locking both knees for awhile, then play with both knees unlocked. If it tickles your fancy try one knee locked too. Without the third leg of a tripod I find both knees unlocked by far the most stable.
Just as a little more food for thought, I'll bet a shiney new penny that without a bridge to stabilize it, you don't shoot with a pendulum stroke very often!
If we consider the bio-mechanics used in any other activity, the bio-mechanics in pool don't make sense. I strongly suspect that stance and stroke will be vastly different than what is typical today if people are still playing pool a hundred years from now.
Hu
Shooting firearms of various types once endorsed styles that involved a locked knee "for stability". Those styles have died a well deserved death because flexed knees are more stable. My opinion, the only reason a locked knee works at all in pool is because we have more than two anchor points. We always have at least the bridge and often are braced off of the table also.
Easy enough to put the stability of the locked knee to the test, play a little one handed jack-up. Since we are primarily interested in stability rather than maximum accuracy, try locking both knees for awhile, then play with both knees unlocked. If it tickles your fancy try one knee locked too. Without the third leg of a tripod I find both knees unlocked by far the most stable.
Just as a little more food for thought, I'll bet a shiney new penny that without a bridge to stabilize it, you don't shoot with a pendulum stroke very often!
If we consider the bio-mechanics used in any other activity, the bio-mechanics in pool don't make sense. I strongly suspect that stance and stroke will be vastly different than what is typical today if people are still playing pool a hundred years from now.
Hu