Best practice drills, shots, routines etc.?

bdr1010

bdr1010

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I am looking to compile a workbook for myself of different drills, shots, and routines to start practicing on the pool table instead of just playing. Does anyone have any ideas or opinions on the best stuff out there? Looking for text documents or books that I can put into a workbook for myself.
 
bdr1010 said:
I am looking to compile a workbook for myself of different drills, shots, and routines to start practicing on the pool table instead of just playing. Does anyone have any ideas or opinions on the best stuff out there? Looking for text documents or books that I can put into a workbook for myself.
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Ideally, you should first practice long straight in shots for hours and hours before you practice anything else. Your cue ball should consistently come to a dead stop with no side spin. Otherwise, there's something wrong with your stroke that will carry over to any other drill that you do, and you won't have any consistency anywhere else. Any flaw in your stroke will show up here.

There are a number of books and DVDs that have excellent drills and shots that will help improve your game.

If you were to buy only 1 pool book for the rest of your life, you should buy "The 99 Critical Shots of Pool" by Ray Martin. If you practice the shots and read the section on fundamentals, this will really improve your game. It's real cheap too. http://www.amazon.com/99-Critical-Shots-Pool-Everything/dp/0812922417

If you were only to buy 1 instructional DVD, the one to buy would be Pro Skill Drills, Volume 1. It has tons of drills you can do, many of which are actually a lot of fun to do. http://www.proskilldrills.com/
 
I am currently using a drill that is easy to describe and can find fault with almost perfect strokes.

Place the cue ball on the head spot
Place object ball on center spot
Hit cue ball with stop english such that the object ball rebounds off the end rail and impacts the cue ball (resting near center spot) which then returns to the cue tip held at the follow through position.

If you can get the cue ball back on the cue tip regularly, then there is llittle wrong with your stroke (or table).
 
My favorite practice book right now is "Practicing Pool" by Phil Capelle. It has an exhaustive number of drills in it - there is sure to be something for everyone. Plus, it is spiral bound so that you can keep it open to the page you are using.
 
hope this helps

poolfoole said:
Ideally, you should first practice long straight in shots for hours and hours before you practice anything else. Your cue ball should consistently come to a dead stop with no side spin. Otherwise, there's something wrong with your stroke that will carry over to any other drill that you do, and you won't have any consistency anywhere else. Any flaw in your stroke will show up here.

There are a number of books and DVDs that have excellent drills and shots that will help improve your game.

If you were to buy only 1 pool book for the rest of your life, you should buy "The 99 Critical Shots of Pool" by Ray Martin. If you practice the shots and read the section on fundamentals, this will really improve your game. It's real cheap too. http://www.amazon.com/99-Critical-Shots-Pool-Everything/dp/0812922417

I agree the ray martin 99 critical shots is an amazing book. I've learned a huge amount from that book, even though it isn't a drill book. Az has a few good drills that I found. Force follow on youtube is a good video guide, there are tons of books. Personally i've been using the circle and the madness drill as my two primary practices.

Another stroke drill to ensure you're hitting center ball is the rail trick. You go from middle diamond to middle diamond but never raise the cue from your stroke. If hit with proper center english [and your playing on a proper equipped table] the cue ball will hit the middle diamond on the far rail, and return in a perfectly straight line to your cue tip. Otherwise just check out some material from some of the instructional guys.
FWIW hope it helps.
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Prior to getting myself a copy of Joe Tucker's Guaranteed Improvements and Phil Capelle's Practicing Pool, I thought about compiling my own drill book.

Its not hard searching through AZB forums, however, its tedious to filter and avoid duplicates. Go in with defined goals for each of your drills, warm up, shot making, position/cue ball control, pattern play, etc.

As for making your own book, any layouts on Wei's Cuetable.com can easily be cut, paste, edit in Microsoft Word, then have Kinko's printed it out and spiral bound into a small book.

Good Luck
 
Good info here. Rep to all of you.

Edit: you've given out to much reputation in the last 24hours!

lol
 
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Kick shots

I spend at least an hour every practice session shooting 1-2 rail kick shots. Set up a snookered position, i.e. block the 1 ball from cueball sight with another ball, then try to play the kick shot. Every time you miss, or hit badly, set it up again until you get the angles and speed right. Some shots will be safety hits, while others you should try to make the ball.

After doing this for an hour, switch to shooting normally again and you'll find that running a table is very easy! Your brain will adjust to the higher difficulty making normal shots a breeze for a while.
 
bdr1010 said:
I am looking to compile a workbook for myself of different drills, shots, and routines to start practicing on the pool table instead of just playing. Does anyone have any ideas or opinions on the best stuff out there? Looking for text documents or books that I can put into a workbook for myself.
Click to expand...
FYI, I have descriptions and links to many drills and drill resources here:


and here:


I'm you can find more than what you need there.

Regards,
Dave
 
This is one of my favorite videos to watch in pool. On it has Buddy doing some instruction in one of the Chalf off commercials.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkCG3q2PDa4&feature=channel

This is one of the ways you can acquire his instruction without paying for it.

I would, though, if I were you, just spend the money on a professional instructor to help you.

Bert Kinister is very knowledgeable, but he's quite different. I couldn't sit there and listen to him for very long. Freddy the Beard is good too. So are Buddy Hall's instructionals. Mike Sigel has some instruction on dvd out there too, as well as Nick Varner. The books by Robert Byrne were primarily all that was available to me in my growing days and it was sufficient. 99 Critical shots is the type of book that is hands down, fundamentally necessary to learn from.

Simply put, I would go to one source, like Buddy Hall, or someone like him, if you're lucky enough to get that. Going to too many different sources will throw you in too many different directions and make you feel over absorbed. Your game will suffer, and you won't know what to believe. Pick one mentor to look up to, and model that mentor..... "and don't change!"
 
I didn't really worry about this too much when I used to play, but since my "comeback" (after a 5 - 6 year layoff) I found it useful to compile information and go through it at the table, especially since I don't have a table at home.

I found tons of information here, or on various websites, which I printed or diagramed on blank table diagrams. Found a lot of good ideas from sources like Capelle, Kinister, the PAT, etc. Also have some old information I wrote on systems (pool and 3 cushion), notes from the two lessons I've taken, useful drills, one-off shots, trick-type or stroke shots, etc. It all went in the binder.

I recommend this approach, especially if you are analytical like me. It's all compiled in a 2" 3 ring binder, and I usually bring it in to the pool hall with me. People sometimes make fun of me, but then I know all the stuff in the binder and they usually don't... :)
 
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