combo drills?

[Tin Man]

OK, I'm not looking for an aiming method discussion on combos (although Creedoo's thread was a good read).

I want to know if anyone has any good drills to practice for combos.

I have two kinds in mind.

Category 1: Money ball combos with ball in hand.

Category 2: Combos that come up in a game, ie laying slightly better but without ball in hand and must keep position on first ball.

Are there any good drills, or just set up a few shots and shoot them repeatedly?

 

[sjm]

Try this one. Set up the balls as below. Try to make the one-nine combo with ball in hand. Replace the nine to its original position, and remove the one ball from the table. Now try to make the two-nine combo with ball in hand, etc, etc., etc. Six shots in all. See how many you can make.

CueTable Help

 

[Neil]

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[CreeDo]

Thanks!

I got one more bit of advice for the non ball-in-hand situations. It's not genius or anything, basically it just boils down to winning a staring contest

The way I line these up is to get down as if to shoot the first OB into the 2nd, and look at the contact point where the tip would touch if I were to shoot with center ball. I look for a 'landmark' on the ball to make that contact point easy to spot. Ideally there's a little ding in the ball near it but if not, the balls' number or marking might help. Sometimes there's nothing.

The only thing I do that I don't see everyone doing (but I think more people should try) is to stare very hard at this point, and keep staring as I walk around the the table to set up my next shot... and keep staring as I get set in my shot... and basically never let my eyes off the spot. I let peripheral vision get me set on the cue ball and trust in it to line me up properly. I keep staring at the spot even as I stroke the CB. It works really well for me.

As for an actual drill... honestly I'd just roll 6 or so balls near the pocket and look for a comboable pair and then try it. See how many of the 6 you can wipe out without a miss and without repositioning the CB with ball in hand.