This, from a couple of years ago:
#####
Well, I finally did it and got my 14.1 lesson with the great Dallas West.
Just by way of background: I got some Accu-Stats 1pocket DVDs for Christmas this past year from my wife. But the gift that really got me was a series of small boxes she had individually wrapped and then strung together. She insisted I open them in order.
The first was a gift certificate that she had personally made up on the computer, complete with graphics, that entitled me to gas money to the city of Rockford, IL. The second box, also with artwork, had another gift certificate, valid for dinner at any restaurant in Rockford. The third was another gift certificate with a photo of a Marriott property in Rockford and good for a one night stay. And the final box held, surprise, one last certificate. It had on it a color picture of Dallas West and was good for "One Pool Lesson with Dallas West."
Apparently, sometime during the last year I had said over dinner that one day I'd love to get a 14.1 lesson from Dallas West, up in Illinois, or perhaps Ray Martin, if I was ever out in Florida again. She had figured out where Dallas was and put together the boxes for my gift. (Sorry about that, Ray.)
As a 14.1 aficionado, I have always considered Dallas to be one of the Straight Pool Greats, with a very pure 14.1 style. Even back on RSB, his name would occasionally come up and I recall discussing a Dallas West vs. Nick Varner match with Grady commenting and relating that Dallas got so good at 14.1 by repeatedly throwing three balls on the table and then practicing getting on a break shot.
Back at the 2000 DCC I actually got a chance to play the great man himself, in the 1pocket division. And, if you ever get a chance to see the Accu-Stats Grady/Varner match, you may catch a glimpse of me playing Dallas on an adjoining table. He beat me 3-2 (I had him 2-1!). Dallas was gracious in victory and provided me with what was probably the highlight of the tournament for me personally. Now admittedly, he may say this to all the girls, but as we were shaking hands after the match he said, "I really like your game. I was lucky to beat you." For a guy that came up playing straight pool and idolized the 14.1 gods, that meant a lot coming from a World Champion Hall of Fame guy like Dallas. That same year, at the 2000 US Open 14.1 Championship in NYC, I was repeatedly drawn to his matches and watched him play and defeat Ginky and John Schmidt and lose to Efren.
And so, with the help of Duane Tuula (thanks, Duane!) and subsequently Dallas’ son, I was eventually able to get in personal contact with Dallas and set up a lesson in Rockford. As I spoke to him on the phone I told him that my basic idea was not to spend much time on basics, but rather let me pop a rack wide open, start a run, and have him talk me through the shots, position, and racks, explaining why one shot should be selected over another.
So on a Monday morning about three weeks ago, I met Dallas and his wife, Shirley, at the Rockford Denny’s and we sat and chatted a bit. Dallas is still as gentlemanly and cordial as ever and over coffee he explained to me that he doesn’t shoot much anymore, having had an eye operation to insert a lens that didn’t quite take -- he said that nowadays he has difficulty focusing out past six feet. We drove out to his studio in a converted barracks out near the Rockford Airport. An old Brunswick table with clay style balls, and true to my request, he had me set up a break ball and that’s were the fun started.
I asked him about break ball theory and asked him to set up the balls for his ideal break situation. And he showed me the set up and where he wanted to go into the stack. That alone was worth a lot. From there we went off to discuss break balls in general: do you prefer a higher or lower break ball (higher); all things being equal will you chose a poorer break ball on the left side in lieu of a better position on the right side (right side); do you play for break balls underneath the rack (no, it sends too many balls up table); do you favor follow or draw for your break shots (draw, to a surprising degree).
And then we had a chuckle when I asked him what he thought of the side pocket break, popular at Bob’s DCC 14.1 Challenge. He didn’t know about this event, so I explained as much as I knew and we finally came back to my original question and he kind of just shook his head and asked me, with a twinkle in his eye, “I don’t like it. Let me ask you something: when they shoot that break shot, what happens? Do the balls open up pretty good?”
And I said, “Sure -- they bust wide open.” And he shot back, “Exactly. And that’s why it’s no good -- it opens them up too much. You lose control of the balls.” And that’s when he threw out one of what was to be many simple but insightful gems, “Work the rack, don’t let the rack work you.” From there we talked about Mosconi, and Greenleaf, and Caras, and Joe Diehl and their preferred styles of playing and breaking and he showed me Caras’ favored break shot which made me blurt out, “Really?!”
All this and neither of us had hit a ball yet.
And so he said, ”Let’s go, open them up” and I rearranged the balls to his favored position and off we went. Each shot, I’d suggest a ball to be shot and what position to be played and often, frequently, well, almost every time I was wrong and he’d correct me and say, “No, you want to do this instead” and then explain why. In all honesty, I’d have to calculate that I was wrong in my selection around 60% of the time. At another point I had two balls on the end rail behind the rack and it was an obvious play: shoot the first ball into the right pocket, lay the cue ball on the rail for position for a gentle back cut on the second ball to the opposite pocket to go up table. I shoot the first ball and lay it on the rail and he stops me and says, “No. You let it go too far.”
What I had done was to gently shoot the first ball with slow follow and the cue ball had rolled forward, like maybe an inch or two. What Dallas was telling me was that the right way to shoot the shot was with draw to bring the cue ball back an inch or two: a total discrepancy of maybe three inches and he said, “That’s what you have to do: fight for every inch, don’t get lazy.” That was an eye opener.
And so it went, shot after shot until, without realizing it, I had run somewhere around 70-80 balls fresh out of the gate. When I finally missed (I had no shot and was frozen against the stack and missed a table length kick) he said, “You have a real nice touch, Lou. And, I know you didn’t want to get into basics, but… would you like to know what took me from being a 70-ball runner to the next level? Because I can see that’s where you’re at and it’s something you could work on.” And I said (wait for it), “Yes.” And he told me and frankly it’s not something I’m going to give away. You all need to see Dallas for that one, but believe me, it has been helping me *A Lot.* In this same vein, he showed me two shots and their variants that he said were essential for me to learn to excel at straight pool (I knew one of them from my 1pocket endeavors, but not the other.)
We also talked about aiming systems and I described current thoughts on the subject and he just shook his head and said, “Just an appeal to the vanity of man.” (I’ll let you figure out what he meant by that ;-) Manufacturing, or as he likes to call it, “fabricating” break balls and key balls. How to use other object balls to break up clusters. How some cut shots are deceptive. How to kill cue ball angles off object balls. He showed me caroms and combos and in particular a two-ball frozen combo that I swear I thought wouldn’t go. (In fact, I was incredulous and swore it wouldn’t go. But he showed me how to do it.)
At the end of four hours I could tell he was getting a little tired (he’s 70 now, but looks great) and I called it a wrap. Honestly, spending those four hours with Dallas was probably one of the best things I‘ve ever done for my pool game and I loved every minute of it. For the entire time I spent with him I felt as though Dallas was willing to share with me any and all knowledge he had and provided a thoughtful answer to each of my queries. And here’s one of the best things about the whole experience that goes beyond any specific tidbit of information he gave me: when I play 14.1 now, I hear Dallas in my head as if we were still back in his studio while he is talking me though the racks. I now have him in my brain and know what the right shot is. And, it’s kinda funny because every once in a while I’ll go against what Dallas is telling me to do and, almost invariably, the shot turns out badly for me and I have to laugh out loud -- me, the student, questioning The Master.
And so that’s it. If you love 14.1, and can get to Rockford, IL, you need to go now.
#####
Lou Figueroa
At 17 years old he made me nervous, and I wasn't scared of much.
)
