Did These Drills Help?

D

DrCue'sProtege

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
ok, as per Russ and the other chap's name that i cant recall, i did some practicing yesterday, and earlier tonight.

1) used the coke bottle, and did notice something about the stroke after the tip/ferrule/shaft got into the bottle.

2) worked on shot #1, hitting the draw EXTREMELY HARD

3) worked on shot #2, between the two balls. follow, stun, draw.

then i broke some racks, and ran several in about an hours time period. seemed to pocket balls better, and get better position. dunno if the above exercises helped, but i played pretty good tonight.

DCP

Shot #1 - The Extremely Hard Draw Shot.

CueTable Help



Shot #2 - Between The Two Balls - Follow, Stun, Draw

CueTable Help

 
Yeah, I've heard of that coke bottle thing, it seems to help. Try putting a dime on your arm (have a friend help you) just above your elbow, then take some shots, if the dime falls off then your stroke is off, and vise versa. I should prob. practice those shots too, thanks.
 
Here are two substantial drills for you. The first is called the 'L'. Its very old. Its also very good. You run the balls in position order up and around the L (numerical order in this particular example). Try it about 100 times and tell us what percentage of the time you can run them all out without a miss. If its too easy, try it without allowing the cueball to hit the short rail. :rolleyes:

The second drill is a Bert Kinister creation. You shoot the balls off in numerical order. Once you can do it in this position, you start rotating and randomizing ball positions, while still running them out in rotation.

These are quite a bit more comprehensive than what you're doing now.

edit: forgot the table...

CueTable Help

 
It helps some people to hit balls firm to loosen their stroke up. Not necesarly real hard but firm with control. Sounds like it helped you. Once you're loose I would work on more finess type of drills and shots.

Rod
 
Kyzyl said:
Yeah, I've heard of that coke bottle thing, it seems to help. Try putting a dime on your arm (have a friend help you) just above your elbow, then take some shots, if the dime falls off then your stroke is off, and vise versa. I should prob. practice those shots too, thanks.
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The problem is you can't do a pendulum stroke into a coke bottle, to keep your cue level throughout the whole range of motion you would have to drop your elbow.
 
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DrCue'sProtege said:
.... i did some practicing yesterday, and earlier tonight.

.... dunno if the above exercises helped, but i played pretty good tonight.
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It's hard to imagine these exercises helped so quickly. Normally it will take a few weeks for any changes or improvements to show up consistently, in my experience. Keep at it !

Dave
 
DaveK said:
It's hard to imagine these exercises helped so quickly. Normally it will take a few weeks for any changes or improvements to show up consistently, in my experience. Keep at it !

Dave
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Agreed. Drills are just that, drills. You have to do them often and work through them in a focused and open-minded manner to gain a higher level of understanding and finesse. Shooting a drill one or twice for 30-45 minutes doesn't really qualify IMHO.
 
PKM said:
The problem is you can't do a pendulum stroke into a coke bottle, to keep your cue level throughout the whole range of motion you would have to drop your elbow.
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Yah... I still haven't decided if when I get seriously back into the game whether I want to go with a pendulum stroke or an elbow drop. Btw, i only use the elbow drop generally on longgggggg shots.

When I was steadily playing, the bottle exercise did more than anything else I have ever done to immeditely improve my game. Yes, yes.. I know it introduces extra moving parts. I found that for ME though, that I built muscle memory much quicker using this drill, even with the elbow drop.

When having problems with long tough shots lately, I exaggerated my follow through, and dropped my elbow, and got right back into my old form.

I don't know, really. I will be getting with an instructor, and we'll see where it goes from there. I know there has been a lot of debate about the advantages/disadvantages of either stroke system.

I can't say much about whether it is right or wrong, just that it worked well for me. :D

Russ
 
Just do bustamante's hokey pokey stroke. Just swing your elbow wherever the heck you want.. elbow the person behind your back, whatever, It's all a part of his stroke and just run out still. Weirdest stroke I've ever seen. I cant even tolerate watching him play it's so weird.
 
cubc said:
Just do bustamante's hokey pokey stroke. Just swing your elbow wherever the heck you want.. elbow the person behind your back, whatever, It's all a part of his stroke and just run out still. Weirdest stroke I've ever seen. I cant even tolerate watching him play it's so weird.
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Watching some people's stroke can actually hurt your game, IMHO.

There's a kid I played some 9 ball with yesterday who has so much motion when he warms up, plus the fact that he probably warm up strokes something like 15 times for each shot, that it's almost unnerving. I found myself consistently looking away when he got down to shoot. Could he pot balls? A little...

Flex
 
When I want to work on my stroke a bit... or to check it out, I like to set up the shot similar to shot #1... but with a bit more separation between the two balls... and the balls lined up so that it's also a straight-in shot but they align perfectly with two opposing (diagonally) corner pockets.

The perfect stroke????... I pocket the OB and I draw whitey directly back into the corner pocket below my elbow.

If you've never tried it, give it a try on your favorite 9-footer. See how many you can make in a row. ;)
 
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