Exercise Your Mind, Exercise Your Game

Steve Lipsky

Steve Lipsky

On quest for perfect 14.1
Silver Member
The next time you practice, consider trying something a bit different. Here are some ideas:

1) Play for all behind-the-rack breakshots
2) Play for all side pocket breakshots (where the break ball is close to the rack, not the pocket). Then do the other kind of side pocket break.
3) Play a game where all you do is blast the breakshots open. Then reverse it and play a game where you are trying to fairly softly only disturb a subsection of the rack on a breakshot.

Also, mix it up by changing your usual key balls for these shots. You can do this even when you go back to traditional side-of-the-rack breakshots. Play a whole day where you look for this end pattern (3-8-5-1):

CueTable Help



Then play another whole day where you only look for this one (3-8-1):

CueTable Help



And another day where you look for this one (11-8-3-1):

CueTable Help



Play another day where you are only allowed to use a break shot if it was manufactured during the rack.

Play another day where you try to shoot at least 4 balls of every rack into one of the upper pockets. It doesn't matter if you have to do something awkward to make that happen - that is not the point of all this.

As you can guess, the idea is to flex your mind in how it thinks about straight pool. You may very well have preconceived notions about the game which are not accurate (we all do); continuing to do the same things over and over again will do nothing to dispel these errors. Exercising your thought patterns may open new possibilities to you, or even just change your ideas on percentages of certain outs.

- Steve
 
Great post Steve, John did a lot of practicing like that in his younger days.
 
Once again Mr Lipsky has enlightened us with hit wealth of knowledge..

Brilliant post!

it is incredible how many times these end patterns come up once you have recognized that they are in your rack. and it is easy to pick them out early in the rack.


Steve
 
A while back I sent Dennis a whole series of break shot diagrams similar to what Steve has here posted. They were given to me by Tom Kollins as a hand-out for his "School for Straight Pool, which he conducted in the mid 1970s. I have used them ever since and frequently practice by setting them up and executing them. Perhaps Dennis can post them if he has the necessary computer knowledge, I dont.

_Rick
 
Steve: Lots of real cool ideas in your post.

I have so much trouble just stumbling through a rack I don't know if I am up for putting additional restrictions on myself, but I can see how it could help expand our ways of thinking and help create new tools and ideas we could call upon as needed.


rikdee said:
A while back I sent Dennis a whole series of break shot diagrams similar to what Steve has here posted. They were given to me by Tom Kollins as a hand-out for his "School for Straight Pool, which he conducted in the mid 1970s. I have used them ever since and frequently practice by setting them up and executing them. Perhaps Dennis can post them if he has the necessary computer knowledge, I dont.

_Rick
Click to expand...

Rick : They were very helpful. As we discussed, Bobby Hunter who taught Schmidty said that he went to one of those classes and that class and an old Johnny Holiday book were what got him started playing the right way.

I think this will work:
View attachment Kollinsbreakshotpatterns.pdf
 
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dmgwalsh said:
Rick : They were very helpful. As we discussed, Bobby Hunter who taught Schmidty said that he went to one of those classes and that class an an old Johnny Holiday book were what got him started playing the right way.

Wow, Johnny Holiday. I have his books (2), set up and played with all his tiny diagrams back in the day. In fact, I still have two handwritten letters from him received when I had written him for clarification on a couple of fine points. If one has the patience to set them up, his diagrams are priceless teaching tools.

_Rick
Click to expand...
 
rikdee said:
Wow, Johnny Holiday. I have his books (2), set up and played with all his tiny diagrams back in the day. In fact, I still have two handwritten letters from him received when I had written him for clarification on a couple of fine points. If one has the patience to set them up, his diagrams are priceless teaching tools.

_Rick
Click to expand...


I have his books, too (3). I looked at them a few years ago and tried a few things, Easier said than done.
 
Tap tap tap! Very good post, Steve! :thumbup:

I'll add one more interesting way to vary your practise: play 14.1 normally, just take a BIH behind the head-string after every shot. You'll need to develop a few more balls into play near the foot rail and breaking up clusters requires more maneuvering than usual. If you run over two racks, you're a world class player (imho). Heck, even one single rack can be very tricky and requires some work. Good luck and don't get discouraged too easily with this :)
 
Steve, I think this is a fantastic post and has a little something for everyone, regardless of their level of play.

My only other comment is, "DAMN"! That's a lot of practicing! What are you trying to do, kill me?!
 
Simple yet very interesting

Well Steve you have done it again. It would be easy to take a difficult position and say what up dog. But here you have taken a simple position and shown it's many different facets. Bravo. And on a completely different note. I would like everyone to take it easy on Jim Gottier. Everyone seems to be running TWO hundreds on him lately, the latest offense being committed by Mika Cinnamon. ( a 257 and a 188 in the same session!). I guess the real blame for this has to fall on George Bush. Instead of sealing off the Mexican border he should have saran wrapped Finland. Thanks again W. And nice shooting to Mika.
 
For the record, Jim Gottier is running hundreds about as easily as anyone right now. He's had some bad luck lately (or good luck, depending on your perspective) but Jim's gonna run a 200 soon too...
 
I really like the idea here. Steve, I'll get back to you in 2023 when I am done with practicing this. Not much time these days.

Maybe I'll just skip the practice and ask Jimmy to play. I'll be running 200 in no time!
 
Steve Lipsky said:
The next time you practice, consider trying something a bit different. Here are some ideas:

1) Play for all behind-the-rack breakshots
2) Play for all side pocket breakshots (where the break ball is close to the rack, not the pocket). Then do the other kind of side pocket break.
3) Play a game where all you do is blast the breakshots open. Then reverse it and play a game where you are trying to fairly softly only disturb a subsection of the rack on a breakshot.

Also, mix it up by changing your usual key balls for these shots. You can do this even when you go back to traditional side-of-the-rack breakshots. Play a whole day where you look for this end pattern (3-8-5-1):



Then play another whole day where you only look for this one (3-8-1):



And another day where you look for this one (11-8-3-1):



Play another day where you are only allowed to use a break shot if it was manufactured during the rack.

Play another day where you try to shoot at least 4 balls of every rack into one of the upper pockets. It doesn't matter if you have to do something awkward to make that happen - that is not the point of all this.

As you can guess, the idea is to flex your mind in how it thinks about straight pool. You may very well have preconceived notions about the game which are not accurate (we all do); continuing to do the same things over and over again will do nothing to dispel these errors. Exercising your thought patterns may open new possibilities to you, or even just change your ideas on percentages of certain outs.

- Steve
Click to expand...

Wow. I only thought I was practicing straight pool, lol...
 
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