Getting worse as time goes by

[Williebetmore]

Just in the last year, I have noticed a deterioration in my game. At first I just thought it was because I only play once a week and I needed to play more, but lately I have been coming to the conclusion that my ability is diminishing. I am 40 and I feel like I am too young to be having a physical deterioration but at this point I don't know.

I have a serious lack of confidence right now in my ability to make certain shots that just a few years ago I would have posted up $$$ that I would fire it in. Maybe this is just a slump...maybe I should take a break from playing...i don't know. Pretty bummed about pool right now.

Suggestions and input on this are greatly appreciated.

U,
Just a note of encouragement. You have obviously played at a fairly high level, and there is NO physical reason why you cannot continue at that level, or even improve if you wish.

Your experience and knowledge should more than make up for any decline in physical skills. After all, all you are doing is moving a light, wooden stick with your arm. This does NOT require extreme strength, but it DOES require precision.

I truly believe that any good player can maintain and improve through dedication to their fundamentals. All of your thoughts and efforts should be directed at making a perfect stroke everytime. Dedication to adhering to your pre-shot routine and setup; then a straight, tension-free, repeatable stroke EVERY SINGLE TIME. The player that does this the most times in a game is usually the winner. More good quality swings = success. Good luck.

 

[CaptainHook]

Yo Captain,
Did Corey and his sidekick ever make it out to your place in Florida to meet that cute chick you had posted in your avatar?

Inquiring minds want to know!

Corey called and and wanted some action without giving up the nuts, yeah Like anyone around here could play him even. Bwa hahahahaha.

So he said he would play the ghost and we could bet $100 per game that he could run out ball in hand after the break, and
we said ok if it was 10 ball but no way in hell if it was 9 ball.

AlFahar or whatever his screen name is, what going to get me Kid D's DVD and I never heard from him.

I guess Corey & Gabe are busy doing that side gig they have.

Buddy should be down in a few weeks.

 

[Fatboy]

its happened to me a few times, I played from 85 to 94 almost the whole time(I was at the pool room all day everyday-no exaggeration) I missed a little over a year in the middle of that time period, and yes in 94 I took a huge slide backwards- I couldnt beat a C player, i couldnt get out from the 6 with ball in hand, I played like that for a month took a week off and still couldnt play I remember saying it took me 10 years to play good and a month to forget how-Iwas done with pool for along time. I was just burned out, So I retired from pool, and didnt play for a year, then played once in a while. Then in 2000 I put a GC4 in my home and played on/off until ,recently. I started to play again(seriously) and can tell that soon as my health is good I'll be playing better than ever. Right now on days I feel good I play good and I have been away from serious pool for 13 years. The lay-off is no problem I just have to put the work in and in 6 months I'll be playing stronger than ever. I have seen many guys start playing again after long breaks. Take a month or two off and do something else clear your head forget about pool.

I'm 40. I had 2 MAJOR back operations this year 6.5 hours each. I still need one more ,I had a degenorative condition condition in my back for years, i knew 20 years ago I was going to have it bad as i got older, but my point is at 40 years old there is no reason you cant play the best you have ever played. Whats wrong with your game is between your ears and that you can fix, clear your head and let it flow when you pick up a cue again.

 

[uwate]

Thanks again for the suggestions folks. lol viagra and laura may not be the ticket here. hmmm then again...maybe mixed together....

Captainhook...i hope your not seriously gonna give Corey 10ball ghost action. I would think you would need to do 13ball ghost with him and even then I'm not sure your liking it. He played the the 12 and 13ball ghost with some locals down here and after he got his break working..well lets just say that the ghost was looking in the phonebook for the rape crisis center.

For you older players...and by that i mean old enough to get senior tour status...I am curious as to if and when you began to notice your physical skills were diminishing? How did you compensate and how much of an impact did it have on your game?

 

[CaptainHook]

Thanks again for the suggestions folks. lol viagra and laura may not be the ticket here. hmmm then again...maybe mixed together....

Captainhook...i hope your not seriously gonna give Corey 10ball ghost action. I would think you would need to do 13ball ghost with him and even then I'm not sure your liking it. He played the the 12 and 13ball ghost with some locals down here and after he got his break working..well lets just say that the ghost was looking in the phonebook for the rape crisis center.

For you older players...and by that i mean old enough to get senior tour status...I am curious as to if and when you began to notice your physical skills were diminishing? How did you compensate and how much of an impact did it have on your game?

Damn, I glad he passed. We would all be broke.

 

[uwate]

We are talking about Corey Duel right? if thats the Corey your referring to, yeah it would have been a bloodbath doing the 10ball ghost, even on the Flamingo trap table.

 

[CaptainHook]

We are talking about Corey Duel right? if thats the Corey your referring to, yeah it would have been a bloodbath doing the 10ball ghost, even on the Flamingo trap table.

yeah, Duel. Dale said he passed, but who knows what really happened.

As far as our table, come on now be nice. Scott Lee was down last weekend playing 1P with me, he broke, made a ball and went 8 and out.

 

[PoolSharkAllen]

Corey called and and wanted some action without giving up the nuts, yeah Like anyone around here could play him even. Bwa hahahahaha.

So he said he would play the ghost and we could bet $100 per game that he could run out ball in hand after the break, and
we said ok if it was 10 ball but no way in hell if it was 9 ball.

AlFahar or whatever his screen name is, what going to get me Kid D's DVD and I never heard from him.

I guess Corey & Gabe are busy doing that side gig they have.

Buddy should be down in a few weeks.

Wow! Corey was apparently more interested in the pool action than in the cute chick. As the expression goes: If you have to choose between playing pool and girls, pool would win every time!

If that babe is still single, you gotta tell her to check out this gent in Colorado.

 

[Neil]

Thanks again for the suggestions folks. lol viagra and laura may not be the ticket here. hmmm then again...maybe mixed together....

Captainhook...i hope your not seriously gonna give Corey 10ball ghost action. I would think you would need to do 13ball ghost with him and even then I'm not sure your liking it. He played the the 12 and 13ball ghost with some locals down here and after he got his break working..well lets just say that the ghost was looking in the phonebook for the rape crisis center.

For you older players...and by that i mean old enough to get senior tour status...I am curious as to if and when you began to notice your physical skills were diminishing? How did you compensate and how much of an impact did it have on your game?

Mine started in my early 40's. Was my eyes.Was at a tourny., playing good, and had to come back the next day. Had the worse headache of my life,couldn't even bend over. So I just looked at the shot, put it on auto-pilot, quick bent over and shot. Ended up 5th. Got glasses when I got back home, but the weird part is, I can't play pool with them.I can't read without them, but due to my eyes, if I play pool with them on I see better for a while and then can't focus. My eyes change depending on how tired they are and my glasses don't compensate for it. So Iv'e learned to shoot at fuzzy pool balls. Thin cuts are the worse. I can see the edge, but not a little less than the edge. So I have to make an educated guess. Every year more and more pains crop up. Iv'e been in manual labor too many years. But they usually don't affect my game. The worse part about age is the mental side. I still want to play, but I'm sick of the same 'ol garbage when I go out. You can only take so many years of it. 6 mo. ago I was probably playing as good as I ever have. Just now the desire is really waning.

 

[whitey2]

I hear you...

Yeh, it gets a little tougher as time goes on. On the mental side, sometimes watching a
pool-related movie or two can reignite the flame and spark up your desire to play.

EDIT: Try this: It reminds me of how beautiful the game can be:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Y2AUElGOwcc

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Tyz2FYkkmEQ

 

[CaptainHook]

Wow! Corey was apparently more interested in the pool action than in the cute chick. As the expression goes: If you have to choose between playing pool and girls, pool would win every time!

If that babe is still single, you gotta tell her to check out this gent in Colorado.

It was my Wife's sister he was interested in, so I played a tape for the girls and he was not her type, but one of my wife's friends said he was cute, and she said what does it say on his shirt?, I said it say's Woodpecker Cues, and they all started to laugh, and she said i got something he can peck with his Wood-Pecker. LOL Silly girls.

We don't see much of her anymore, she hooked up with a guy who lives just north of Daytona, so she spends the weekends there.

As far as the pool before girls, just the oposite for me. I have been a Bass player since I was a kid, and being in bands and playing Bass is all about who can get the hotest ass. Girls come first for me.

 

[Snapshot9]

Fyi

Some of my best Pool was in my early 40's. Pool sometimes can run in streaks or seasons if you will. You have to watch for any eye changes.
I started to notice a decrease in my stamina about at 56 a little, and last year a little more at 58. Went to soft contacts last December from hard contacts, which my eyes went from 20/40 with astig to 20/25 with astig, and my eyesight is better than it has been since I was 5. My playing is up, but
I start to notice a little fatigue after 6 hours of playing. I can still go a 12 hour session, but don't plan on playing more hours than that any more.

And I try to stay in shape, and have beeen most of my life. And I don't drink.

 

[APA7]

It was my Wife's sister he was interested in, so I played a tape for the girls and he was not her type, but one of my wife's friends said he was cute, and she said what does it say on his shirt?, I said it say's Woodpecker Cues, and they all started to laugh, and she said i got something he can peck with his Wood-Pecker. LOL Silly girls.

We don't see much of her anymore, she hooked up with a guy who lives just north of Daytona, so she spends the weekends there.

As far as the pool before girls, just the oposite for me. I have been a Bass player since I was a kid, and being in bands and playing Bass is all about who can get the hotest ass. Girls come first for me.

Has NE 1 here actually met UR "wife" or her "friends" in person?

All U ever show us is pics stolen from MySpace??

Brian

 

[JimS]

You are way too young to be thinking that your problem is age... unless it's a stamina question and judging from your post that's not the issue.

Get some help... a good player to watch your game and see what's happening. Work! Really work on your game. Practice hard and work your way through the slump. Go back to very basic stuff.. stance, pre-shot routine, grip, length of stroke (my game gets better when I take a short back stroke and pause). I"ll bet just practicing on those basics and then carrying it over to your game will make a big difference.

You know from past experiences that you have the game to be a winner but somehow getting to 40 has made you feel old. Sheeeeeit! You just a boy. My body will be 64 years old this summer and some body parts have deterioated some....got a bad back, bad knee, bad shoulder, big time feet problems, but I play better pool than I ever have. I practice hard and I KNOW that my stroke is better than it has ever been. I 've changed the stance to compensate for the back and knee problems as much as I can. Got glasses and then got pool glasses. You learn to compensate for all that stuff but your body is not that old so don't let your attitude get that old. That's the bottom line... do NOT let your attitude get that old... not ever. Not ever.

 

[uwate]

The advice in this thread has helped me some this week. This really is between my ears and not anywhere else.

I actually hit balls this week on my home table and even got out for a second time this week and played in another $15 handicapped tourny. Won my first match and played well and then lost double hill the next match. I actually managed to string a few racks together and put a little heat on my opponents. These handicapped tournaments are funny though, the guy I lost to last night was getting the wild 6/7/8 with the call 6 on the break, and he made the money ball on the break 3 times in a race to 8. I was pretty happy with my performance, even though I got beat in that match.

My game plan to get my game back on track is to focus on stance/staying down/ preshot routine, stay positive and remember this is a game I play to have fun. While I work on building more confidence again, I am going to play a bit more conservative and try to get BIH through safety play instead of taking low percentage shots. The aspects of my life that jumble my mind while I am trying to negotiate a tough run out (like pressing work issues and my family), I still don't have any easy answers on how to resolve that. Maybe for starters I should scale back on surfing AZB when I should be busting ass at work.