Hello 14.1 forum,
Do you remember your first hard fought battle for victory in a match? How it felt when you came away with a win after much struggle for control of the table? I had just that experience on January 1st and I wanted to share it here if you care to read.
I am playing in a 14.1 league here in SE PA and I am five weeks in. I am relatively new pool player (about 17 months now, coming late to the game at 37) and started playing 14.1 about six months ago. Now I don't want to play anything else as I see that this is the ultimate game of skill, concentration, planning, execution and cue ball control. I am hooked, period.
I played the match I am referring to on Saturday night at 10pm against another league player who is even with me. No handicap race to 125. I figured the match to take 2hrs, but we finished at 1:50am, almost four hours after we started. I figured at midnight when I was down 83-41 that I was finished. But I held myself together and came away with the win 125 to 105. :smile: We traded big leads several times and had lots of safety play. Our high runs were only 19 for me and 20 for my opponent so nothing noteworthy in that category. Here are a few lessons that I took away from the experience.
1. Don't ever give up. Even if you can't run 100 (or 50) balls, you can still win with calculated play.
2. Don't fire at any ball that is *almost* dead! I did this twice early in the match and handed my opponent a wide open table. This is how I got 40+ down...
3. Don't schedule a match for 10pm when you have to get up the next morning at 7am to help your pregnant wife paint the nursery, take down all the holiday decorations, clean the house, play with your 3 year old, etc!
- Jason
Do you remember your first hard fought battle for victory in a match? How it felt when you came away with a win after much struggle for control of the table? I had just that experience on January 1st and I wanted to share it here if you care to read.
I am playing in a 14.1 league here in SE PA and I am five weeks in. I am relatively new pool player (about 17 months now, coming late to the game at 37) and started playing 14.1 about six months ago. Now I don't want to play anything else as I see that this is the ultimate game of skill, concentration, planning, execution and cue ball control. I am hooked, period.
I played the match I am referring to on Saturday night at 10pm against another league player who is even with me. No handicap race to 125. I figured the match to take 2hrs, but we finished at 1:50am, almost four hours after we started. I figured at midnight when I was down 83-41 that I was finished. But I held myself together and came away with the win 125 to 105. :smile: We traded big leads several times and had lots of safety play. Our high runs were only 19 for me and 20 for my opponent so nothing noteworthy in that category. Here are a few lessons that I took away from the experience.
1. Don't ever give up. Even if you can't run 100 (or 50) balls, you can still win with calculated play.
2. Don't fire at any ball that is *almost* dead! I did this twice early in the match and handed my opponent a wide open table. This is how I got 40+ down...
3. Don't schedule a match for 10pm when you have to get up the next morning at 7am to help your pregnant wife paint the nursery, take down all the holiday decorations, clean the house, play with your 3 year old, etc!
- Jason
