How well do you play in competition?

[JoeW]

One way to find out is to play the ten ball ghost. Play ten games with ball in hand after the break You get one turn at the table and earn one point per ball. The maximum score is 100. When you miss you have to re-rack for the next game.

Your “average is the number of balls you pocket /10.

This is your real estimated average. The second time you play you are in competition with yourself. The estimate is actually a little high because you get ball in hand. However it is a pretty good estimate of the number of balls you can expect to run in any given game given the vagaries of the game.

There are a few things I have noticed when playing this way. If you take it seriously you begin to get nervous because you want your average to be as high as possible. One screw up where you pocket one or two balls and then miss position can change you style of play. Your bad habits emerge and all you can do is try to control them and make note of what needs to be practiced later.

I have also found that I can play alone for hours using this form of competion with my last high average. Often I will play a set and then work on the short coming. After some time, when I think I have it mastered, I play another set.

One of the key ideas here is that you cannot run off the rest of the balls after you miss. You have to move to the next rack. This creates more tension and of course I have all of the usual excuses for why my score is not higher.

Contrary to what some will say, I think this is one of the best ways to find out how well you can expect yourself to play in competition. I think that most of my problems also show up. It is a benchmark, no physical opponent, no complaints about bad rolls, good roles or the amount of money on the line. It is just you against yourself.

 

[TX Poolnut]

This is like playing bowlliards without the second chance at the rack. I like it, plus you don't have to learn how they score in bowling.

I'll give it a try. Thanks Joe.

 

[tpdtom]

I get competitive anxiety when I play myself Joe ).

Seriously, good drill. I miss your articles...Tom

 

[macguy]

One way to find out is to play the ten ball ghost. Play ten games with ball in hand after the break You get one turn at the table and earn one point per ball. The maximum score is 100. When you miss you have to re-rack for the next game.

Your “average is the number of balls you pocket /10.

This is your real estimated average. The second time you play you are in competition with yourself. The estimate is actually a little high because you get ball in hand. However it is a pretty good estimate of the number of balls you can expect to run in any given game given the vagaries of the game.

There are a few things I have noticed when playing this way. If you take it seriously you begin to get nervous because you want your average to be as high as possible. One screw up where you pocket one or two balls and then miss position can change you style of play. Your bad habits emerge and all you can do is try to control them and make note of what needs to be practiced later.

I have also found that I can play alone for hours using this form of competion with my last high average. Often I will play a set and then work on the short coming. After some time, when I think I have it mastered, I play another set.

One of the key ideas here is that you cannot run off the rest of the balls after you miss. You have to move to the next rack. This creates more tension and of course I have all of the usual excuses for why my score is not higher.

Contrary to what some will say, I think this is one of the best ways to find out how well you can expect yourself to play in competition. I think that most of my problems also show up. It is a benchmark, no physical opponent, no complaints about bad rolls, good roles or the amount of money on the line. It is just you against yourself.

I am not going to disagree with you but I have always found what breeds success is success. Practicing in a way that stresses you out and attempts to make you dog it is not really productive. In fact you can turn yourself into a dog. Danny DiLiberto always said that "Good pool is nothing more then doing simple things you know how to do consistently". Pool except when you are playing safety play is a solitaire game. The guy in the chair can't beat you, it is not boxing or tennis where the other player can directly effect your game.

When you go into competition with the confidence you know you have a game and you know you can play, a lot of the self imposed pressure and stress is just not there. There should be no fear of losing, one of you are going to lose no matter what, that is just a fact. If you play your game that is all you can do. Training yourself to worry in practice is counter productive. In fact you could beat the ghost many times and the few times you don't will be all you will remember. Forget about it, just play your game.

I often watched Miz warming up before a match. He would just throw the balls out and just run them off never missing a ball. In fact if he got in trouble he would just move the cue ball with his stick dismissing it completely. The last thing he wanted to do was miss balls while warming up then go into the match. He wanted all positive input.

You often see less experienced players warming up before a match breaking trying to run hard 9-ball racks, missing then setting up the shot again and missing again, shooting long hard shots and banks and so on. You can actually see the panic set in as they screw up. Not the mind set you need going into a match.

All you can bring with you to the match is your game, work on that not some imaginary player. Playing the ghost is OK some of the time just to see where you stand as far as the percent of times you get out and clock your improvement over time but it is not a good practice tool. It is just good as an occasional bench mark. Of course that is just my opinion but it comes from years on being in pool rooms and watching players, often the night before a tournament practice. You watch them instead of doing positive practice, play themselves into a complete mental state and leave the pool room that night with their confidence damaged scared to death want may happen the next day.

 

[JoeW]

I understand your point and agree that too much self-competition may not be good. Thanks for the idea. I am not sure, but I think I read somewhere that Shane V simply kept running racks for long periods of time - 8 hours or so? But as you point out perhaps he wasn’t competing with his last high score. I found that self-competition keeps me interested when there is no one around to play with.

Me - I never have competitive anxiety -- sure , right.

 

[lstevedus]

I am not going to disagree with you but I have always found what breeds success is success. Practicing in a way that stresses you out and attempts to make you dog it is not really productive. In fact you can turn yourself into a dog. Danny DiLiberto always said that "Good pool is nothing more then doing simple things you know how to do consistently". Pool except when you are playing safety play is a solitaire game. The guy in the chair can't beat you, it is not boxing or tennis where the other player can directly effect your game.

When you go into competition with the confidence you know you have a game and you know you can play, a lot of the self imposed pressure and stress is just not there. There should be no fear of losing, one of you are going to lose no matter what, that is just a fact. If you play your game that is all you can do. Training yourself to worry in practice is counter productive. In fact you could beat the ghost many times and the few times you don't will be all you will remember. Forget about it, just play your game.

I often watched Miz warming up before a match. He would just throw the balls out and just run them off never missing a ball. In fact if he got in trouble he would just move the cue ball with his stick dismissing it completely. The last thing he wanted to do was miss balls while warming up then go into the match. He wanted all positive input.

You often see less experienced players warming up before a match breaking trying to run hard 9-ball racks, missing then setting up the shot again and missing again, shooting long hard shots and banks and so on. You can actually see the panic set in as they screw up. Not the mind set you need going into a match.

All you can bring with you to the match is your game, work on that not some imaginary player. Playing the ghost is OK some of the time just to see where you stand as far as the percent of times you get out and clock your improvement over time but it is not a good practice tool. It is just good as an occasional bench mark. Of course that is just my opinion but it comes from years on being in pool rooms and watching players, often the night before a tournament practice. You watch them instead of doing positive practice, play themselves into a complete mental state and leave the pool room that night with their confidence damaged scared to death want may happen the next day.

Another great post by someone who obviously knows what they are talking about.

 

[fathomblue]

I have to totally agree with this. I like as much positive feedback from my game as possible. I've noticed that a lot of the very good players do as well.

I try to start by setting up benchmark shots to see if the table is playing long or short. Then I set up short, easy shots to build confidence. Then I slowly increase the difficulty a bit and try to let my stroke out.

Then I'll try some pretty easy bank shots (I'm a closet Bank Pool lover) and make my adjustments. I'll try to finish up with easy shots, so that I end on as positive note as possible.

I'm by no means a great player, but since I've started doing this a couple of months ago, the outlook on my personal game has gone up and I'm becoming a "fast starter" and winning the first game in sets more often.

While I don't mind the OP's "stress test", I'd probably only do it once a week or so to check my game's progress. I wouldn't do it every day. To me, that would be like someone on a diet weighing themselves constantly looking for results. I could see frustration setting in by doing this too often.

But, in the end.....whatever works for you and your game.

 

[Quesports]

This and some similar drills are excellent ways to practice. I have one slightly different version where I start with 6 balls # 1 thru 6. I break get ball in hand and have to complete two full racks with no misses. If I miss I have to start all over from the beginning. Then I add the 7 ball and do the same thing again and so on till I get to the 10 ball. After that I need a break from drills and will just set up whatever I like and have some fun.