Is a Slip Stroke OK?
- Thread starter zpele
- Start date
Thanks for all the replys. I was under the impression that the slip happens after contact with the cueball for adequate follow-through when you are not allowing your elbow to drop.
This is what I am doing and what makes me think I need to either shorten my follow-through (weird..) or move my bridge hand a few inches closer to extend the natural follow-through without a slip stroke or an elbow drop.
As for moving my hand farther back on the cue I hold it at the balance point already so that isn't really an option.
The other thing that may play into this discussion is that the stroke is straighter without an elbow-drop. It was always straight at the point of cueball contact but sometimes wavered a bit at the end of the follow-through.
Now it appears to follow the line of aim perfectly and stop on the felt naturally even on shots with high english.
This is what I am doing and what makes me think I need to either shorten my follow-through (weird..) or move my bridge hand a few inches closer to extend the natural follow-through without a slip stroke or an elbow drop.
As for moving my hand farther back on the cue I hold it at the balance point already so that isn't really an option.
The other thing that may play into this discussion is that the stroke is straighter without an elbow-drop. It was always straight at the point of cueball contact but sometimes wavered a bit at the end of the follow-through.
Now it appears to follow the line of aim perfectly and stop on the felt naturally even on shots with high english.
Mr. Phelsson
Registered
I will tell u what nobobody dares!!! If your stroke feels combfotable to u where u can make a shot and get reasonable position( in the vacinity of where you are hopeing). Do not change your stroke!!!! Fact of the matter is this, what I or any professional pool player deem to be an acceptable "stroke" varies. The fact of the matter is this, if you feel comfortable with your stroke, and by which I mean this. If you feel right with the way you stroke your cue, if you hit exactly where you need to on the cue ball so it hits the object ball exactly so it is pocketed, and the cue ball goes in the vacinity of your desired location( ideal position) then you are doing everything correct. The main thing is FOCUS not letting anything distract you from what you are attempting to accomplish is the most fundamental rule, no matter what anyone tells you, even if they are a "pro" they don't see or feel what you do. You just stick to feeling comfortable with your stroke and concentrating on where you need to strike the cue ball and object ball to get your desired results, and evrything will fall into place!!!! Seriously just FOCUS!!!!
Don't you owe someone a cue?
I recorded Wayne Norcross a few years ago, trying to capture the slip stroke.
He doesn't use it all the time, and some times he adds the stroke slip in the same shot. Please excuse the camera movement.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb6CKYqTC98
He doesn't use it all the time, and some times he adds the stroke slip in the same shot. Please excuse the camera movement.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb6CKYqTC98
Well I can't figure out what Hopkins does. He comes forward with the cue, almost stops about an inch before the ball, and then whatever he does he does it so fast I can't tell what he's doing. I thought maybe he lets it slip. But if when he almost stops you're calling that a quiver: sounds good. If then he's doing the opposite of slipping and instead he's triggering: I've learned something. As I said, he does it so fast I can't tell what he's doing.lol, Allen has more of a quiver trigger style !
koskimomin
Registered
What is a slip stroke?
Watch the you tube video from the link Johnny P. Provides a few posts above. Watch the guy's back hand slip. I just watched it and realized oldzilla was perfectly appropriate in giving me an "lol" and a frowning face!
Be sure to have some Dramamine handy if you watch this video. It made me seasick.
Only
In response to your title....yep.
In response to your title....yep.
So the reason I am changing things up is that I developed a bad habit of dropping my elbow. While this works great when the timing is correct and I am in stroke... it sucks when in a pressure situation where nothing is working. In order to correct this I am taking the whole 'timing' out of the picture and limiting the amount of issues that can occur during a stroke.
This is to know that no matter what the situation is I can rely on my fundamentals to deliver a straight stroke.
The other reason I am trying to remake myself is I have hit a plateau in skill recently and I am looking to breach that level of play.
In my pool life I have always lived by the philosophy that the less moving parts you have to control and the less variables you have to modify during a stroke the better your cue ball control will be.
This is because if you just have to change only one thing to modify the speed you hit the cueball (i.e., where you grip the cue, speed of stroke, bridge hand length from cueball, etc.) you will have a much easier time developing a feel for the correct speed. If you can then rely on yourself to not change any other part of your body during the stroke due to sound fundamentals then you can further modify your speed to be correct for the situation.
Obviously there is more to it but that's the whole reason for me altering my stroke.
I have spent the past week just hitting straight shots into the corner pocket (about 1000 so far) from the spot in order to develop the muscle memory so that I don't have to think about my elbow during a tournament.
So after all that I think I finally found out what was happening last night. When attempting stroke shots (think hard shots with extreme english to bend the cueball after contact with the object ball) is where the slip stroke rears it's head.
I think this is because in order to get the follow-through required for most of these shots you need to extend the cue past the pendulum arc allowed by not moving your elbow.
Because of this I naturally let the cue slide through my back-hand to get to the proper point.
I may modify my stroke even further to allow for an elbow drop only on stroke shots but I will only attempt that once I am confident that I am not dropping my elbow during normal play (so another 2000 balls or so).
This is to know that no matter what the situation is I can rely on my fundamentals to deliver a straight stroke.
The other reason I am trying to remake myself is I have hit a plateau in skill recently and I am looking to breach that level of play.
In my pool life I have always lived by the philosophy that the less moving parts you have to control and the less variables you have to modify during a stroke the better your cue ball control will be.
This is because if you just have to change only one thing to modify the speed you hit the cueball (i.e., where you grip the cue, speed of stroke, bridge hand length from cueball, etc.) you will have a much easier time developing a feel for the correct speed. If you can then rely on yourself to not change any other part of your body during the stroke due to sound fundamentals then you can further modify your speed to be correct for the situation.
Obviously there is more to it but that's the whole reason for me altering my stroke.
I have spent the past week just hitting straight shots into the corner pocket (about 1000 so far) from the spot in order to develop the muscle memory so that I don't have to think about my elbow during a tournament.
So after all that I think I finally found out what was happening last night. When attempting stroke shots (think hard shots with extreme english to bend the cueball after contact with the object ball) is where the slip stroke rears it's head.
I think this is because in order to get the follow-through required for most of these shots you need to extend the cue past the pendulum arc allowed by not moving your elbow.
Because of this I naturally let the cue slide through my back-hand to get to the proper point.
I may modify my stroke even further to allow for an elbow drop only on stroke shots but I will only attempt that once I am confident that I am not dropping my elbow during normal play (so another 2000 balls or so).
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I've never heard of someone developing a slip stroke in an attempt to correct their fundamentals.
That doesn't sound right to me.
I can't imagine any reason why it'd be necessary to let go of the cue
when swinging, just to fix elbow drop or similar issues.
In my opinion this is not to the time to develop a funky new stroke that nobody uses any more.
Not if your goal is to fix stroke issues.
It's the time to focus on fixing your existing stroke to make it more 'textbook'.
A slipstroke is definitely not textbook.
The guys who made it work are like the guys who make sidearm work. They instinctually did it
from the time they were kids. They didn't start it after several years of playing some other way.
I promise you no instructor ever said "We need to get you using a slip stroke."
Fix your elbow drop, but don't sweat it too much. When stretching across the table or doing a powerful
stroke with a long follow through a little elbow drop is going to happen naturally and there's no reason
to fight it, just like there's no reason to stop following through after the cue tip hits the cue ball.
For closer shots, you really don't need the full strength of your entire arm and a simple motion
from the elbow can deliver the cue without any other moving parts.
That doesn't sound right to me.
I can't imagine any reason why it'd be necessary to let go of the cue
when swinging, just to fix elbow drop or similar issues.
In my opinion this is not to the time to develop a funky new stroke that nobody uses any more.
Not if your goal is to fix stroke issues.
It's the time to focus on fixing your existing stroke to make it more 'textbook'.
A slipstroke is definitely not textbook.
The guys who made it work are like the guys who make sidearm work. They instinctually did it
from the time they were kids. They didn't start it after several years of playing some other way.
I promise you no instructor ever said "We need to get you using a slip stroke."
Fix your elbow drop, but don't sweat it too much. When stretching across the table or doing a powerful
stroke with a long follow through a little elbow drop is going to happen naturally and there's no reason
to fight it, just like there's no reason to stop following through after the cue tip hits the cue ball.
For closer shots, you really don't need the full strength of your entire arm and a simple motion
from the elbow can deliver the cue without any other moving parts.
Here is a pretty good example of a slip stroke as I know it...
...from Tony Robles
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-H7Yb1Rf8Y
Jimmy Moore and Cornbread Red had marvelous slip strokes.
I find it hard to define what a 'slip' does for a player...but there's a tricky
back-bank at one-pocket where I also have to keep whitey on my opponent's
side of the table....I have to slip it or I can't do it.
...from Tony Robles
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-H7Yb1Rf8Y
Jimmy Moore and Cornbread Red had marvelous slip strokes.
I find it hard to define what a 'slip' does for a player...but there's a tricky
back-bank at one-pocket where I also have to keep whitey on my opponent's
side of the table....I have to slip it or I can't do it.
Alright after hitting about 1000 balls from the spot into the corner I think I figured it out finally....
I wasn't doing a slip stroke per say- what I was doing is by being so strict about where I was holding the cue and not dropping my elbow I was having to 'throw' the cue after contact with the cueball in order to have the same length of follow-through on the forward stroke.
In order to correct this I have started changing where I grip the cue depending on how hard I have to hit the cueball.
This has allowed me to always stroke with the same speed and I no longer slip around on the wrap.
Of course this varies depending on where the cueball is on the table (i.e., on the rail, etc.).
I wasn't doing a slip stroke per say- what I was doing is by being so strict about where I was holding the cue and not dropping my elbow I was having to 'throw' the cue after contact with the cueball in order to have the same length of follow-through on the forward stroke.
In order to correct this I have started changing where I grip the cue depending on how hard I have to hit the cueball.
This has allowed me to always stroke with the same speed and I no longer slip around on the wrap.
Of course this varies depending on where the cueball is on the table (i.e., on the rail, etc.).