Practice on 8' Table

F

Fliedout

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I have an 8' table, which is all that will fit in my basement. When I play on a full-size table I have terrible problems, especially with the dreaded long straight-in shot, to the point where I sometimes wonder whether practice on my table is even productive. I know there's no magic bullet here, but has anyone found ways of easing the transition? Thanks.
 
Anything is better than nothing, so don't give up. Just playing and stroking the cue will help in some way.

A couple of things I might do is, at home just practice hitting the long shots on your eight footer. Make the long shots as long as you can while still being able to bridge comfortably, but also practice long shots where the cueball is against the rail. This might help a little bit.

Try to get out to a pool room once a week and do some solo practice on a 9 footer. If you can get on a snooker table that would be huge for you. Even if you don't like the game of snooker, some places have snooker balls that are fashioned after pool balls (numbered and striped). Or you could play with regular pool balls on a snooker table, that will certainly increase your accuracy.

Off the top of my head the only other thing I can think of is do some exercises to improve your stroke. After all there really is no trick to long shots, its just having a straight and reliable stroke.

If I think of anything else I'll post again.
 
Fliedout, might try shimming your pockets down to improve your accuracy. I owned a small 8' table for 3 years before getting my current
9'. Work on your stroke mechanics, try to get the ball into the heart of the pocket everytime. There's so much to learn on any table. Hone your position-play skills, and you won't have many long shots to make, no matter what table you play on. 9'-footers do help develop your accuracy, but you also get used to playing with lots of room on the table. A good break / spread makes for fairly easy runouts. Don't get to practice as much with cluster-busting, caroms, etc. This shows when I play on the
smaller tables in league play. Enjoy your 8'!
F4P
 
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