Shooting with your opposite hand

P

PoolSharkAllen

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
There are times when playing pool it might be easier to shoot a shot with your opposite hand instead of with a bridge. Well, yesterday I had an inspiration to try practicing shots with my opposite hand.

For the first 10 minutes or so of practicing with left-handed, it was a very awkward and difficult transition for me. I missed the easiest shots as I wasn't used to playing left-handed. However, as I start focusing on improving my stance and my grip on the cue and shooting with a smoother stroke, I started potting more and more balls of easy to moderate difficulty.

I just wanted to share this experience and suggest to those that haven't tried it, that playing pool opposite-handed appears to be a skill well worth developing too.
 
PoolSharkAllen said:
There are times when playing pool it might be easier to shoot a shot with your opposite hand instead of with a bridge. Well, yesterday I had an inspiration to try practicing shots with my opposite hand.

For the first 10 minutes or so of practicing with left-handed, it was a very awkward and difficult transition for me. I missed the easiest shots as I wasn't used to playing left-handed. However, as I start focusing on improving my stance and my grip on the cue and shooting with a smoother stroke, I started potting more and more balls of easy to moderate difficulty.

I just wanted to share this experience and suggest to those that haven't tried it, that playing pool opposite-handed appears to be a skill well worth developing too.
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Good advice Allen. You can actually learn faster with your opposite hand than you did originally. And your game will be much stronger.

The best opposite handed players - Keith, Buddy, Sigel. All can run out after switching hands.
 
@PoolSharkAllen

I totally agree, to what you said and experienced !

Being able to shot both handed is an very big advantage !

Have an look at Pro`s like Efren Reyes or Francesco Bustamante. They do it perfectly ;)

Last but not least it is not everybody favorite. Some Players still prefer a bridgetool. It depends an your personal style !
 
i tried it didn't like it that much i would just go behind the back LOL. But kidding aside i like that a person can switch hands i always hear jokes like that when someone using the opposite hands, you will see me on ESPN and switch my hands with ease. Its kewl to have it in your bag of goodies. though.
 
PoolSharkAllen said:
There are times when playing pool it might be easier to shoot a shot with your opposite hand instead of with a bridge. Well, yesterday I had an inspiration to try practicing shots with my opposite hand.

For the first 10 minutes or so of practicing with left-handed, it was a very awkward and difficult transition for me. I missed the easiest shots as I wasn't used to playing left-handed. However, as I start focusing on improving my stance and my grip on the cue and shooting with a smoother stroke, I started potting more and more balls of easy to moderate difficulty.

I just wanted to share this experience and suggest to those that haven't tried it, that playing pool opposite-handed appears to be a skill well worth developing too.
Click to expand...

Many good player are Ambodexterious, and it is a Learned SKill that take Practice...;)
 
I recently discovered a good bridge/grip for opposite shooting... The cool part about it is the right and left hand have the exact same finger setup no matter which way you're shooting!

In Byrne's book (and most others) he shows the bridge hand where the thumb is placed over the first knuckle of the middle finger so the cue can rest on that intersection and the first finger loops over the top. Most use this bridge. Well, when working on my grip, I discovered that I can use the exact same setup for my GRIP hand. The cue rides on my middle finger and is held at its side by the thumb. No clenching problem, a nice, loose, free-flowing grip and it's the same as the bridge hand.

So, back to opposite shooting....so....just make the same setup with your opposite bridge hand as you do with it when you grip the cue your normal way. It's weird, but it really helped my game and it really helps my opposite shooting. I don't know if it'll work for you the way it worked for me, but what if it does?

fwiw,

Jeff Livingston
 
i do want to learn to shoot with my left hand, and soon i'm gonna spend a couple of night shooting only with it. But tbh in my case it's just for the coolness factor of being able to swap hands, because I find the rest really easy to use.
 
Can all the Pro's shoot with there other hands, i know Nick, Mike, Allen, Buddy just to name a few that i know of can. Allison when hurting herself that one time shot with the other hand and used the bridge and still won a few games against Karen Corr, now that is something to admire. I just love how Francisco just goes behind the back and makes it look easy also.
 
O'Sullivan is said to have made century breaks (runs of over 100 points in snooker) opposite-handed in practice. That's incredibly impressive to me, because in snooker there really are no easy shots IMO.

Also Bustamante's behind-the-back skills make me sick. It's not just that he makes a lot of shots that way, it's that he can really control the cue ball too.

In a sense, you could say Sigel's always shooting opposite handed, since he's right-handed but shoots with his left. When he does switch to right-handed for hard-to-reach shots, you almost don't even notice because it looks so natural.

-Andrew
 
I've been doing the same lately. while i'm not strong enough with my opposite hand yet, I definitely see the long term benefit. whenever i'm at the pool hall or the bar just messing around, I'll take a few minutest to practice with the other hand. And slowly but surely its improving.
 
Andrew Manning said:
O'Sullivan is said to have made century breaks (runs of over 100 points in snooker) opposite-handed in practice. That's incredibly impressive to me, because in snooker there really are no easy shots IMO.

Also Bustamante's behind-the-back skills make me sick. It's not just that he makes a lot of shots that way, it's that he can really control the cue ball too.

In a sense, you could say Sigel's always shooting opposite handed, since he's right-handed but shoots with his left. When he does switch to right-handed for hard-to-reach shots, you almost don't even notice because it looks so natural.

-Andrew
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I watched Mike switch hands years ago, and that is what got me started doing it.
Now I can shoot pretty smooth with my left.:)
 
Learning opposite-handed is the same as learning natural-handed (is that a word? ;) ). Remember when you first picked up a cue and starting banging away? It didn't come all at once, but over time, you got comfortable. It just takes a little commitment. In my situation, I just decided one day that I was going to learn to shoot left-handed. Two years later, I hardly ever need the mechanical bridge and I can generally play well left-handed. I think folks try it and feel awkward and don't give it time to sink in.
 
Shooting with the left hand also impoves your stroke with the right hand.
It´s an interesting phenomenon called "bilateral transfer".

So it won´t just help you in difficult situations where you could do without a bridge, it also makes your "normal" pool better...

Most people are surprised, how fast they improve with their opposite hands, too.
 
@Skyline

"It´s an interesting phenomenon called "bilateral transfer"."

That really sound interessting :rolleyes:

THX for that Information !
 
Well .;.

Sigel is RIGHT HANDED niormally, he just shoots Pool left handed and a couple of other things, so he is used to his opposite hand ... lol

Switching hands for him is going to his dominant arm and hand.

I switch hands for shooting without much problem (more of a problem on a big table because of stretching to reach). Taught myself to shoot one handed with each hand, and also using left foot as a bridge, and I glad I did. You never know what type of offers you going to get about midnight in a Pool hall, and sometimes, the skills come in handy for hustling a game.
 
Well .;.

Sigel is RIGHT HANDED niormally, he just shoots Pool left handed and a couple of other things, so he is used to his opposite hand ... lol

Switching hands for him is going to his dominant arm and hand.

I switch hands for shooting without much problem (more of a problem on a big table because of stretching to reach). Taught myself to shoot one handed with each hand, and also using left foot as a bridge, and I glad I did. You never know what type of offers you going to get about midnight in a Pool hall, and sometimes, the skills come in handy for hustling a game.
 
TheConArtist said:
Can all the Pro's shoot with there other hands, i know Nick, Mike, Allen, Buddy just to name a few that i know of can. Allison when hurting herself that one time shot with the other hand and used the bridge and still won a few games against Karen Corr, now that is something to admire. I just love how Francisco just goes behind the back and makes it look easy also.
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Dont forget Wade "Billy Johnson" Crane...one of the all time great either hand players. Most time's I been around Danny Diliberto see's a guy shoot opposite hand he say's "look, he's amphibious" HAHAHAHA!!
 
branpureza said:
you can't even tell when efren switches hands...
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I've heard Cardone say during commentary that in 20 years he's seen Efren miss one shot opposite-handed.
 
I haven't taken the time to learn to shoot off-hand. Many years ago, I decided to learn to shoot one-handed and now shoot that way instead of opposite hand. It is harder to control the cue ball, though. It does come in handy for those shots you can't reach with either hand or the bridge (cue ball in the cluster around the foot spot). I love that new word that PoolSleuth came up with as an alternate spelling for ambidextrous (ambodexterious).
 
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