There are only two strokes in pool?

JoeyInCali

Maker of Joey Bautista Cues
Silver Member
One with you don't accelerate.
Two, the one you have to accelerate ( punch, draw , follow , break, jump ).
Agree or disagree ?
 
i ummm, err, the first stroke uh....well, er... nice avatar!

when wouldn't you accelerate? i've always believed that you need to accelerate on all shots no matter what the speed, in order to guide the cb to the target more accurately. sometimes i roll the cb slowly but there still has to be some acceleration there to some degree otherwise you'd get no follow through (contact with the cb)
 
you have to accelerate to go from zero to any motion..how much acceleration is the base of speed control and I have more than 2 stroke speeds..

I think that deceleration..... intentionally slowing the cue down mid stroke causes your bicep and triceps to fight one another and that can kill your accuracy..
 
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In my book there two strokes one is "YES !!!" and the other is "f@#$@!# !!!"
 
what is the name of the shot where you hit the ball firm 2mm above center to follow the ball a couple inches when you cannot slow roll a follow shot. Is that called a punch?
 
what is the name of the shot where you hit the ball firm 2mm above center to follow the ball a couple inches when you cannot slow roll a follow shot. Is that called a punch?

That's just an ordinary shot that is accomplished with a knowledge of the spin/distance ratio. Every good player masters this because it allows them to avoid the slow roll AND use a consistent stroke speed on almost all their shots.....there is no name for this.
 
Accelerating at the point of contact (which I assume is what you are talking about) does absolutely nothing for what happens to the cueball. You aren't contacting the ball long enough to have any real-world effect.

dld


DoubleD I think you are wrong but i cannot prove it. The Jacksonville experiment executed by some great players and other pool freaks has a lot of knowledge of exactly what happens at the point of impact. They were limited by having only a high speed camera no accelerometers or any other tools so they experimented visually.

They found that impact lasts about 8/10,000 and quality of player/stroke did not greatly increase that time. I do not know that they videoed much of weaker players as they had great pool and billiards players. I do not have a link to it or the writeup but Bob Jewett was a part of it.

I think there are at least 3 strokes in pool accelerating at and thru impact, constant speed thru impact and declling before and thru impact.

They key points to what happs to the cue ball are cue direction, CB/tip location, velocity.

Those items are a given what I think is also critical and are the great seperators are the player controlled items such as bridge quality, grip/cue control, power and acceleration. These secondary items are all extremely minor in effect on the ball but I think are important as well.
 
There is only on type of optimal stroke.......that is one that accelerates in consistent fashion untill tip penetration into the CB at a minimum.

Of the Optimal Stroke we have 3 sectors:

1) Pendulum
2) Piston/vector
3) Complete side arm/chickenwing (Hoppe, McCready)
4)Bridge/Crutch Stroke

Pendulum is most basic, piston when done correctly is exactly the same as the piston untill after contact when the elbow begins its drop.

The sidearm stroke involves more physically than the Pendulum and Pistion and has more trouble with extraneous movement as the stroke is not hanging and staying plumb its out to the side so its height is controlled by the position the shoulder puts the elbow on the vertical plane.

-Grey Ghost-

Last, the Bridge/Crutch Stroke is wholly differient than any other stroke as the arm extends to shoot it, it doesn't fold/bend it UNFOLDS.
 
A question about your question

One with you don't accelerate.
Two, the one you have to accelerate ( punch, draw , follow , break, jump ).
Agree or disagree ?

Joey-

Clarification please.

If the 'speed' or 'pace' of the backswing is the same as the speed or pace of the forward stroke-is this 'swing' of a contant speed and therefore without acceleration? Is that what you are referring to?

Are you talking about 'rates of change' in defining strokes that involve acceleration?

In a non-technical way-draw/force follow/stun at various distances(cb to ob) seem to require different rates of change to be effective. By that I mean-as the stroke comes forward-are we increasingly accelerating (driving car analogy) from 0mph to ???mph/20 to 50? etc.

Like for close draw shots-a smooth gradual acceleration of 0 to 20mph will get the job done very well. The same paced stroke at a further distance may become a 'stop shot' or a drag shot that will leak forward.

Joey-is this maybe what you're asking about 'are there only two stokes in pool'?

I wonder too-especially when you watch Efren deliver what sometimes appears to be a de-celerating stroke on some finesse/'holding english' shots.

Joey-Interesting question. Hope you further clarify by example your original question.
 
Joey-

Clarification please.

If the 'speed' or 'pace' of the backswing is the same as the speed or pace of the forward stroke-is this 'swing' of a contant speed and therefore without acceleration? Is that what you are referring to?

Are you talking about 'rates of change' in defining strokes that involve acceleration?

In a non-technical way-draw/force follow/stun at various distances(cb to ob) seem to require different rates of change to be effective. By that I mean-as the stroke comes forward-are we increasingly accelerating (driving car analogy) from 0mph to ???mph/20 to 50? etc.

Like for close draw shots-a smooth gradual acceleration of 0 to 20mph will get the job done very well. The same paced stroke at a further distance may become a 'stop shot' or a drag shot that will leak forward.

Joey-is this maybe what you're asking about 'are there only two stokes in pool'?

I wonder too-especially when you watch Efren deliver what sometimes appears to be a de-celerating stroke on some finesse/'holding english' shots.

Joey-Interesting question. Hope you further clarify by example your original question.
I'm talking about on the last forward stroke to hit the ball.
 
I would guess, you could have three strokes.

Accelerating
Decelerating
Constant

Maybe you could throw in a fourth for those nervous types that I call the Start and Stutter.

It's really all about speed, location of tip and angle of penetration. (don't get excited).
 
Then I would also say 3. Accel, Decel, and Constant. You could add Squirrelly stroke and if you throw in your avatar I think we could come up with more strokes!

Bob Danielson
www.bdcuesandcomix.com
 
One with you don't accelerate.
Two, the one you have to accelerate ( punch, draw , follow , break, jump ).
Agree or disagree ?
As you see, this question caused some confusion. Most people can't distinguish between acceleration and velocity.

Whether the stick is accelerating at the time of impact makes virtually no difference to what the cue ball will do on most shots. As mentioned above, if you want to play with minimum effort, the best time to hit the cue ball is when the stick is moving at top speed. That is exactly when the acceleration is zero by the definitions of acceleration and velocity.

Whether that's the best time to hit the ball when you take other factors into account is another matter. For certain special shots, something else is required. The best example I can think of is when the cue ball is 1/4 inch from the object ball and you have to shoot straight at it. This needs to be hit with a severely decelerating stroke, and there are several standard techniques to achieve this. Jump shots are another example where deceleration may help you to not double hit or trap the cue ball.

To get maximum power, it may be best to still be accelerating when you hit the ball, but this is only because if you hit the ball at peak speed your stroke might be too long for accuracy. This depends on the player's skill and technique. Watch videos of power nine ball breaks.

For standard shots, some players seem to use constant acceleration, some hit the ball at zero acceleration and others hit the ball somewhat before the peak velocity so there is still some acceleration. You can make hand-waving arguments to support each of these techniques. Unfortunately, no professional sports kinesiologist has looked into this, AFAIK.

There are several articles here: http://www.sfbilliards.com/articles/BD_articles.html (look for "stroke") about various aspects of strokes including a list of types. Dr. Dave has some good discussions and measurements on his site as well.
 
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DoubleD I think you are wrong but i cannot prove it. The Jacksonville experiment executed by some great players and other pool freaks has a lot of knowledge of exactly what happens at the point of impact. They were limited by having only a high speed camera no accelerometers or any other tools so they experimented visually.

They found that impact lasts about 8/10,000 and quality of player/stroke did not greatly increase that time. I do not know that they videoed much of weaker players as they had great pool and billiards players. I do not have a link to it or the writeup but Bob Jewett was a part of it.

I think there are at least 3 strokes in pool accelerating at and thru impact, constant speed thru impact and declling before and thru impact.

They key points to what happs to the cue ball are cue direction, CB/tip location, velocity.

Those items are a given what I think is also critical and are the great seperators are the player controlled items such as bridge quality, grip/cue control, power and acceleration. These secondary items are all extremely minor in effect on the ball but I think are important as well.

You are saying I am wrong and then giving evidence that I am right?

I hope you aren't a lawyer or engineer.

dld

I am an engineer and if you note I did not say you were wrong, rather (the lawyer in me) said that I thought you were wrong. I definitely do not think the stroke is understood but i am sure Dr Dave and Bob will get that all figured out. I was just saying that I think acceleration vs velocity can play a major role in what is put into the cue ball and how it acts coming off the tip. The major factors are contact point and velocity and most players cannot control those, the other factors I mentioned seperate the great players even farther
 
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