Turning point in your pool game?

B

BillyKoda

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I can go back to one night as the night my game jumped several notches. It happened to be my B-Day last year, turned 46 years old. I was playing partners (8-ball) at the local hang out and we had 3 balls + the 8 left. Our opponents were sure they left me stymied but they were wrong. I proceeded to make 4 incredible bank shots in a row and the guys just shook their heads and picked their jaws up off the floor. They said awesome shooting and I said "well it is my birthday!" and they all laughed. Ever since that night my game has been consistent and good (in my opinion), I shoot with confidence and very rarely beat myself which I did constantly before that night.

Anyone else have a turning point day or night that changed your game dramatically?

BK
 
I sorta had one during my second season playing APA 8-ball. I was playing as a 4, although I would be a 5 a few matches later. Anyway, my captain put me up against another strong 4 who liked to run a lot of balls, but lacked the strategical abilities to be ranked higher than a 4. Anyway, since you never knew when he would run 5 or 6 balls to get out of an 8-ball rack, my captain suggested after I won the opening break that I break softly, decreasing the chances he'd simply outrun me.

Now anyone in my league can tell you that breaking defensively and playing smart through ugly racks is thoroughly not my biggest strength, and I could tell the only reason my captain suggested it is that he thought I had no chance otherwise. So I got a little annoyed, broke hard, and beat the guy 3-0 in about 10 innings, which was playing out of my mind by my standards at the time. Basically, I would break, we'd trade shots once or twice, and I would get out, in each rack. After that I started to realize that I could beat people who were supposed to be better than me, and it really changed my attitude toward the game. I think that's when my learning curve really got steep.

-Andrew
 
My game seems to come and go because I only
play on weekends 10 months a year.
A recent turning point was Scott Lee pointing
out that I was choking up too much on the
cue at the AZ room at the DCC.
I've been kicking some behinds since then.


BillyKoda said:
I can go back to one night as the night my game jumped several notches. It happened to be my B-Day last year, turned 46 years old. I was playing partners (8-ball) at the local hang out and we had 3 balls + the 8 left. Our opponents were sure they left me stymied but they were wrong. I proceeded to make 4 incredible bank shots in a row and the guys just shook their heads and picked their jaws up off the floor. They said awesome shooting and I said "well it is my birthday!" and they all laughed. Ever since that night my game has been consistent and good (in my opinion), I shoot with confidence and very rarely beat myself which I did constantly before that night.

Anyone else have a turning point day or night that changed your game dramatically?

BK
Click to expand...
 
My dad had always told me to use as little english as possible on my shots. Did I listen…NO, I would only play ABOUT THEIR POSITION when I was young. I liked moving the QB around the table and drawing it back the length of the table. When I was young I could make just about any shot on the table including the long ones.

When I got into my late thirties I began losing more games. That’s when some old guy said to me, “I know you think all that english you use impresses people, but winning games is what really impresses them. Just use running english on your QB and play better position.”

I played my best pool in my late thirties to mid fifties after listening to him. Funny thing was my dad told me the same thing over twenty-years before, when I was fifteen. Johnnyt
 
I was practicing several different things which I was not good at. Like using stun on cut shots, using english, being able to tell where the cue ball would go after a shot, and breaking out balls after a shot.

Then one night I was able to "put it all together" for one shot. For my shot I used stun with right english and just the right speed to get the cue ball to hit the rail and come back to break out a ball.

I pocketed my ball, broke out the other ball, and left myself good position for my next shot. Prior to this I could not do anything like this. I was happy as could be with that one shot! Could care less what happened for the rest of the night...

Since then, I've been able to do things like this more and more. Everything just "clicked" for me that night.
 
My turning point was when I grew up and realized how this one player kept beating me. He used to play these silly little "meaningless" hook and leave shots that I realized later won him games. Once I figured it out I used it to MY advantage and beat him. Once I beat him that one time, my game went right through the roof. After that nothing used to make my eyes twinkle more that a good safety game against someone who had no patience. LOL. Oh the memories!!
 
BillyKoda said:
Anyone else have a turning point day or night that changed your game dramatically?

BK
Click to expand...
The biggest turning point in my game was when a friend of mine taught me a good aiming system. There were shots that I wasn't sure how to aim and I always made a best guess on how to shoot the shot, but now I can see how to hit the shot and I can concentrate on the fundamentals. My game and confidence have risen quite a bit since I play with a system now instead of feel.
 
several turning points, and hopefully more to come

Well, I've had a few turning points, if I can call them that.

1 - About 25 years ago I was real young, and actually did not know how important position play was.
At that point I was great at making shots, and that was all I really focused on, as I did not too much
about things, and only knew vaguely where the cue ball was headed. My roommate at the time was a
serious player, and had many books, and made it quite clear position play was what pool was all about.

2 - About 15 years ago, I purchased Bert Kinister's first tape, and before that, I had absolutely no
idea of the level of control people could have over the cue ball and position. I tried to master those
shots, but was too involved with my day job to stay with it, and I lost interest, and just let it fade.

3 - The whole outsourcing and downsizing era dawned, and I lost my software engineering job. I
got back into pool a little, but found another job and abandoned pool completely, since the pool
hall in our town, and the other one 7 miles away closed. Now, the company that I was working
for had a major layoff, (and actually folded thereafter), and I find myself in a situation where I
have lots of time, and little money, and have been studying all the books/videos/articles I can find,
and have been trying to refine my stroke to perfection. I don't know what the road ahead holds, but
I can now hit the ball like never before, know stuff I've never known, and am in a position where I
might just have to pursue pool as an income generator in the very near future.
 
My biggest turning point was a mental one. For years, I had been known as having good cueing skills, but my confidence would often fail me in the heat of the competition, so I was also known for not performing under pressure.

One night, I matched up with another local player for $300 a game (I only had two barrels). My oppoenent left me in a tough trap where I had to kick at a ball in the middle of the table, and I had only two options--make it or sell out. I got down on the shot, drilled the kick and from there I ran out all night to make what at that point, was the biggest score of my pool career. A few months later, I exceeded that total by beating a road player in some $1K sets, and from there my confidence took my game to a whole new level.

It was just a matter of developing that intangible quality of belief!
 
My game took a huge turn when I stopped just playing and started concentrating on practicing.
 
SCCues said:
The biggest turning point in my game was when a friend of mine taught me a good aiming system. There were shots that I wasn't sure how to aim and I always made a best guess on how to shoot the shot, but now I can see how to hit the shot and I can concentrate on the fundamentals. My game and confidence have risen quite a bit since I play with a system now instead of feel.
Click to expand...

What is the system? Sounds like it's worth trying.
 
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