Your mileage may vary.
I've been snakebit on the break for a long time, and I hit them really hard... I often make the kind of break that makes people nearby say "jesus christ". But absolutely nothing falls, like 7/10 times I used to come up dry. (This is 8 ball break btw)
What fixed it for me was two things. One obvious one that maybe a lot of people are overlooking is: make your buddy give you a proper rack. Ask him to rerack if everything's not frozen, and fix it if it's a little tilted. You might feel like a bit of an ass for insisting when you've been playing together forever... but if he's a shooter he'll understand. Some tables just take more work than others, let him know you don't mind waiting if it takes a minute to make a particular table cooperate.
The more important one is to pick a particular spot on the cueball, and, once you have your aim, make sure you're looking the cueball last when you stroke. Trust that you're lined up and going to hit the first ball square, and just focus hard on where you're hitting. I aim for about a half tip below center and generally it either stops or draws. You'll know when you're getting lazy or jumping up when you see it follow into the rack.
When these two things happen, I make a particular ball in a particular pocket every time... I mean religiously... I'm making something on the break like 8 out of 10 or better, and almost every time it's the righthand ball in the 2nd row... it goes into the right side. Strangely I almost never send the left ball towards the left side, and I swear I'm aiming for a dead center hit on the one (and I'm teeing off from the head spot). I'm a lefty if it matters.
I think it goes in more reliably when the cue ball has a little backspin but I could be crazy. In any case if I hit the break with the same aim and it's got forward roll, that ball never even comes close. Sometimes it hardly moves. If my buddy racks a bit below the spot, it ends up hitting towards the bottom of the side pocket or hitting the nipple.
Just thought I'd share that long and fascinating story =)
Might as well make this a bit more useful by adding a question:
On our tables, regardless of how the balls are racked, the wing balls in 9 ball never seem to go anywhere near the pockets they're supposed to. They always hit above those pockets. Looking at the rack, the tangent line between the wing ball and the ball it kisses off of is way above the pocket. This seems to happen from all break positions. Is our spot in the wrong place or something? I've resigned myself to trying to sink the 1 ball in the side and praying I get something on the 2.
I've been snakebit on the break for a long time, and I hit them really hard... I often make the kind of break that makes people nearby say "jesus christ". But absolutely nothing falls, like 7/10 times I used to come up dry. (This is 8 ball break btw)
What fixed it for me was two things. One obvious one that maybe a lot of people are overlooking is: make your buddy give you a proper rack. Ask him to rerack if everything's not frozen, and fix it if it's a little tilted. You might feel like a bit of an ass for insisting when you've been playing together forever... but if he's a shooter he'll understand. Some tables just take more work than others, let him know you don't mind waiting if it takes a minute to make a particular table cooperate.
The more important one is to pick a particular spot on the cueball, and, once you have your aim, make sure you're looking the cueball last when you stroke. Trust that you're lined up and going to hit the first ball square, and just focus hard on where you're hitting. I aim for about a half tip below center and generally it either stops or draws. You'll know when you're getting lazy or jumping up when you see it follow into the rack.
When these two things happen, I make a particular ball in a particular pocket every time... I mean religiously... I'm making something on the break like 8 out of 10 or better, and almost every time it's the righthand ball in the 2nd row... it goes into the right side. Strangely I almost never send the left ball towards the left side, and I swear I'm aiming for a dead center hit on the one (and I'm teeing off from the head spot). I'm a lefty if it matters.
I think it goes in more reliably when the cue ball has a little backspin but I could be crazy. In any case if I hit the break with the same aim and it's got forward roll, that ball never even comes close. Sometimes it hardly moves. If my buddy racks a bit below the spot, it ends up hitting towards the bottom of the side pocket or hitting the nipple.
Just thought I'd share that long and fascinating story =)
Might as well make this a bit more useful by adding a question:
On our tables, regardless of how the balls are racked, the wing balls in 9 ball never seem to go anywhere near the pockets they're supposed to. They always hit above those pockets. Looking at the rack, the tangent line between the wing ball and the ball it kisses off of is way above the pocket. This seems to happen from all break positions. Is our spot in the wrong place or something? I've resigned myself to trying to sink the 1 ball in the side and praying I get something on the 2.
