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There are lots of ways to have fun shooting pool. Tournaments are an excellent test of personal skills and courage. They can be a simple quickly assembled challenge among friends, a semi-formal arrangement run by the local pool hall or neighborhood bar – or even the more formal qualifiers or sponsored regional tournaments.

Formats will vary among the different venues – and the personal preferences of whoever is the designated tournament director. Here is a brief description of some common tournament formats and how they are put together. Continue reading →

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When you are leaning how to draw, you know that the cue tip must be lowered so that the tip will contact the ball below the horizontal center line. This explanation excludes power draws and is useful for draws of around 3 to 6 diamonds when shooting at an object ball up to 2 diamonds away. Continue reading →

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The biggest advantage to getting a custom cue is that it is built to your specifications. Here is a list of custom elements that will make a stick unique: Continue reading →

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Miscues occur when the cue tip contacts the cue ball and does not “grab”. When that happens, the tip slips off of the cue ball which then travels in strange directions. There is a certain sound that accompanies the miscue. If there are others around, everyone will look at you. The only way to get them to look away is to pretend it wasn’t you. Continue reading →

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There are proponents of both styles of bridges. The open bridge allows an unobstructed view of the shaft for aiming purposes. The closed bridge ensures that the stick will not deflect when hitting the cue ball out from the center. Continue reading →

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Here are some suggestions where the weaker player can still bang away at his best speed, and the stronger player (in this example is you) has to follow one or more of these restrictions. Playing straight up is too lopsided and the fun of playing quickly fades.

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When you practicing by yourself and have done all the drills you can handle, it is fun to rack up the balls and try to run as many as you can. When playing alone, you should always have a purpose. Continue reading →

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For the majority of pool players, whether you need a break cue is more of a matter of do you want one? Being able to get a great spread with the greatest chances of pocketing a ball will require some separate practice time. This means racking and re-racking the balls as you experiment around with various stances, body positions, and follow-through. Continue reading →

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Eye dominance means that (generally) one eye takes in the majority of the scene you are looking at with the other eye being used to identify depth of field (how far away things are).

When you bend down for a shot, your head aligns above the stick and you utilize your eyes to draw the imaginary aiming line. Eye dominance affects the placement of that aiming line. When the dominant eye is off to one side of vertical, the imaginary line gets skewed. This messes up the accuracy of your aiming line. The closer your dominant eye is to a vertical position over the aiming line, the more accurate your shots will be. Continue reading →

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When you are setting up the rack for yourself, you may want to sequence the ball positions to help you out. If setting it up for your opponent, use the other setup. Continue reading →