video of my cueing from behind

[Malachi-b]

this is a video of my cueing from behind i should be getting a slow mo one put up soon but this is all i got for now. any help and advice appriciated i know the feathers are a bit fast but im generally just looking at how i bring the cue back and forward and the grip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHzWZuAbkPk

any help really appriciated

thanks


malachi

[Anthony762]

I am still working on my grip it can take years to complete,

But I noticed that you are opening the fingers too much let the cue push your fingers away you are doing what I done.



Try to relax your last 3 fingers and let the cue push them away not the you.
__________________
Originally posted at Http://www.thesnookergym.com/forums

[themayorofflair]

Pretty nice cueing action their Malachi, the cue is in a nice position in your fingers & the grip is nice & loose (maybe a little too loose if I am being hyper critical) but you have to be loose to produce at snooker !

Personally I would work on a couple of things. Try & work the fluency of your action (the smoothess) as at present it looks a little jerky. I would suggest not taking your cue quite as far back on the feathers & make them more of an even pace back & forth with no pause on the backswing apart from a very small one just before you strike the cueball (the last backswing).

Your elbow / forearm also seems to slope a little from left to right (as you move from the wrist up to the elbow). It is crucial to try & get this part of the action as perpendicular to the floor as possible as any lean will cause your cue not to travel in a straight line when striking the ball. You can see that on your final follow through after striking the cueball that the elbow straightens up (your elbow moves a couple of inches to the left). You should make it your aim to keep the elbow / arm as straight as possible (no lean at all) & you will eliminate this movement.

I would hazard a guess that you may currently be putting unintentional lefthand side on the cueball (which may cause you to miss your shots to the right sometimes).

I good way to straighten your cueing out (& see how the adjustments recommended above are working) is to practice hitting the cueball up & down the brown, blue, pink & black spots with a small amount of screwback (starting from the brown spot & hitting the cushion directly behind the black spot). It will be your goal to make the white move up & down to spots in a straight line....sounds easy but trust me the more screwback you apply the harder it gets.

If you work on these points above I would pretty much guarentee that you will see a significant improvement to the overall consistency of your game.

I am sure that my fellow snooker lovers will be able to offer you other advice also.

Practice makes Permanent !

Good luck & enjoy.

[checkSide]

IMO, you are a feel player Malachi.

Don't get tangled up in technical aspects.

Just practice straight long pots, and when you start knocking them in, remember the feeling.
Read Steve Davis's articles on his MySpace. In one of them he dismisses a lot a textbook technique in favour of just simply potting balls. (citing Mark. J. Williams and Jamie Cope as examples.)

This is the route you should follow IMO.

[heera2009]

Pretty nice cueing action their Malachi, the cue is in a nice position in your fingers & the grip is nice & loose (maybe a little too loose if I am being hyper critical) but you have to be loose to produce at snooker !

Personally I would work on a couple of things. Try & work the fluency of your action (the smoothess) as at present it looks a little jerky. I would suggest not taking your cue quite as far back on the feathers & make them more of an even pace back & forth with no pause on the backswing apart from a very small one just before you strike the cueball (the last backswing).

Your elbow / forearm also seems to slope a little from left to right (as you move from the wrist up to the elbow). It is crucial to try & get this part of the action as perpendicular to the floor as possible as any lean will cause your cue not to travel in a straight line when striking the ball. You can see that on your final follow through after striking the cueball that the elbow straightens up (your elbow moves a couple of inches to the left). You should make it your aim to keep the elbow / arm as straight as possible (no lean at all) & you will eliminate this movement.

I would hazard a guess that you may currently be putting unintentional lefthand side on the cueball (which may cause you to miss your shots to the right sometimes).

I good way to straighten your cueing out (& see how the adjustments recommended above are working) is to practice hitting the cueball up & down the brown, blue, pink & black spots with a small amount of screwback (starting from the brown spot & hitting the cushion directly behind the black spot). It will be your goal to make the white move up & down to spots in a straight line....sounds easy but trust me the more screwback you apply the harder it gets.

If you work on these points above I would pretty much guarentee that you will see a significant improvement to the overall consistency of your game.

I am sure that my fellow snooker lovers will be able to offer you other advice also.

Practice makes Permanent !

Good luck & enjoy.

Great advice mate, just like to add that i noticed that in the video you tend to let your back fingers leave the cue ,, i would suggest that you should try and keep all your fingers in contact with the cue at all times.
If you look at some of the clips on youtube of the pros , a good example is Hendry , see how they are always in contact with the cue , it is wrong for someone to think that by keeping all the fingers on the cue that you will not get a smooth cue action, in fact it is the opposite .
You are doing a great job , keep it up, and we look forward to some more videos. good luck.

[RGCirencester]

Great advice mate, just like to add that i noticed that in the video you tend to let your back fingers leave the cue ,, i would suggest that you should try and keep all your fingers in contact with the cue at all times.
If you look at some of the clips on youtube of the pros , a good example is Hendry , see how they are always in contact with the cue , it is wrong for someone to think that by keeping all the fingers on the cue that you will not get a smooth cue action, in fact it is the opposite .
You are doing a great job , keep it up, and we look forward to some more videos. good luck.

thats what i noticed too. you seem to open the back fingers because someone told you to, rather than because it is neccesary to keep the cue level.

[Terry Davidson]

malachi:

Holy CRAP!!!! S-L-O-W I-T D-O-W-N !!!!!!!!! You are feathering about 4 times faster than you should and your final backswing, although a little slower, is still MUCH too fast.

Also, the fingers should remain in contact with the cue throughout the backswing and delivery. What you're doing is not really bad, after all Hendry won world championships doing that in his early days.

If you slow it down a lot you will also naturally develop a natural rear pause which should make you more consistent.

Everything else looked OK to me

Terry

[arbitrage]

you should really find a qualified coach to give you this sort of advice instead of seeking it on a forum.
this is why professional players have coaches to fine tune their own game

this is a video of my cueing from behind i should be getting a slow mo one put up soon but this is all i got for now. any help and advice appriciated i know the feathers are a bit fast but im generally just looking at how i bring the cue back and forward and the grip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHzWZuAbkPk

any help really appriciated

thanks


malachi

[Malachi-b]

Hey everyone thanks for all the help its really appriciated.

and i have a world snooker qualified coach but there are always things that one coach dont see that another does so its always good to get as many opinions as possible.

[StevieB13147]

Malachi:

Pretty much all decent advice from your fellow forum'ers.

Slowing your cueing down with a final slight pause to create a smoother action is all very sound and good advice from everyone.

The MayorOfFlair has called it right when he states that you are most probably imparting left hand side and overcutting to your right.
Your finishing position and line all point to this common fundamental flaw.

Dont be disheartened by any of the advice, take it on board and work hard at producing the very best cueing and striking action that you can possibly achieve.

You are on the right path mate.

Seek out a properly qualified coach in your area and get him to run the rule over you.
Then set about working on eliminating the weak points whilst enhancing all the good parts you already have.

Good Luck

Stevie Baillie
WSA Grade A Coach

[ADR147]

a bit quick but also i would say not all the feathers are even - try and do the same number and the same rhythm everytime - maybe pick a tune you like and cue in time to it if you understand what i mean - the idea just being to make sure you cue the same way everytime.

[dpdubai]

you should really find a qualified coach to give you this sort of advice instead of seeking it on a forum.
this is why professional players have coaches to fine tune their own game

After spending 6 months buggering around with my own technique through research on books, forums and asking questions this above statement rings true.

Only a qualified coach is fit to evaluate your cue action, if he's good 10mins of his time should be worth 10 weeks of self analysis and research online.

So 25-35 quid an hour should become good value, if you spend 10 weeks on solo practice even once a week its going to cost you way more than £35 in table time alone and your technique will be no further forward.

This is my own experience, I know some excellent self taught players but I chose to take the coaching route.