Weight Forward In Stance

[armstm]

I went to see Patsy fagan recently for some coaching and he made this point - you want to get your weight shifted forward onto the shot. This will give you much more cue power and more accuracy also.

What was happening with me is my right leg (i am right handed) was straight but weight was slightly back. The knee was not taking the weight as it would if you're walking, the leg was kind of locked but not taking the weight in a relaxed manner.

You have to try to have the right knee slightly bent initially to achieve this and then you kind of move your pelvis back a bit. (the classic stephen hendry or neil robertson "bum out" position). This will mean the weight is on your right knee (as if you're squatting to lift a weight) and is more stable.

Try to see if you can do a mini squat in your stance position... if you can i think this means your legs are ok and in a relaxed position capable to taking the weight...

It feels a bit weird at first but i did feel more stable and the cueing was more stable also.


I have seen patsy on a number of occasions and he made this point over and over again - so its clear that its important and its also clear that i will slip back into bad habits without realising!

[Terry Davidson]

That's certainly a good point and one I agree with. Another way to get the weight forward into the shot is to have some weight on the bridge arm forearm and the bridge itself. The test is, if you can easily lift the bridge hand off the table then your weight is to far back in the shot.

If you have to push on the bridge hand in order to lift it off the table then that is the correct balance but if you can just lift the bridge hand with no adjustment to your legs then you are too far forward.

Terry

[Sidd]

If you have to push on the bridge hand in order to lift it off the table then that is the correct balance but if you can just lift the bridge hand with no adjustment to your legs then you are too far forward.

Terry could you kindly elaborate this point further on for understanding...??? Particularly the last part; "if you can just lift the bridge hand with no adjustment to your feet then you are too far forward...???

[DandyA]

I went to see Patsy fagan recently for some coaching and he made this point - you want to get your weight shifted forward onto the shot. This will give you much more cue power and more accuracy also.

What was happening with me is my right leg (i am right handed) was straight but weight was slightly back. The knee was not taking the weight as it would if you're walking, the leg was kind of locked but not taking the weight in a relaxed manner.

You have to try to have the right knee slightly bent initially to achieve this and then you kind of move your pelvis back a bit. (the classic stephen hendry or neil robertson "bum out" position). This will mean the weight is on your right knee (as if you're squatting to lift a weight) and is more stable.

Try to see if you can do a mini squat in your stance position... if you can i think this means your legs are ok and in a relaxed position capable to taking the weight...

It feels a bit weird at first but i did feel more stable and the cueing was more stable also.


I have seen patsy on a number of occasions and he made this point over and over again - so its clear that its important and its also clear that i will slip back into bad habits without realising!

I don't understand the bit I've highlighted in bold at all ... I agree with getting your weight (ie centre of mass) a little bit forward so the three parts of the tripod (right leg, left leg and bridge arm) are all stable but surely the way to do that is by moving your hips (and hence torso) slightly forward, not backward as you say ...

John Higgins is a really good example of this ... he walks into the shot, plants his feet and bridge arm, gets down on the shot and then quite noticeably shifts his weight forward (head and torso move possibly an inch or two forwards) to get a good weight distribution ...

I'm not sure about Robertson but I wouldn't base a stance on Hendry ... it's always seemed to me his spine is bent the other way to the norm ... there must be technical terms for it but I think most people have "witch's disease" to some extent (ie spine bends forward) but Hendry has "reverse witch's disease" ...

[Terry Davidson]

Sidd:

It's very simple...get down into your normal stance with say the cueball about 6" ahead of the baulkline as if you were going to shoot the spots. Now WITHOUT STRAIGHTENING YOUR BENT LEG (I forget whether you're left or right handed) so in a right-handed player do NOT try and straighten the left leg when doing this.

Keep the cue on the bridge and try and lift the bridge hand off the table completely but without straightening the left leg at all. If you can do this then you are too far back in your stance and balance since a player should have about 10% of his wieght on the bridge forearm and hand for great stability. Also the hips (centre of gravity) should be centered over the feet and not too far behind them.

So if a player can lift his bridge hand with no other effort then he should do as Higgins does and move his upper body forward and inch or two (and it's usually just a small amount as we tend to naturally centre our weight). This is often helped by having a more square stance as opposed to the Joe Davis 'boxer stance'.

Terry

[Sidd]

Thanks for the response coach. If I understood correctly I will do this; I will place the cueball as you said and go fully down on to the shot (I am a lefty). Then without straightening my bent leg I would try to lift the bridge hand and if I coudl do that without any effort then I am too back and should adjust a little forward by pushing my upper body a bit forward.

However, how to know if I am too forward in to the shot. How will I know if I am putting my weight too forward? I still think I might be doing that (you know my bridge arm shoulder weight right) so if I find myself too much forward into the shot then how should I correct that... and when and how would I know I am in a balanced position where my bridge arm is taking only 10% of the weight... Looking forward to your kind response.

[Terry Davidson]

Sidd:

I'm not going to answer your question. Please remember I am a PROFESSIONAL COACH and as such I make my pocket money from coaching and I expect to be paid for my services.

What I DO NOT expect to have to do is to answer question after question on this forum for you FOR FREE!!!!

I have a life too outside of answering all your questions. There are some things a student has to work out by himself or at a one-on-one coaching session with his coach and this is one of them.

Terry

[billabong]

Sidd:

I'm not going to answer your question. Please remember I am a PROFESSIONAL COACH and as such I make my pocket money from coaching and I expect to be paid for my services.

What I DO NOT expect to have to do is to answer question after question on this forum for you FOR FREE!!!!

I have a life too outside of answering all your questions. There are some things a student has to work out by himself or at a one-on-one coaching session with his coach and this is one of them.

Terry

LOL . . Terry, I've got this picture of you in my head doing the shoe-shine guy role from Police Squad . . . ;-)

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[Terry Davidson]

Some students are too lazy and take the easy approach of asking questions about things they could easily sort out themselves and it does become a little tedious at times.

Besides, where your weight is centered doesn't really matter that much as long as you are stable and don't move on the shot. Every pro has his feet in a different position and most likely their weight centered in a slightly different spot because it depends on the individual's physique on where the centre of gravity is.

One-on-one coaching is the only way to sort that out

Terry

[billabong]

I may have imagined this, but I remember someone quoting Joe Davis , advising that you play
with your weight on your heels, because if your weight is on the balls of the feet, you can unintensionally rise up
slightly when playing pressure shots.
i realise of course that your weight can be both forward AND on your heels
( and also that thoughts on this may have changed over the years ).

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[Terry Davidson]

I'll have to check my Joe Davis book. To me the best idea for stability is if the player cannot easily lift the bridge side of his body without using leverage from the bent leg. I'm not sure it matters where the weight is on the foot but I would think keeping the weight evenly distributed along the bottom of the foot would be best.

Tery