Rear Pause.

[throtts]

How many of you guys have a rear pause ?, a proper stop one too.

I do have one and find it improves all aspects of my game, such as stillness and getting through the white. Tried just having a subtle one but it messes with my timing.

Thanks, just curious what % of us have the rear pause.

[DeanH]

I do, always have done.
But since reading the coaches on here that I have realised that the rear pause has (for me anyway) a major contribution to my shot success.
The pause gives me a second to get "just so" with how I am going to deliver the cue. Works for me

[itsnoteasy]

yep i have a rear pause, cant pot a thing without it.

[Byrom]

yes I have but it is not so much a pause - more just a moment at the back of my back swing where I transfer my eyes to the contact point or line of the shot. If you get it wrong and pause to much you go 'past your point' so to speak and this defeats the object of it helping with your natural timing.

I would describe it like being that moment in your car when you press the clutch to change gear before you accelerate.

Learning the pause is like when you are learning to drive a car - at first you have to make an effort to think how to do it like this and it can be a bit jerky at first but then over time it becomes almost a smooth natural thing.

I pull back and pause momentary on the back swing as I look at where I am sending the ball then try to keep still as I accelerate through the white ball keeping my eyes on this point as I drive forward.
Like others on the forum I think this helps me with the natural timing of the shot and I think builds consistency too.

I tried playing other ways and I think this suits me best. I think though it is probably a hard thing to develop if you are already in the habit of doing something else and like my analogy with driving it can be a bit jerky and feel unnatural at first and it can hurt your game at the start until after many hours of practice it eventually becomes more a natural thing and I think this is one thing that can bring great reward to your game eventually. My advice is stick at it and remember when you change gears in your car it is smooth now compared to when you first learned.

[ace man]

I have played for years without any sort of pause from the beginning. On power shots my final backswing was even quicker than my (already too fast) feathers. Exactly the opposite of what you need.
Once I tried the pause and realized its benefits, I decided to give it a go. It took me about 2 and a half years to learn the pause(s) and slower feathers and backswings. It was hard to unlearn crap habits. Everything went easily in solo practice of course, but not in matches, even friendly ones. Many times I thought that I could never possibly play with a back pause, that it wasn't for me...etc. It is funny, but this back pause for me started first working on shots with the rest. In the end I have no idea how it got incorporated into my game. Reading this coaching section and hours with the cue in hand helped I suppose.
If I had access to a real good coach or if I regularly played against properly trained real snooker players then I'm sure I would have learned it quicker.

[Terry Davidson]

I've never had a rear pause but I really want one. I've asked many top coaches how I could get one ingrained into my action but I found none of the suggestions helped.

After losing my first one or two matches in every tournament this season I've decided that what I have right now just isn't good enough to compete effectively so I am now forcing myself to incorporate a rear pause. It's only been a couple of days however I'm using the Alex Higgins method of starting out with the real easy shots and using the line-up since most times you have a simple pot and I can work on cementing in that rear pause.

I am an advocate of the rear pause and I coach it as I believe it really helps the player to drive through the cueball and that is something that breaks down for me during matches and I'm hoping the rear pause can help in that regard.

After gaining the rear pause my next project will be to lengthen my backswing but I never work on more than one thing at a time.

Terry

[jimmyc]

I try to pause at the rear, but I can tell that I have another bad habit: sometimes, after pausing, I'll bring the cue back just a little further before starting the forward stroke. I don't know why, but I'm trying to kick the habit.

[SouthPaw]

I really want to incorporate one too, but it seems every time i try i get into the cue ball too much, i guess practice practice practice has to be my mantra if i want to develop one in my shot routine...

[cyberheater]

I've slowly rebuilt my cueing up from scratch and now include a rear pause. It's really hard to do when you're not used to it but slowly, it's becoming ingrained and I'm making progress.

I'm also slowing down my game and trying to include a slow back swing and on my forward swing to start off slowly and accelerate through the cueball. That, I'm finding is a lot tougher to keep together.

[viv0147]

After the initial cueing to bring your cue to a total stop isn't advisable all the cueing done prior to the stop has been wasted where players can be misled is on the final backswing the drawback is slower and it can give the illusion of a stop

[nrage]

After the initial cueing to bring your cue to a total stop isn't advisable all the cueing done prior to the stop has been wasted ...

Sorry but this makes no sense to me. How is it wasted? In pure physics terms you /always/ stop at the end of the backswing, that is at one point in time, however small, the cue has no forward or backward velocity - it's an inescapable fact. The only difference we're talking about here is how long it remains motionless.

I don't have a back pause, and I think they're a good idea. But, I think that provided your cue action has gradual decelleration toward the full back position (doesn't stop abruptly) and smooth and gradual acceleration on the stroke (doesn't jerk forward) then you get most of the benefits of a back pause, without most of the difficulties with timing the pause - which many people seem to have trouble with when trying to artificially introduce a back pause.

There are some really good slow motion videos of Nic Barrow with Terry on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCRcNZWQ53s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOWO6D6JDAs

Notice that when Nic cues, his cue speed has both smooth deceleration and smooth acceleration, you can tell this by the vertical lines he adds at regular time intervals. It also shows his cue "stops" and "pauses" at the end of the back swing.

[viv0147]

You make some very good points but from my observations if the stop is too long then the cueing then becomes wasted! I know some players who were Champions destroy they're game by having an exaggerated stop, but they did not cue like that on the way to becoming Champions, but there are always exceptions to the rule.

[DeanH]

I think all the coaches say that the front and rear pauses need to be perceptible and definitely not too long.

[nrage]

You make some very good points but from my observations if the stop is too long then the cueing then becomes wasted! I know some players who were Champions destroy they're game by having an exaggerated stop, but they did not cue like that on the way to becoming Champions, but there are always exceptions to the rule.

Ahh, ok, I understand what you mean by "wasted". Artificially adding a rear pause can wreak havok with your timing, both of the cue action itself, and the rhythm of your eyes which is especially key because you have to be looking at the pot (back of ball, or ghost ball, or similar) as you push the cue through or you risk cueing across it.

It's a risky thing, trying to add a rear pause:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BfHCP-mmks

Even expert players and coaches like Neil above find it very hard to add. It's probably much easier for a new player to learn.

But, like I say, I don't think it's essential, provided you have a smooth cue action.

[nrage]

I think all the coaches say that the front and rear pauses need to be perceptible and definitely not too long.

True.

Personally I suspect that the pause is actually just a mechanism for promoting a smooth cue action, especially under pressure. If you pause, then even if you rush the odd shot by a small amount, all you're likely to do is shorten the pause, so there is still a good chance you will accelerate smoothly on the shot. If you have no pause, and rush the shot, then you have to shorten the time taken for the slow/stop/start rear part of the cue action, meaning you stop faster, pause less/not at all, and accelerate faster .. basically you have a less smooth, more jerky action.