How long can you practice for?

[jonny66]

Would it be an idea to give yourself a little electric shock when you miss? Nothing big just the spark from a lighter or something.

[narl]

45 mins or so before it gets a bit tedious

[Master Blaster]

as long as you are sitting in the toilet :biggrin:
Solo practice for me is a max of an hour at any one time as concentration goes.
Tried longer but frustration creeps in and it is worse than no practice.
luckily though usually after about 45 mins a mate comes in and we have a match so the concentration comes back for the frames

Some days, you wonder why you bothered and after an hour, it's like, can I go home please. And then you think, damn, I made this trip, I really should try again, then it gets a bit better and time ticks by. Then in the last half an hour, it all clicks, you're re-energised and you could stay there for another three hours and you think, why didn't his happen earlier?!

[DeanH]

How long can you practice for?

yep :biggrin:
or the other way
the first 30 and you miss nothing like you have been playing for hours and then click! can't pot 2" sitters!
and as you say you think go home, just go home

:wink:

[jonny66]

purple patch

[Leapfrog11]

Before you begin to lose focus? I can't really go on for more than a couple of hours before I stop giving every shot the attention needed, I also have tendinitis so my arm and leg start to hurt after a while. I've heard the pros do like 6-8 hours a day which is impressive, would that be split into smaller chunks of a couple of hours?

Excellent thread jonny

I try to practice as much as possible but it can become very tedious.
1 hour of proper practice is much better than 3 hours of hittin balls.

[bolton-cueman]

I was talking to a coach in my club about it yesterday - he recommends 4 attempts at a routine then move on to something else. Obv, you can go back to a routine if you need to work on it, but he advocates mixing it up into short intensive 'bits'. He quoted some research from a study to back that up, but I cant remember who he said did the research.

The tables at my gaff are on a meter so I use that for rough timings - eg do the T routine until the light goes etc.

[vmax4steve]

Half an hour tops, same for matches. If I'm playing a best of five, if I don't win three nil then I will lose. My concentration is fleeting at best and non existant at worst, like it was last night, one twenty break in three hours of playing my mate.
I don't know why I bother sometimes, but hey presto a big break goes in and I'm off again.

[Master Blaster]

Half an hour tops, same for matches. If I'm playing a best of five, if I don't win three nil then I will lose. My concentration is fleeting at best and non existant at worst, like it was last night, one twenty break in three hours of playing my mate.
I don't know why I bother sometimes, but hey presto a big break goes in and I'm off again.

So strange, I played a few hours of solo practice today but I could have stayed for 6. At the end I was powering twice round the table with stun like Trump, ridiculous power and getting a full foot or more through the ball. At one point I was rearing up like Higgins and the balls were literally hitting the back and bouncing out. Magic, pure magic on days like that. It was a case of thinking about topping oneself on every shot. Had a lovely night sleep last night and I recommend this above all else to anyone practising. Concentration and energy are key. Take food, have mini-rests, drink plenty of liquids (not beer) and play with no FEAR. Once you beat fear, you've already won.

* Note - I spent two years learning my set-up and perfect alignment to be able to hit the ball as hard as I want, as hard as anyone that I know can, to be able to cue straight at dead-weight drop or hundred miles an hour. Terry told me to do it. So do it I did. And that's why folk have to practice and learn the very basics of straight cueing first. If you can't make a break of 30-50 or clear the colours, you should be devoting at least half your time to hitting just one ball. 10,000 times is the research finding; the number of times you need to do something so that it is automatic/natural. If you can manage 12hrs a week like me, then half of this time should be on cueing alone. It's very boring but if you don't do it you will be forever limited. Yes, you can improve without perfect cueing but you will never achieve your potential. Club snooker is littered with folk who should have hit a fifty or a ton in their lives but didn't. Make sure you're not in that class, practice hard and as often as you can.

[pottr]

I usually practice solo for around 45 minutes a time... usually gives me enough time to do 3/4 routines and then work on any particular shots I feel I could improve upon...

I usually take this time after I drop the kids at school before I go to the office. This morning I had a bash at Les' new challenge once, did a line out and then did a cross lineout, then I worked on a certain shot and played it about 10/15 times in different ways...

I find if I play for much longer than that, I am doomed unless I'm playing for something.

[Byrom]

Time commitments and all that stop a lot of players - but nothing comes without a little sacrifice.

I can quite happily play until my feet fall off but only in spurts that work and life allow - I look forward to it more when I do get time this way though.

After reading this really good article and realising what this guy went through to achieve what he did in a way I am happy not to be him. I love snooker but it ain't everything - to me its a game to play and enjoy and watch and enjoy - just to be able to just play nicely now and again at a reasonable standard and enjoy it for what it is ups down and everything in between. To have fun with it and keep smiling is everything I can wish for with snooker.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/oth...in-Samuel.html

[alabadi]

i can practice solo for 5-6 hours , i will take probably 2 breaks a 10 min one and a 15 minute one . i will probably do 10 hours solo a week and about 6 hours playing time.

i will work on 5-6 different routines during solo , sometimes i start and finish with the colours off there spots.