cueitis

[renniwevarb]

I've experience this before, but not to the extent of totally unable to hit the white. Confidence was rock bottom and just thought I will miss any ball even before I hit them.

A more pronounced experience came from Archery, which I was very involved with in my university days when I was in the varsity team. I hit an all-time low valley in my form, and it came to a point when I actually got "TARGET FEAR", meaning when I drew my bow string and start the process of aiming for the bullseye, my target sight just cannot reach the bull!

This is really a very interesting experience, just goes to show how powerful the mind is. No matter how hard I tried, my arm just can't bring the bow low enough to set my sight on the bullseye. We did a little experiment by having me draw the bow without any arrow notched. I was able to sight the bullseye. But once an arrow was notched, I just couldn't.

It was really a crisis for me then, but after talking to my teammates and coach I realised that you just need to calm your mind down and stick with your basics instead of letting negative thoughts impede your performance. (at this point of time I just remembered a quote which I read somewhere in a golf psychology book - "Confidence is something that when you have it, you never think you are going to lose it, but when you lose it you never think you are going to get it back") After relaxing and throwing away all worries and just going through the drills in practice I was finally able to aim on the target again (it was not an easy journey though).

I would say it is the mis-use of your own concentration by thinking of results before your excecution, or some distracting thoughts that somehow creep in at that point of time coupled with your lack of confidence which will affect your excecution; well we need the mind to tell the body what to do in the first place! So if the mind is on holiday or fighting a war... :snooker:

[burny147]

Thanks Neil, that sounds like something to definitely look into. Cheers.

[burny147]

Thanks John, some good stuff to think about.

[burny147]

Many thanks Dantuck, i'll be getting him to do some of those drills you mentioned. Fingers crossed we get some results.

[Terry Davidson]

burny:

I believe Neil has it right on and it has to do with the eye rhythm when you are doing the backswing and delivery.

When I took my examiner's training with Nic Barrow one of the things we have to demonstrate to either a new coach or student are the various types of eye rhythm different players use.

One of these was one I couldn't do and deliver the cue. It involved flicking the eyes back to the cueball at the start of the actual delivery and doing this injected a stutter in my delivery and I had to stop it. (My normal eye rhythm is to bring the eyes to the object ball on the start of the BACKSWING and lock them there until after I've completed the delivery (following the object ball with my eyes only at the end of the delivery).

The other thing that might help is an exercise developed by Frank Adamson. Just get down to a shot and DO NOT FEATHER AT ALL, just lock your eyes on the object ball after you check your aim and then backswing and delivery. You will actually be surprised as how accurate this is, especially for long potting. Try this exercise with the cueball close to the cushion too, but not on a hard shot.

ALWAYS start any of these drills with easy shot that you would normally have no problems with

Terry

[burny147]

Thanks Terry,
Your advice is really promising, i'll be getting him to try these for certain next time we go for a game. Thanks again.

[Nic Barrow]

The 7 Day Cueitis Challenge

Please feel free read below until you reach the 'Yips Challenge' toward
the end...

Below is what I generally ask people to do before I help them with any cueitis issues. It tends to loosen the problem and often it will fall away, preventing the need to spend money and time with me:


With the yips, it is not so much about ‘curing’ as it is about giving you the full flexibility and control that you want over the cue.
In other words, if you can ‘deliberately have the yips’ on demand, and then other times cue too fast, other times cue too slowly then we will be getting toward this ultimate cueing flexibility.
We need to imagine you are a coach who is wanting to be able to demonstrate ANY type of cue action and all types of cueing faults to a player on demand.

So before we talk about a session, try the following.
If by doing this you lose the ability to do the yips then this will save you a trip and some money/ time etc.
If your body does lose the ability to do the yips and you cannot get back to doing them properly then that is the type of place we would have wanted you to end up at.

Tell me (by going to the table and testing) EXACTLY at what point of the strike/cueing you do the yips.
Then tell me if this changes with:
1. Long balls
2. Power shots
3. Screw shots
4. Stun shots
5. Half ball in off billiard shots
6. Striking the cue ball up and down the spots
7. With a backswing that comes all the way to the thumb before playing
8. With pauses of different lengths before the backswing / at the end of the backswing
9. Without an object ball on the table
10. Without a cue ball on the table
Then tell me can you bring this yipping point forwards or backwards in the cueing process – or not?
Then tell me if you make the yips more intense or less intense – or not?

If through all the above your ability to do the yips remains constant, i would like you to teach me how to do them in a few sentences.
IE if i wanted to learn to do the yips like you (to be able to demonstrate them to my clients as something not to do), then how would I do that?
What would I have to believe, say to myself, do in my approach to the shot to achieve the exact type of yip that you have?

Please report back your friend's results if he would like to give these a try.
If his yips stand the first tests and they still remain at the final explanation stage above, I will then need to approve his 'yips coaching' statements to make sure they are good enough for me to be able to replicate the behaviour precisely.
If they are not good enough I will go back to him to improve his coaching methods until I really get how to do it properly.

PS the other thing that can happen (and is the reason I like players who have learned this way of hitting the ball to apply the above before I see them) is that they develop an amount of secondary gain around doing the yips: EG:
-being in the drama of it all
-self pity
-they subconsiously dont want to play competitively (any more)
-having a story to tell
-being a victim
-etc etc

This does not happen all the time, but is worth pointing out - as in fact if these secondary gains are strong then the player actually WINS in their mind and gets the result they want by YIPPING.
So a very important part of untangling the yips is dismatling any secondary gain if there has been any.

The other thing to say is that anything the body or the cueing arm does, it does for a POSITIVE INTENTION.
So a yip is not an enemy, rather it is trying to tell you something.
Usually something like this / following through to one side/ jumping up from the table/moving the bridge hand etc will be to COMPENSATE for some other hidden error which will often be uncovered by some form of 'root cause analysis' (I thank Terry Davidson for introducing me to this phrase for snooker coaching).
So simply ask The Yips:
'Dear Yips MBE, what is that you are trying to tell me, and what am I doing/ not doing that is making it hard for my cue to go through as I ideaaly would like?'

The more you resist, the more it persists... so often yips can be untied by the resistance to them dissolving which will allow a curious awareness the space to watch what the cue is doing, rather than criticizing yourself harshly.

Why dont we make a '7 Day Cueitis Challenge' whereby players go through the above steps diligently...
If they can STILL do the yips after all those steps then I will firstly be impressed, but secondly field more questions from those players on this thread so we can explore more...
It must take diligent effort to explore the experience of doing the yips a bit more deeply, though (rather than a diligent effort to show that these steps can't loosen the habit and give you more cueing options and freedom)...

Sincerely
Nic
07920 888 788

[Nic Barrow]

Thanks Dan

[The Doctor]

There are two main reasons why the yips happen.
I have worked with both professional snooker players and pro golfers on this subject.
I don't like to call it a fault because, as Nik says, there is a reason the brain and body are not in sync.
It will usually come down to either Eye movement not in proper sync with backswing and delivery or improper length of backswing.
Try these three variable eye movements and see what makes it better or worse and you will be on your way to fixing this issue.
1: Eyes back and forth as normal and when pausing at cue ball before final backswing(front pause), switch eyes to objectball and keep them there all the way through the backswing and hit.
2: same as above but when at final front pause keep them on cue ball and switch during final backswing.
3: Same as above but when at front pause keep them on the cue ball and wait until final pause and then move onto object ball.
See what helps and what makes it worse.
If that fails to fix it or help it, go back and look at the length of the final backswing. See what shots are worse and then try it with longer and shorter backswings and see what helps.
Finally, If none of this helps, your problem is in the mind and although not physical just as bad if not worse although fixable.
Try some distraction techniques.
Identify when the yips come on. Just before this point work on distracting the mind by using positive thought. An example is saying "back hit"
Back during backswing and through during delivery.
Ask a trusted friend to help you and say out loud "back" at exactly the point when you reach the end of your backswing and say "hit" at the exact moment you strike the cue ball.
Ask your friend if you said it at the exact time, Doing this will not only distract your mind but will also help bring more control to your cue action.
I hope this helps on a very tricky subject.

[abhi147]

What exactly is cueitis?
From the initial discussions it seemed like a physical/health problem and now it seems like its a cueing / mental game problem

Can someone explain what cueitis is and how do you know you've got it

[The Doctor]

Yes, it is more of a mental problem. What happens is the arm either stops when you want to deliver the cue or delivers in stuttering fashion. A problem but fixable.