15 Levels of Pool: Easy to Complex | WIRED

I'm Tony Robles and these are 15

levels

of billiards. All of the shots, techniques and fundamentals we are learning today are applicable to most

pool

games, but today we will focus on the basic level 1 8-ball game. Fundamentals to master the game you must have a solid foundation and that is the bridge, the stance and the stroke, the v-bridge or open hand bridge is what is used for approximately 60 to 70 of the shots on the

pool

table, form a fist your thumb, attach it to the knuckle, spread your fingers out to create like a letter v and that will help hold the cue moving back and forth nice and smooth, whereas with a closed hand, your fingers are nice and loose, you don't. want.

If you keep them too tight the cue will rub against your fingers when you try to move the cue back and forth, the stance is to make sure you align your body with each and every shot, a shot is like a throwing motion on the shooting game, but the most important aspect is to make sure you always come back nice and pause slowly for a second or two before deciding to speed up as you go, the best way to confirm that your fundamentals are intact is to practice an exercise called a drill center ball, so you're basically hitting the cue ball in the center and making sure it goes in a straight line to the cushion and then in a straight line back to the point once you have your fundamentals. down it's time to take it to the next level level two by aiming the cue ball using the ghost ball method the way the ghost ball method works is if you want to line up two frozen balls together in a direct line to the center of the pocket and Then you get low on your shot and align the center of the cue ball with the center of the ball representing the ghost ball, the cue ball will hit the target ball where the ghost ball was aligned once you have mastered the ghost ball method .

You will gain much more confidence and start pocketing balls more consistently level three controlling the cue ball there are three ways to control the cue ball the follow up shot the release shot and the stop shot the follow up shot is when the cue ball hits the object ball and follows it after contact after hitting the cue ball above the equator, it gives what we call instant forward momentum which allows the cue ball to continue rolling forward after contact. A draw shot is when the cue ball comes back to you after hitting the object. To achieve the pull shot, you must hit the cue ball well below the equator to return spin, so that after contact the cue ball comes towards you.

A stopped shot is when you hit the cue ball and send it to the object ball and make the cue ball come to a complete stop, in other words it has no forward momentum or backspin, you are going to hit the cue ball anywhere from the equator as low as you can and what happens is in order To achieve what we call the slide spin, you must hit it so that the cue ball starts with backspin. Once the cue ball runs out of backspin, it begins to slide for a very short period of time before beginning to gain forward momentum.

It is in the Signal that the cue ball is sliding and that you must contact the ball to achieve a stopped shot. Understanding how to master the stop shot is all intuition and experience, as well as a lot of practice, but if you are trying to hit a stop shot. and the cue ball goes back a little bit that means you hit it too low or you hit it too hard if it goes forward that means you hit it too high or you hit it too soft the cue ball always tells you the truth and it never tells you you are a lie Let's see how these shots would work in a real playing situation level four basic positional play positional play is planning where your cue ball will end up after you play a shot.

The way I play the position is that I always plan three shots ahead. We're going to use the shots we just learned, draw this parry and the next shot, and as you can see here, we're now in a perfect position for the eight ball, level 5, the tangent or 90 degree angle line that doesn't always you will have. a straight shot, however if you need to cut the ball, things work differently if you are cutting the ball with stopping speed, the cue ball will not stop, it will follow a 90 degree angle, you can also change the angle it comes out of the object. ball using a follow shot or a pull shot a follow shot will go in front of the tangent line while a pull shot will come behind the tangent line level six the carom shot a cam shot is used when coming from a ball that no You don't have access to a pocket and you want to get out of that ball and use it almost as a kind of cushion to bounce the cue ball and pocket another ball on this shot here the 14 does not have a clear pocket. shot into a pocket and neither does a 9 ball, so I'm going to send the cue ball from the 14 to the 9 ball in the corner of the pocket level 7 combination shots a combination shot is when you hit the cue ball to an object ball in an attempt to pocket a second ball, the simple version is where you have a straight combination shot, you are hitting the center of the cue ball to the center of the first object ball to the center of the second object ball to the center of the pocket but you will rarely have a perfect combination shot in the game.

The ghost ball method can also be used to shoot more

complex

combo shots. It's the same technique, but instead of one ghost ball we now have two. It may seem simple, but when you look at it. two ghost balls instead of one is a skill that comes with time and experience and a lot of practice now there are a few more advanced shots I want to talk about level eight the kick shot a kick shot is basically a follow up shot that comes out of the lane to understand how a kick shot works it's basically the same angle in and say smash out and that means the angle at which the cue ball hits a cushion will be the angle that it comes off the cushion so for shots of a rail we use a diamond system the target points that they have on the pool table that we use as a guide to give us a better idea of ​​how to achieve a certain angle that we look for every time you shoot, let's say a kick shot and the object ball is next to the embrasure. that is considered zero and then each diamond we overcome we do it in increments of 10. from the corner pocket to the first diamond, which would be 10, the second diamond, 20, the third diamond, 30 and the fourth diamond, which is the side pocket, 40. so what you do is divide it by two and that will give you the same angle in and the same angle out, so half of 40 is 20.

Then all you have to do is go to the opposite ray on the opposite side of the table. and sends the cue ball toward 20. Common mistakes with kick shots are when a player hits the cue ball too hard or accidentally adds side spin to the cue ball. If you use a side turn, you won't get the same angle at the same angle. instead, you get a completely different angle, either longer or shorter. Level 9, the bank shot. A bank shot is when you hit the cue ball at an object ball and the object ball goes off the rail into the pocket.

It's basically the same angle in an angle. so when a bank shot is hit too fast, it misses the mark, it's hit too soft, it actually lengthens the angle a little bit. It's very

easy

to mess up speed if you're not familiar with the different types of speed in the shooting game. level 10 defensive shots you are not always going to have a clear shot in the shooting game when that happens you will have to learn how to shoot defensive shots the most basic defensive shot and shot is when you hit the cue ball into an object ball while trying to hide the cue ball and give your opponent a very bad shot.

There are many types of defensive shots, but we're not going to get into those today. Level 11. Lateral spin, all the shots we have discussed. this point has been hit on the cue ball on this vertical axis just up and down here now we're going to talk about the horizontal axis of the cue ball which is called side spin with a kick shot the cue ball basically comes at the same angle and the same angle off the rail, but when we apply side spin things work differently, it actually widens the angle coming off the rail or shortens it depending on which side you hit.

Some of the common mistakes people make is that they end up hitting it without enough side spin or too much side spin, so I recommend going in half-point increments to the left and right so you can get familiar with how much the angle affects you. comes off the rail with a little bit of side spin versus a lot of side spin level 12 batter a shot a batter a shot is an extreme curved shot that is fired at an angle of almost 90 degrees q when you hit the cue ball at 90 degrees, actually it makes the cue ball spin almost like a u-turn like I like to use a massive shot or a curved shot whenever there is a ball in front of the pocket and I have a ball that interferes and blocks me or prevents me from hitting the ball directly .

This shot requires a lot of confidence, but with practice comes confidence, so you should always start with just a little bit of lift and see how much you can slow it down from there while trying to keep a lot of spin on the cue ball, whether you hit it on the right side or on the left side and as you start to get familiar with the curvature of a ball, you start to raise the cue a little more until you can finally get a full blown mass sail curve around the object ball at level 13 It is a mistake to think that a jump shot is when you go under the cue ball when in reality that is considered a file in the game of pool, a real jump shot requires you to approach at an angle and send it. all the momentum to the bed of the table making it bounce off the object ball and speed is very crucial because if you hit it too hard you always run the risk of jumping the cue ball off the table or both balls off the table now that We have covered a long list. of shots we are ready to play a level 14 game the break the objective of the break is to have the best chance of running the table the ideal break is when you send the cue ball in a direct line to the front ball, this sends the momentum of the cue ball towards the rack by spreading the balls along the table this will give you the most options for the first shot after the break there are two ways to learn to break first you must learn to break with just your arm, with no body movement at all until You learn how to get a precise, square hit to the head.

Once you've done that, you'll learn to throw your body forward with your arm for more power once you've mastered the push. By throwing your body into the bit, you have the ability to hit it much harder and increase your chances of putting a ball in the bit. Now let's play at level 15 advanced position. When I run the table, most of the time I end up using the techniques we used. We discussed today whether it's a draw shot, a chamber shot, an explosive shot, a nine-degree angle shot, all of these shots are tools that must be mastered in order to come off the table consistently.

Whenever I evaluate a table, I always look for a pattern that is going to Minimize cue ball movement as much as possible by thinking backwards. First I start looking at the eight and I choose a ball that I think will be the best candidate to take me to the eight at the end of the rack and once I figure it out For that shot, I choose another ball that would be the best candidate to take me to the shot before the eight ball and so on, so we have covered many shots and techniques today, but there is always more to learn, every game is different and will require different shots and techniques.

No two pool games are played the same way. With the knowledge we cover today, you should be well prepared to win. Thanks for watching and I hope this improves your game.