Dominant Eye Question
I received the following email from a fellow pool player:
Hi Samm, I need your opinion. I am a lefty and have had great success with my stroke in the past. I practice and practice shooting straight in shots. On my 9 foot table I shoot corner to corner straight in shots for hour on end. My high is 157 without a miss. I have had over a hundred runs of 100 in a row. Anyway enough bragging. Recently I got a giant brain fart going. I mean, I’m struggling to run 50 and 25s are average. I know its mental but I think maybe mechanics are involved. I have had a natural stance with my left leg in line with the shot and my chin directly over the cue, a technique the Jerry Brieseth a Master Instructor taught me. I think I may be having a problem with my dominant eye. I seem to be getting a lot of spin on the cue ball when I miss. Either left or right spin so I assume I am not hitting on center. I am right eye dominant but shoot with my left hand. Is this a common situation or am I fighting body posture by centering my right eye over the shot. Seem to me that I can see the shot better with my right eye over the shot and can shot directly at the cue ball and predict the path better. Any advise you can give me will be truly appreciated. I want to get back to those 100s. Thanks so much.
Mark
To start with, I just want to praise Mark for his impressive record! Not only is that tough to do, but most people do not have the discipline to shoot stop shots over and over again. That’s truly commendable!
Here was my response:
First, do you catch yourself thinking about how many balls you’re on when you miss? It sounds like you probably didn’t before, but have you been lately?
Second, have you watched any of the Joe Tucker videos or are you familiar with his 3rd eye trainer? Check out JoeTucker.net and click on “previews” to view videos (1), (2), and (3).
Have you tried setting up a striped ball in the middle of the table and just shooting it to the other end and letting it come back to your cue tip? If you’re adding any unwanted english, this is one easy way to see it happening.
Lastly, do not be discouraged. It’s very common to, as we become more and more comfortable with our mechanics, to slack off a bit and perhaps get lazy with one thing or another. Make sure you go through your entire checklist, secure bridge, stance alignment, lose grip, etc. when this happens. When I play for too long, my legs get tired and my stance gets lazy. I just have to be that much more conscious of my mechanics when this happens.
I invite other readers to post their feedback on this matter.
Thanks!
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