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General
Vocabularies, Material
- Balls
- Carom balls are made from cast phenolic resin (only in artistic
billiards ivory balls are used) and have a diameter of 61.5 mm.
2 white
 and one red  are used. For distinction one white has a spot
on it; in TV and championship billiards the dotted white is replaced
by a yellow one  .
- B1
- This is the ball that each player may touch with the cue, also
called "the players cue ball". Any game is started using the white
ball as b1. Player 2 uses the dotted (<=> yellow) ball as
b1.
- B2
- Object ball touched first by b1 (also referred to as "1st object
ball"). This can be either the other white or the red.
- B3
- Object ball touched second (="2nd object ball").
- Billiards
- All games using cues to make balls move on a rectangular table.
2 characteristic forms exist:
- Played on tables with 6 holes, where the goal is sinking colored
balls, are Pool and Snooker.
- Carom-games: Using three balls the players cue ball (b1)
must contact one of the other two.
- Played on a Snooker-table a mix-form of potting and making caroms
exists. It's referred to as Billiards or English Billards.
- Break Shot
- The first position of classical carom games, also known as "spot
shot":
Fig.1
corner balk area (exists 4 times!)
The player winning the lagging is allowed to decide whether
he wants to play it first or second (equalizing inning). Red
must be hit first.
Carom
- Any collision of balls.
- b1 (one of the "whites") touches b2 as well as
b3, sequence doesn't matter. This is known as cannon, too.
Whether a carom counts is decided by the discipline.
- don't mix it up with CARROM.
- Carom table
- Main form of carom tables are the match (2.84m x 1.42m) and
the half-match billiard (2.10m x 1.05m). For carom it is heated
(25-30° C) to reduce cloth friction and moisture on cloth/ balls.
- Cloth
- Usually green, usually wool (perhaps with some nylon). It should
cover table and cushions not loose. The looser, the higher is
the friction; this is the main reason why on an older table balls
don't roll as good as on newer.
- Cue
- Conical, usually wooden stick which is used to transport the
balls and transfer spin. Important characteristics are:
- straightness (one check is rolling the cue on the table, another
one to sight down the stick )
- balance (center of weight somewhere at one third from the back)
- weight (450-550 g)
- no loose parts (especially contact ferrule-wood)
- not more than 2 parts.
-
- Cushion
- Cloth covered rubber that borders the playing area. It's supposed
to reflect the balls elastically.
- Ferrule
- Link between leather tip and wooden part of the cue. There
shouldn't be any overlap between ferrule-leather and ferrule-cue
in either direction (ref. pic. 2).
Fig.2
- Inning
- One inning on the table ends with a miss or a foul.
- Set
- set of balls:
- 3, more seldom 4 balls are used in Carom
- 10 or 16 are used in Pool, 21 in Snooker. Few games
exist on hole-tables with other number of balls.
- -> rules.
- Tip
- The cue tip is made from leather. Ideal shape is shown in
picture 1. What makes a tip form ideal:
- curvature (for max. ball - cue contact independent from
contact point). Some use a nickel as reference ;
- exact fit to the ferrule (transfer of force and spin)
;
- sufficient thickness for elasticity ;
- sufficient roughness for good contact (improved by chalking).
Rules
- General
- All Carom disciplines share the goal of the players to
complete as many caroms as possible in as few tries
as possible.
- Average
- Number of points divided by number of visits.
- Balkline m/n
- To hinder the rail nurse and other very close (same
people think boring) manipulations, the table is divided
into rectangles. In each segment only n caroms are allowed
before at least one of the object balls has to leave it.
But -fortunately- it may come back into the field. There
is a bunch of balkline disciplines of different difficulty.
m characterizes the size of the rectangles (actually it
is the distance of the lines from the outer cushion here
in cm) and n the number of allowed caroms before moving
one object ball over a line. The discipline becomes more
difficult with increasing m and decreasing n.
Fig.3 showing a 71/2-setup
- Distance
- Amount of caroms to win
a) a game
b) a set.
- Discipline
- For one size of a table 7 classical disciplines exist.
With rising difficulty they are on a championship table:
straight rail, balkline (47/2, 47/1, 71/2, 71/1), single
cushion and three cushion (3C). For less classical games
have a look here..
- Equalizing inning
- If the first player wins the second player gets to complete
his half of the last inning and starts from the break
shot. (If no set system is played).
- Game
- The game ends when
- a) one player reaches the sufficient amount of points and both
players had the same number of visits.
- b) both players reached the amount of visits.
- c) one player won enough sets.
- Lagging
- A way to determine who shoots first. Each player puts a
ball behind the head string and banks it off the rail. The
player whose ball comes closer to rail has choice of shooting
first or second. Also known as "Stringing" in the U.K.
- Player1
- Begins a game and uses the pure white as b1.
- Player2
- Visits the table second, therefore has the chance of an
equalizing inning. He plays the dotted white or the yellow
as b1 (=cue ball).
- Point
- Every regular carom counts 1 point in classical disciplines.
There exist other rules on pocketless tables where
other scoring systems apply.
- Single cushion
- At least one cushion has to be hit before completing a carom.
- Straight rail
- The easiest discipline, where no extra obstacles hinder
scoring (apart from a special rule in the corner -> "corner
balk area").
- Three cushion
- The most difficult form of carom. To complete a carom, 3
cushions have to be hit by b1. The world champion averages
2.
- Set system
- Analogous to tennis a match is divided into shorter distances
which make up sets. This holds mainly for 3C, where
mostly best of five sets to 15 points are played.
Technique
- Aiming line
- Hypothetical extension of the cue to a certain point.
Only in case of a central hit this equal to the shot direction.
One can (or should) aim on anything that can me memorized.
Good aims include: diamonds, part of a ball, chalk on
cloth, a glass of water on the next table, whatever helps
aiming.
- Bridge
- For righthanders the left hand forms the bridge which
supports the front end of the cue. Recommended is the
closed bridge, that gives a firm support of variable height.
Other types of bridge are the exception in carom. The
open bridge (as used in Snooker) or massé type comes into
play for very close positions (e.g. rail nurse) or for
some follow shots, where the closed bridge would hinder
exact aiming. Another special case is the massé type bridge,
which you need when you have to elevate your cue butt
or have little space for your bridge.
Fig. 4
- Bridge distance
- This is one variable determining the max. power achievable.
The bigger, the more force can be used, but to the same
extend accuracy decreases.
- Hit of b2
- The amount of b2 (how full or thin it was hit (ref.
fig. 5)) determines
- the angle of deflection for b1,
- the speed distribution between b1 and b2.
Fig.5
- Dessin
- This (French) term describes the planned solution for
a position. This includes the paths of b1 and b2 , more
seldom that of b3. Also the position of all balls is planned.
A good dessin should lead to an easier position or one
with a good chance to gain more points.
- English
- Any off-center shot leads to an additional rotation
of b1. Top English leads to a follow shot bottom
English leads to draw action, left English forces a clockwise
rotation (so-called side), right hit to anti-clockwise.
- Grip
- The grip should be firm enough to allow for good speed
and direction control. The position of the grip hand should
wander the closer to the cue end, the more power is needed.
For close manipulation it can lie before the center of
weight of the cue.
- Stance
- The stance should be comfortable and firm, everything
else doesn't really matter. For a good aiming position
wrist, head and bridge should lie in one plane (fig. 6
& 7).
Fig.6
Fig.7
As with the grip the distance of feet from b1 depends
on the intended speed: The more force is needed, the
further the feet are positioned away from b1.
- Shot direction
- This parameter covers the initial direction in that
b1 travels. It is parallel to the aiming line,
for a center shot they are identical. In the other cases
English / side is created (ref. fig. 8).
Fig. 8
- Swing
- Swing or warm-up-stroke means the preparation of the
shot, it should mainly allow to gain a feeling for the
following execution of the plan. This includes that in
most cases swing and real shot should be adopted to each
other; e.g.: fast shot -> rapid swing. One should mention
that many world class players, especially in snooker only
use a slow, constant back swing for every kind of cue
speed. If we admit, that you use the same cue weight every
time, the height of cue - b1-contact determines the speed
transfer, too: The more off-center your tip hits b1, the
less speed is transferred to it, the other amount mainly
ends into rotation.
- Speed, Tempo
- The tempo of b1 is determined by the cue speed at the
moment of ball contact, which is determined by stroke
power. This power -apart from the body building capacities
of the shooter ;-)- is influenced by 4 parameters:
- distance grip - bridge;
- length of bridge;
- speed of warm-up strokes;
- position of feet.
The amount of ball hit (ref. fig. 5) mainly determines
speed of b1 after the first carom.
- Some additional
information about Newtons' Laws.
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