Back at it.

So after not playing much pool for about a week or two I'm back at it. My Tuesday night league started up again this week and the Wednesday night is still going for another
1 1/2 months. Tuesday night we played a team that was pretty bad. I usually don't have anything to say about anyone's skill level but the Tuesday night league is supposed to be a Masters league and this team is quite poor. I don't get much enjoyment out of playing someone who doesn't even want to play me because "I'm to good" and beating her 7-1. I've spoke in ad nauseum about the mental side of pool but this attitude will get you nowhere fast and keep you from getting better. If there is only one piece of advice I could give to someone wanting to get better it is this: PLAY PEOPLE BETTER THAN YOU. It's not always the most enjoyable thing when you're doing more racking than breaking but if it bothers you enough then you will figure out what you're doing wrong or what you could do better and start winning more.

I drove clear over to the west side of town for tonight's match and there was one person there for the other team so they had to forfeit. This would normally get me a little pissy, to put in mildly, but it was at the Elk's club and they had a snooker table there. I'm a fan of pretty much any game played on a pool or billiard table, although I'm not at all familiar with balkline and only vaguely familiar with snooker, but pretty much anything else, I'm game. Whether it be 8 ball, 9 ball, 10 ball, one pocket, straight pool, or my most recent adventure golf. Don't be confused golf is played on a snooker table, which is a similar to a pool table. I played this old guy on my team a game of golf since we all drove clear over there any damned ways. He beat me up pretty bad but it was a good time anyways. I would have to say that one pocket is probably my favorite game but 8 ball is my best game, this is undoubtedly due to the fact I didn't play anything else until about 3 years ago. I believe straight pool is the most difficult game, it looks easy and sounds easy but you better shoot'em pretty sporty if you're gonna run some balls in that game.

I'm planning on taking a trip to Denver or possibly Wyoming at the end of the month to play in a big tournament, at least 32 and hopefully a 64 person field. I enjoy a different setting than league play offers on occasion and the competition is usually top notch. There is rarely a tournament in Colorado Springs with these characteristics so I'm forced to the Denver area. Both tournaments are handicapped in a form that you enter as a "C", "B", "A", or "AA/AAA", with "AA/AAA" being the best, and play people from that same level. I'm probably going to enter into the "A" field. This should be real competitive and force me to play rock solid if I want to do well. The "AA/AAA" players are out of this world good, and the only reason they group the "AA" and the "AAA" players are because there aren't enough of them in the area to get a full field, that will tell you the skill level of those guys. Playing in the "A" bracket might be a little over my head but I love a good challenge.