Experiments

When Earl Strickland and Johnny Archer were here giving me some lessons last week, one of the suggestions they had for me was to take some weight off my cues. At 20.5 ounces each, they figured they were just too heavy. Since my right shoulder has been giving me continuing problems with pain and stiffness, I'm thinking taking some of the weight off might even help relieve those conditions.

So it was off to Quality Billiards in Santee, CA to get Dave Whitsell to remove some weight from both my break and playing cues. Now the break cue is 18.7 oz. and the playing cue is 19.2 oz. and since they now have no weight bolts at all in the butt, that's as light as they're going to get.

They feel better, but the proof will be in the playing.

While I was at the shop today, I also got one of my spare shafts fitted with an Elk Master tip, which Earl Strickland highly recommended. And not just any Elk Master tip, but only the 20 year old tips which are much different than the current kind. As luck would have it, Dave W. had a few, so now I should be able to stroke like Earl. Right...

Experiments! You might think that after 5 years of serious play I would have figured out what works best, but there are so many choices, I may never settle down to one combination of shaft/tip/weight/cue/etc.

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