Introduction

A gather shot is a point which allows the player to gather the balls in a confined space, the so-called „gathering zone“.

A long gather shot is a gather shot which uses the complete surface of the table, contrary to the gather shot in the third of the table, where the balls stay close to the short rail.

The gathering zone can be anywhere on the table, but the margin of tolerance increases considerably if it is close to a rail or a corner.

In this book you can find a description of 67 positions of long gather shots. Each of these typical positions can be slightly modified into numerous similar positions, where the position of the balls and the distance between them changes, but the type of the solution stays the same. Here is an example:

The diagram to the left shows the basic position. It can be modified as you wish, some of which are shown in the diagram to the right, but the method of gathering is always the same.

The long gather shots are points which are played only relatively precise, contrary to the gather shots in the third of the table where the player can be more precise because of the shorter paths. The point where the cue ball hits ball 3, the direction of ball 2 and the force applied on ball 1 and 2 are elements which are difficult to cope with, precisely because the distances are often long.

The positions in this book have very different degrees of difficulty. Some are very easy and are played very often, others are exceptionally difficult. When they occur during a game, players hesitate to play them this way, because of their difficulty. Even if the player refrains from the solution shown here and he chooses another solution, still it is important to know and to practice them, since they often open additional perspectives which can only be of advantage.

All gather shots are numbered and shortly described in the heading.

The billiard table, the balls and the cue are drawn in their original proportions. The only element which is difficult to depict in the diagram ist the balls' impact in the rail.

The balls are positioned precisely on the table. I suggest to use the exact positions, in order to make sure that the point can be played as described.

The three balls are positioned using reference lines, which are the balklines of 47/2 and the connecting lines between the diamonds.

Sometimes the balls had to be positioned outside of these reference lines. In this case imaginary balls (marked with a cross) are used. They make it possible to position the balls outside of the reference lines.

The points were played, using the parameters described next to the diagram, several times. But you always have to consider the material, the differences between the tables, the balls and the rails. So it might be, depending on your material, that the parameters are not entirely correct and they have to be adapted.

Next to the diagram you find the description of the parameters. The first diagram shows the balls 1 and 2 and fixes the quantity of ball 2, the cueing height and the English.

The inclination of the cue is not included in these parameters, since all positions should be played with the cue kept as level as possible.

The last parameter, the energy, is described in both components,the force and the velocity (speed).

The force is shown by the weight of the cue, depending on the position of the hand on the cue. The muscular power is not depicted. The force is devided into four levels: 1 weak, 2 medium, 3 strong, and 4 very strong

1 and 2 are more for playing in a confined space, preparation and gather shots in the third of the table.

The velocity (speed) is depicted by the speed of the warm-up strokes by the forearm. It is devided into 5 levels: 1 slow, 2 normal, 3 fast and 4 very fast. Slow is more or less only used for playing in a confined space, preparation and gather shots in the third of the table.

All parameters are set in order to help the player to make his choice. But it is obvious that you cannot reduce the parameters force and speed to four levels. Also, the number of the possible quantities of ball 2 is larger than the 7 used ones. The quantity of ball 2 was marked as precise as possible, but a certain uncertainty remains. Even though everything has been done to determine and draw the parameters as exactly as possible, some margin of error might exist.

The points are devided into levels of difficulty: easy, medium, difficult. Each point is described with a short text.

Along with the positions described here, there are many other positions. Also each player invents his own patterns by combining several paths or finding new solutions.