1. Pick a poolroom or bar with good equipment.
"Obviously you want to hang out where your best buds are," says Ewa, "but encourage them to go to a place that has better equipment, because playing on a bad table is going to definitely hurt your game." Bad tables can have dead rails, worn cloth or slanted slate that can make you miss -- and you won't know whether to blame yourself or the table.

2. Pick a good stick.
"People roll cues on the table, but more often than not, they have no idea why they do that," says Ewa. "They've just seen everybody do it." It is a good idea, Ewa notes, but you need to understand why: If the cue bobbles when you roll it, it's not straight. You want a straight stick with as round a tip as you can find. It may seem counterintuitive, but take Ewa's word for it, a round tip will hit a round ball better than a flat one.

3. Chalk it up.
Be sure to chalk before every shot, but don't chalk up your cue tip and then blow it off like a gunslinger blowing smoke away from a gun barrel. "That tells the whole world that you are definitely a rank amateur," the Striking Viking warns. "You can't put too much chalk on the tip. It's impossible."

4. Keep the game simple.
"Stay away as far as you can from the masse shots [curved shots using spin on the cue ball] and the jump shots," Ewa warns. She notes that these shots are extremely difficult to execute precisely, not to mention that they can be next to impossible on bar tables, where the cue ball is often weighted. "Trying those shots is also about the only way you can damage the cloth with a regular shot," she adds. If you've chosen a good pool hangout, shredding the cloth is not a good way to get invited back.

5. Keep it even simpler.
Avoid bank shots and combinations. If you don't know the rails, you don't know what will happen when you bank a ball. If you're playing on a bar table that doubles as a dance floor, it will probably have loose or dead rails. Even though Ewa plays on top-of-the-line Brunswick tables with predictable rails, she still says, "I would much rather cut a ball -- no matter how severe the angle -- than bank it any time." Combos are hard on any table. As Ewa notes, "You're hitting a round object into another round object into a third round object, and it's very difficult to judge."

next
01 · 02