Spend an hour shooting opposite handed — if you’re a righty, try left handed, and vice versa. Be aware of the challenges you face as you try to pocket balls, and try to identify which of these obstacles give you trouble in your “real” game.

When you play pool normally, with your dominant hand, if you’ve played for long enough, your muscle memory takes over — and you don’t really think about what you are doing. When you switch sides, and try opposite handed, you don’t have that muscle memory, so it forces you to focus on what you are doing mechanically. This is a good refresher in analyzing what is important — steady body, smooth stroke, loose wrist, straight as a string.

Muscle memory is a wonderful thing — but it can also be a liability — when a player has committed a bad habit to subconscious control. Playing opposite handed may help you isolate bad habits in your normal game.

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