Topic: practise

[Francesco]

Does anyone know any practise techneques they use on the 5-bar or any other rod?

[snake eyes]

I occasionally put an extra man on my fiverod for practice, it might work for you too to get the feel of where the lanes are. hope this helps.

[SumnerH]

Does anyone know any practise techneques they use on the 5-bar or any other rod?

The most important thing is to do ball control drills--practice tic-tacing the ball back and forth between every man on the 5-rod, faster and faster.  That will help your passing more than almost anything else.

Otherwise, it's repetition without repeating mistakes.  If your pass goes too high on one try, make sure you don't just repeat that motion over and over--correct it.  I always alternate lane pass/wall pass/lane pass/wall pass so that I'm used to switching back and forth and don't become used to doing the same one over and over.

I used to do the extra snap-on man on the 5-rod trick, but I found it wasn't that helpful for me.  Some people swear by it, give it a shot.  Basically you pull the opponents' 5-rod all the way toward you, snap a man next to the 2nd nearest man (the nearest one who's not on the wall) on the side of the man near you, put a rubber band around his head and the guy next to him, and then you put a half an extra bumper on the rod and lock it in place.

The idea is then you have a small wall pass open, and the lane pass is open but you can't pass through the area where the 2nd man would be if the opposing 5-rod was on the wall.