BILLIARDS

HISTORY

•  The game of billiards a.k.a. pool has a long and rich history. It's been played by kings,
commoners, presidents, ladies, gentlemen and hustlers alike.
 What Is Billiards and How Did It All
Start?

• Billiards began as a lawn game similar to the croquet played sometime during the 15th
century in Northern Europe. It has evolved from that point into the present-day style of
billiard/pool table and rules.
• The game moved indoors to a wooden table with green cloth to simulate grass (I'm not really
sure why they decided to simulate grass) and a simple border around the edges. The term
"billiard" is derived from the French language, either from the word "billart," one of the
wooden sticks, or "bille," a ball.
• Most of our information about early billiards comes from accounts of playing by royalty and
other nobles. It has been known as the "Noble Game of Billiards" since the early 1800's but
there is evidence that people from all walks of life played the game since its inception. In
1600, the game of billiards was familiar enough to the public that Shakespeare mentioned it in
his play "Antony and Cleopatra." Seventy-five years later, the first book of billiards rules
remarked of England that there were "few Tones of note therein which hath not a publick
Billiard-Table."
 FROM MACE TO CUE
• In the original game (when they first brought it indoors),
the balls were shoved (rather than struck) with wooden
sticks called maces. The cue stick was developed in the late
1600s. When the ball lay near a rail, the mace was very
inconvenient to use because of its large head. In such a
case, the players would turn the mace around and use its
handle to strike the ball. The handle was called a "queue"
meaning "tail" from which we get the word "cue." For a
long time only men were allowed to use the cue; women
were forced to use the mace because it was felt they were
more likely to rip the cloth with the shaper cue (it must
have been all the trick shots they were trying to do).
• At some point, someone used chalk to increase friction between the billiard ball and the cue
stick (even before cues had tips) and found significant improvement in their performance.
Around the turn of the 18th century in Europe, the leather cue tip was developed, which
allowed a player to apply side-spin, topspin, or even backspin to the ball.
• All billiard/pool cues used to be one single shaft until the two-piece cue arrived in 1829.
 THE GAME OF POOL EVOLVED
WITH MANY DIFFERENT FLAVORS.

• In Britain the dominant billiard game from about 1770 until the 1920's was "English
Billiards," played with three balls and six pockets on a large rectangular table. The British
billiard tradition is carried on today primarily through the game of "Snooker", which is a
complex and colorful game combining offensive and defensive aspects and played on the
same equipment as English Billiards but with 22 balls instead of three. The British appetite
for snooker is comparable only by the American passion for baseball; it is possible to see a
snooker competition every day in Britain.
• In the U.S. the dominant American billiard game until the 1870's was American Four-Ball
Billiards, usually played on a large (11 or 12-foot), four-pocket table with four billiard balls
- two of them white and two red. This was a direct extension English Billiards. Points were
scored by pocketing balls, scratching the cue ball, or by making caroms on two or three
balls.
• What is a "Carom"? A "carom" is the act of hitting two object balls with the cue ball in one
stroke. With many balls, there were many different ways of scoring and it was possible to
make up to 13 pints on a single shot. American Four-Ball produced two offspring, both of
which surpassed it in popularity by the 1870's. One of the games used simple caroms played
with three balls on a pocketless table was something known as "Straight rail" which was the
forerunner of all carom games. The other popular game was American Fifteen-Ball Pool, the
predecessor of modern pocket billiards.
WHEN WERE BILLIARDS
INVENTED?

• The earliest documented record of a

billiard table was made in 1470. In
an inventory of the possessions of
King Louis XI of France
 MIKE SHAMOS

• Mike Shamos is the author of

The Illustrated Encyclopedia of
Billiards and curator of The
Billiard Archive, a nonprofit
organization established to
preserve the game‘s history.
ENGLISH BILLIARDS
 OBJECT OF THE GAME

• The object of a game of Billiards is to score more points than your opponent, reaching the
agreed amount that is needed to win the game. Like chess, it’s an immensely tactical game
that requires players to think both attacking and defensively at the same time. Although not a
physical game in any sense of the word, it is a game that requires a tremendous degree of
mental dexterity and concentration.
 PLAYERS & EQUIPMENT

• English Billiards can be played one-vs-one or two-vs-two with the singles version of the
game being the most popular. The game is played on a table that has exactly the same
dimensions (3569 mm x 1778 mm) as a snooker table, and in many places both games are
played on the same table. Three balls must also be used, one red, one yellow and one white,
and each must be 52.5mm in size.
• Players have a cue each which can be made from wood or fibreglass and this is used for
striking the balls. The last essential piece of equipment is chalk. During the game, each
player will chalk the end of their cue to ensure there is good contact between the cue and the
ball.
• BALLS

• TABLE

• CUE

• CHALK
HOW FREQUENTLY SHOULD A
PLAYER ADD CHALK?
IS THERE A DISADVANTAGE TO
CHALKING UP FREQUENTLY?
WHAT IS THE BEST WAY TO
CHALK UP?
 SCORING

• In English Billiards, scoring is as follows:

• A cannon: This is where the cue ball is struck so that it hits the red and other cue ball (in any
order) on the same shot. This scores two points.
• A pot: This is when the red ball is struck by the player's cue ball so that the red ends up entering a
pocket. This scores three points. If the player’s cue ball strikes the other cue ball resulting it going
down the pocket, then this scores two points.
• In-off: This occurs when a player strikes their cue ball, hitting another ball and then entering a
pocket. This scores three points if the red was the first ball hit and two points if it was the other
player’s cue ball hit first.
• Combinations of the above can be played in the same shot, with a maximum of ten points per shot
possible.
 WINNING THE GAME

• English Billiards is won when one player (or team) reaches the agreed amount of points
needed to win the game (often 300). Despite their being only three balls on the table at any
one time, it is a very tactical game which requires a tremendous degree of savvy gameplay
as well as skill to ensure that you keep ahead of your opponent.
• As well as thinking in terms of attack and scoring points, it is essential for anyone who
wants to win a game of billiards to think defensively at the same time and make things as
difficult as they can for their opponent.
 8 RULES OF BILLIARDS
1. All games of Billiards shall be played with three balls, consisting of a red, yellow and
white.
2. Each of the two players has their own cue ball, one having the white ball, the other the
yellow ball.
3. Both players must decide who is to break off first, and this is done by both players
simultaneously hitting their cue ball the length of the table, hitting the cushion and
returning back towards them. The player who gets their cue ball nearest to the baulk
cushion at the end the shot was played gets to choose who breaks.
4. The red is then placed on the Billiards sport and then the player going first places their cue
ball in the D and then plays the ball.
5. Players then take it in turn to attempt to score the most amount of points and eventually win the
game. Players can score in three ways:
• In-off: When your cue ball hits one of more balls and then goes down a pocket (2 / 3 points).
• Pot: This is when any ball other than your cue ball goes into a pocket (2 / 3 points).
• Cannon: This happens when the cue ball hits both other balls (2 points).
6. Playerss remain on the table until they fail to make a scoring shot.
7. Following a foul, the opposing player has the option of having the balls all put on their spots or
leaving the table as it is.
8. The winner of the game is the first player to the points total that was declared the winning total
before the game.
EFREN “BATA”
REYES
• Efren "Bata" Manalang Reyes OLD PLH (born August 26, 1954) is a Filipino professional
pool player. A winner of over 70 international titles, Reyes was the first player to win world
championships in two different pool disciplines.
 EIGHT BALL
• Eight-ball (also spelled 8-ball or eightball, and sometimes called solids and stripes, spots and
stripes[1] or highs and lows) is a pool billiards played on a billiard table with six pockets,
cue sticks, and sixteen billiard balls: a cue ball and fifteen object balls. The object balls
include seven solid-colored balls numbered 1 through 7, seven striped balls numbered 9
through 15, and the black 8 ball. After the balls are scattered with a break shot, a player is
assigned either the group of solid or striped balls once they have legally pocketed a ball from
that group. The object of the game is to legally pocket the 8 ball in a "called" pocket, which
can only be done after all of the balls from a player's assigned group have been cleared from
the table
 ONE POCKET
• One-pocket (sometimes spelled one pocket or 1-pocket) is a pool game. Unlike other games
played on a pool table where any pocket can be used to send in object balls, only two
pockets (one for each player) are used in this game.
 NINE BALL
• Nine-ball (sometimes written 9-ball) is a discipline of the cue sport pool. The game's origins
are traceable to the 1920s in the United States. It is played on a rectangular billiard table
with pockets at each of the four corners and in the middle of each long side. Using a cue
stick, players must strike the white cue ball to pocket nine colored billiard balls in ascending
numerical order.
 ONE- CUSHION BILLIARDS
• One-cushion billiards, also known as cushion carom billiards, and historically as the indirect
game, is a carom billiards discipline generally played on a cloth-covered, 10-by-5-foot (3.0
m × 1.5 m), pocketless billiard table with two cue balls and a third red-colored ball.
 THREE CUSION BILLIARDS
• Three-cushion billiards, also called three-cushion carom, is a popular form of carom
billiards. The object of the game is to carom the cue ball off both object balls and contact the
rail cushions at least three times before the last object ball.
THANK YOU!