Coaching Clinic 23
In this month's darts coaching clinic we have a 2 minute video that may help you play better darts!
An Average Performance
I started thinking about this article over the weekend of the Masters golf as I had been listening to some of the players reflecting on their round scores and which areas of their game had either been the reason for them doing well or which areas had let them down. In golf statistics are available that allow players to decipher exactly where the round was won or lost; their chipping, putting and driving data is all available, information that can't be gleaned by just their round score.A golfer may have ended up in the bunker every hole for example but chipped into the hole to rescue the par every hole. Only with a more detailed analysis of every statistic available would the coach then be able to work out that bunker work could be set aside and maybe driving accuracy would be the focus of the next session. A score card showing level par after 18 holes wouldn't have told him this!
It was because of this that we suggest to dart players that the darts version of the golfers round score, the 3 dart average, should not be viewed as the "holy grail" of performance and to look elsewhere for a true guide to areas that may need strengthening. The 3 dart average is no more than a rough guide to how many darts a player has checked out on. It can get distorted though, for example during losing legs and sometimes the loser has a higher average than the winner of the match!
In darts, is it the power scoring, doubles, counting or other factors that are detracting from a winning performance? The 3 dart average will not tell you so spending time looking beneath the surface of your match play (9 or 12 dart average, checkout percentages, number of darts to take out a sub 100 finish etc) will pay dividends. This will also allow you to focus in on practising areas that need work and stop you from spending valuable practice time on areas that are working fine!
Flight Experiment
Another one of our members decided to try out our flight experiment to see if a tweak of kit may work for him. James is in touch regularly and always has something interesting to say along with insight in to the ups and downs of grass roots darts and playing in a local league.His feedback on his experiment will no doubt resonate with many players and how it can be such an infuriating game! James reported back he was "very surprised and impressed" after switching from a short stem and standard flights to a medium stem and pear flight. His practice went well with his new set up, finishing with five 140's and three in the bull. The next night was his league game, what could possibly go wrong?
Yes you guessed, James had a nightmare with the new set up. His match play went to pot and he admitted: "I did a stupid thing, I was trying to force them and as we should all know, the technique goes and that it isn't going to help!" This is of course why players either stick with their "old favourite" or quickly switch back when a change doesn't take effect immediately. It is a true darting dilemma, James is going to persevere despite his darting disaster, I will keep you updated!
On the other hand we have a client that is hitting more 180's than he has ever done in decades of playing darts due to a kit change. The key is to be open minded, what you have may be best for you, but unless you try something else, how do you know for sure?
Proper Practice Makes Perfect
This is me (Paul Gillings) and Double Top Dave! Dave came to see us at our coaching day at The Porters Lodge. He did something during his coaching session that he does when he practises at home. The video may come as a bit of a shock to some dart players, as they realise that perhaps the hours of practice they have been putting in was not doing them as much good as they perhpaps thought! Although it may account in some way for that great darting mystery:
"Why can't I take my practice game on to the match play board"?
There are of course numerous factors that contibute to not being able to replicate your practice game during a competitive match, but one way to help is to make sure your practice is as realisitic as possible. This is an area we at The Darts Performance Centre have been promoting since we first set up over two years ago now!
Spend 2 minutes watching what Double Top Dave does, it may just help you play better darts!