Last month my 147 Academy travelled all across Austria to hold Cue Zones in three different cities on behalf of the Austrian Billiards & Snooker Association. First I arrived in Innsbruck where I held the first training cue zone in Jimmy’s Billiard Sport Arena which is owned by Jimmy Riml who invented a laser system to allow three cushion carom players to play against each other in different countries. The club is also the home base of Austrian player Andreas Ploner who will play in Thailand next week in the World 6 red Championship.
Full list of Innsbruck Students : EGERMANN Jan, GÄRTNER René, KALSER Günther, KETTENHUMMER Pascal, HASELBRUNNER Andreas, SCHEIBER David, STATTMANN Petra, EBENHOCH Wolfgang, MATHIS Bernhard, PLONER Andreas, STECKEL Lucas, STROLZ Jakob, ROBATSCHER Anita , WEBER Dietmar. Next I travelled to coach in the city of Graz in the Snooker Lounge where I also had a chance to coach players from Croatia when club owner Darko Hojan brought his talented boys for training on the opening day and the following day I trained members from the host club which included top Austrian junior Florian Nussle who is improving at each camp.
Full list of Graz students : BROZOVIC Patrick, HOJAN Darko, JELENIC Jan, LEPESIC Luka, RASAN Alen, TOPIC Tin, VISMAR Filip, HACKL Christian, HERG Thomas, MEGJIDI Randos, NÜSSLE Florian, UMSCHADEN Alf, WÜRSCHINGER Wolfgang, WUTTE Manuel
My final stop was Vienna where I held my final cue zone in the Austrian Billiards & Snooker Academy. It was amazing to travel all across Austria to meet players and club owners in a search for upcoming talent as my main aim was to highlight the training and coaching. We did find some new talents which goes well for the Development of Snooker and Billiards in Austria. Full list of Vienna students : BAUER Markus, CHARLESWORTH Oskar, JURDAK Andreas, KUNKEL Clemens, SCHLAGER Georg, WEIHS Therese, ZANOL David, BLIEM Daniel, BRAIDT Jutta , DONHOFER Christian, FELLINGER Timon, KOCH Philipp, KUNZ Walter, SCHNEIDER Hanna, LIEDTKE Jerome, SCHERÜBL Dominik, STIEDL Bernhard, STIFT Patrick, ZEITLHOFER Gerhard, ZEITLHOFER Michael
Each player was coached on improving their technique, shot selection, training structure and potting skills. They practiced from 10am – 6pm. I worked on getting each player into the correct address position and stance position using my alignment laser.
All the players practiced various routines to improve Concentration, Cue Ball Control, Break Building, Tactical and Safety Games. Each player received a DVD of their playing techniques plus training programs and sports psychology audio. I would like to thank Sport Director Christian Fock, Jimmy Riml, Michael Peyr and Franz Meszaros for ensuring everything went perfect during my trip. Finally I would like to thank all the players in making in a great success and it was a pleasure training them as their commitment was superb. I really hope it helps them build up their confidence to improve more. I look forward to holding my next cue zone for the National Snooker Team for the Austrian Association this September and thank you again to all the players and hope to see you all again soon.
