How to Rack Pool Balls

Video Transcript

Hi! I'm Michael Lamendola with expertvillage.com, and today we're going to shoot some pool. Okay, so here we are at the other end of the table. This is where the rest of my balls are at. Now, we've got 15 balls here that number from 1 to 15. Now, balls 1-7, these are called solids. Mainly because they're solid. Balls 9-15 are stripes. That leaves lonely little 8 ball. 8 ball is the 8 ball. It doesn't go with solids, doesn't go with stripes, it's its own little club. I'm going to show you how to rack the balls so you're going to have a good break. I'm going to do so by racking them for 8 ball, which we'll talk about later. This is your rack. Usually you'll find it somewhere underneath the table, hanging on the wall. Look around, it's there. You place it on the table and all the balls go in. Now, when you're 8 ball, one thing to remember is that the 8 always goes in the center and the 1 always goes up front. Otherwise, what you've got to do is go around the perimeter and go solid, stripe, solid, stripe. I'm doing that right now. There. It doesn't matter what these 2 balls are, as long as you've got alternating balls along the rack. Now, it's very important that the rack be tight. Otherwise, when you break the balls won't go anywhere. To get a tight rack, bring them forward. Usually there's going to be a little dot right here. It kind of shows you where the 1 ball goes. We're going to pretend there's dot right there. 1 ball goes over the dot, and then with your hands holding onto the rack, push the balls forward so they're forced forward. If you can see, when you've done it right, there's going to be space at the bottom of the rack. Now, here comes the pressure part. You've to take off the rack without moving the balls. Do so by lifting up on the back and pushing forward. Now, you know you've done a good job if the balls along the perimeter are all touching. If there's a space, like say a ball has rolled liked that, not good. Let's try it again. Tighten it up, push the rack forward, and you've got a tight rack. Now you're ready to break.

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