Church of the Good Hustle - October 2 2010

Saturday October 2, 2010

Feature Story

Church of the Good Hustle

Its like playing a violin, only with a pool cue

Craig Hill/Voice

Voice photos

Chilliwack 8-Ball Club members shoot pool at Vegas Billiards on Yale Rd. during their Meet and Greet to begin the league fall season which runs from September 14 to December 14.

ow much am I gonna win tonight? Ten grand, I'm gonna win ten grand in one night. Well, who's gonna beat me?...I mean, what other pool room is there in the country where a guy can walk out with ten grand in one night?

Perhaps at pool halls like the ones in The Hustler movie with guys like Fast Eddie Felton shooting would there be money changing hands. Serious stuff, but at Vegas Billiards, Chilliwack's only pool hall, it's all fun.

Jack Grant was busy installing the BCE Westbury snooker table when the Voice was at Vegas. The table was originally built in Bristol about 60-years ago. This table is the crème de la crème of pool tables. They were pricey when first brought into Canada. A new one would run a prospective buyer about $30,000.

Most of the large pool halls in the lower mainland are gone, so finding a public hall with the big tables is becoming more difficult and now Vegas can offer the full size table to the snooker crowd.

Vegas' snooker table was bought from someone in Chilliwack who had it in their basement for many years but decided to sell it to make room for renters. Grant heard about it and put the two parties together.

Repairing and recovering them is a dying art now. Grant has put together hundreds of tables throughout his decades in the business and has also played for many years in the Lower Fraser Valley Mainland League and was a member in the BC Cue Sport Society League which has about 200 players. But Grant is more well known for his work under the tables as opposed to on top. Jack Grant works on snooker table.

When he moved to Chilliwack last January, he went in to the hall one day and introduced himself. "They'd heard of me before as I've done all the seniors homes and legions up and down the Valley including the army and navy vets here and the senior vets over on Main St."

Prior to meeting Grant, Vegas had a company in Alberta do their table work and we pleased to have someone nearby whom they can call on.

The monolithic 6'x12' table Grant was working on is the largest at Vegas. Others there range in size from 5'x10' and 4.5'x9' to a small 4'x8' red one in the corner but nothing comes close to the 'landing strip' snooker table.

"This is for the game of snooker," said Grant of the unfinished project. "Snooker has been failing a bit but it's starting to make a comeback and there's still a lot of snooker players around."

Donovan Booth, manager of Vegas Billiards shows form.

Putting a big table together is a lot like a jigsaw puzzle. Getting it even is a science in itself, and once assembled, it takes months of settling and leveling to get it perfect. The table top came in 5-pieces, each weighing 400-pounds and the first time leveling the two tons of Italian slate took 3½ hours. It will have to be re-leveled every 3-days for the first month and then weekly until its to within 1/1000th of an inch.

"We started this job yesterday with many pieces and picked up the frame and the put pieces together and got the slates in, which is the major part of the job." he said "Tomorrow I'll probably put the bed cloth on and some of the leveling can get done and the rails with the rubber and netting I've got them out getting done and they won't be back until the end of the week."

"Now I'm just in the process of grouting between the slates so we have a perfect finish on the top then after that we'll get to the cloth and put the final outside rails on."

Vegas found out about Grant when the Booths asked local cue maker, Dan Wuttke, if there was a snooker table around that they could purchase and they were hooked up.

The hall is a true family-op business. The Booths bought the pool hall about a year ago in June and manager Donovan Booth usually works the business alone which is owned by his parents.

Booth says they've got nothing but praise from patrons.

"We're in it for the long run," he said. "We actually care about the place, obviously, we work on the tables, I fix cues and I fix tables myself."

Since taking over, the Booths have put in 4 new tables and are getting rid of the others and putting in all new tables.

On Tuesdays, the RCMP and Jim's Pizzaria sponsor a youth league for teens aged of 10-17.

"The kids come in have some free pizza and pop and play a couple games of pool free," she said.

Booth says there's never been any trouble and kids are told if they "screw up once, we kick you out and that's just the way it goes and so far we haven't had to kick anybody out."

"They're not problem kids by any means, it's a lot of really good kids coming in and their not thrashing the tables, they're not breaking anything," said Booth. "They're really respectful around us."

Booth says they'll be doing more renovations inside and may be adding dart boards for the Brits in town.

"I love darts. I haven't played since I was a kid," he said.

Business is steady now but it wasn't always that way says Booth who also serves liquor and bottles of beer at $4.25.

Chilliwack 8-Ball Club President shows his "gem" cue

We've never had this stuff before," he said. "Now we've got leagues on Tuesdays, tournaments on Wednesdays, Thursdays is couples night so if you want to bring your wife, girlfriend or daughter in, its half price pool."

"We're really hoping that this snooker table is going to take off in the next little while because we have a lot of people excited and looking forward to it," said Booth. "It's going to be a really nice table and Jack is doing a wonderful job, it's something that will be good for us."

"I'm real excited," said Booth of the new table. "I grew up on a snooker table and played it since I was a kid and never played 8-Ball even when I was old enough to go to the bar and the last time I played on a full size table must have been 5-years ago."

Booth says the older crowd appreciates the big tables and he can watch them play snooker for hours.

"They're the kind of people who come in and play for 6½ hours."

The old table is not without character and has a few cigarette burns on it's ancient rails from back when smoking was allowed in pool halls.

Table rental is $10/hour and on weekends, Friday to Sunday, its $5 per person to play all day. They'll make sure the snooker table doesn't get hogged all day by one group because Booth is sure there will be lots of people coming to play on the big table and they have to be fair.

There's no membership required to play. Its an all-ages place and anyone can go in and shoot a game of pool.

Vegas Billiards is also home to the Chilliwack 8-ball Club who gather weekly for tourneys and casual play.

Club president, Doug Robinson, said the league consists of 6-teams with 4 players on a team and they use a handicap system so that everyone gets a chance to compete.

Robinson says the handicap system is a way to even it out for the weaker players and the better players so they can still contribute to the team's overall standings.

"There's so many points with the balls left on the table and you have an average that you have and if you make your average you're valuable to your team," he said.

The league is one big family who helps each other and if the need arises will raise money for each other if one of the members lands in financial straits.

"We did a benefit tournament last year for one of the players who's ill and having hard times and I think we're going to be having that again this year."

Robinson has been playing pool since he was about 14-years-old.

When asked if he was good at the game, he responded with a simple "Yes," adding that "there are others who are better but it's good play, good atmosphere and great to get together with a nice bunch of people and just play pool."

"Pool is a game you can play all your life and it has a physical aspect and a mental aspect, it's like playing chess on a board with strategy and everything else," explained Robinson. "You've got to aim and shoot and its really all about ball control and you're always trying to fine tune it, you never know it all."

The league takes players of any ability, even novice players who've never shot a game before can join. He says its actually good for teams to have a weak player because they're always getting better and therefore always playing above their handicap rating.

He uses a pair of cues, one heavier cue when breaking and has his "gem" for shooting.

"When you break and you're always hitting hard, it flattens out the tip so when you change cues then you're always playing with a good tip."

Robinson isn't a trick-shot type of player but would like to practice that aspect of it.

"I know of tricks that I think I could do and make myself look good with," he said with a laugh. "I watch the Trick-Shot Masters on TV."

One type of stroke are massé shots which puts "excessive spin" on the cue ball to make it walk around other balls on the table.

"A more simple massé shot we can use in the game, is where a ball is in your way and you can spin it around and hit your ball.

Robinson likes the new table and plans to play on it but loves to play on the 8-Ball tables.

"The 4½'x9' are a 9-Ball table, which is when you shoot the balls in numerical order from 1 to 9 and when you sink the 9, you've won and that is typically played on that size of table." he said.

"Snooker is more like the big table game but you can play 8-Ball on the big table too but traditionally it's played on the smaller table."

There is a slight difference from American and Canadian tables. For instance, in Canada, the game of 8-Ball is played a lot on 4'x8' bar tables and stateside its played on 3½'x7' tables.

The 8-Ball Club runs a fall season ending December 14. They then take a break over the holidays and start again early January until May.

"We're trying to get more people in and promote the game but we'll see," he said. "Last year we did 15-weeks of regular play and this year we might shorten it and do 10."

Robinson says eventually the club may try playing tournaments against leagues in other areas of the Lower Mainland but needs more to look into it more.

According to Robinson, tournament play can be friendly or more intense one-on-one games.

"It's a real battle of confidence in terms of how aggressively you approach the game from the psychological aspect and then something happens and you lose it and you've got to get your edge back," he said.

"Particularly in 8-Ball you can play defensively or attack and you've got 8-balls that you need to take down, well you can hide behind your 8-balls because he can't hit your balls and some of the other games don't have that aspect."

Chilliwack resident, Mike Silvius, has played lots of tournaments in the circuit both in Canada and the states.

He plays it pretty straight. Nothing too fancy but now and then has to rely on shots like a half-ball swerve or a jump shot.

The half-ball swerve is where the ball is hooked around behind and is used when blocked and unable to see their own ball. The jump shot is used by the pros to try to avoid a foul.

"Trick shots are good entertainment but not practical in competition." said Silvius. "it's a set scenario where you control all the positions and you control placement of the ball and not something that comes into competition play."

Silvius says jump shots are used, just not very often and many do in fact foul trying it because the shooter has to hit the ball at a 45-degree angle above the centre of the ball.

"There are specialty cues for it, like "jump cues" which are shorter and have a flat tip."

Silvius likes to play with top quality cues which can start around $250 and go up to $1500 plus a bag to carry your cues can cost $250.

But you don't need all that to play in the Chilliwack 8-Ball league. The price is very reasonable at $3/night with a portion of the proceeds going to Vegas and the rest going to the league for trophies and their end of the year party.

They meet at 7pm Tuesdays until December. Learn how to play, join the league and have family fun in tourneys. For more information on the league call Doug at 604-792-8565 or inquire directly at the pool hall or contact him through e-mail here.

Vegas Billiards is open Tuesday to Thursday at 6pm, Friday through Sunday at 2pm and closed Mondays. They're open to the public on league nights as well. Vegas is located at 45742 Yale Road West. For more information call Donovan at: 604-702-0400.

For table repairs and recovering, maintenance and moving or sales and service call Jack Grant at: 604-846-6274

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