Carom billiards

thumb|Video of a game of carom billiards

thumb|The Family Remy by Januarius Zick, , featuring billiards among other parlour activities

Carom billiards, also called French billiards and sometimes carambole billiards, is the overarching title of a family of cue sports generally played on cloth-covered, billiard tables. In its simplest form, the object of the game is to score or "counts" by ' one's own off both the opponent's cue ball and the on a single shot. The invention as well as the exact date of origin of carom billiards is somewhat obscure but is thought to be traceable to 18th-century France.

There is a large array of carom billiards disciplines. Some of the more prevalent today and historically are (chronologically by apparent date of development): straight rail, one-cushion, balkline, three-cushion and artistic billiards. also known as star fruit. But this may simply be folk etymology, as the fruit bears no resemblance to a billiard ball, and there is no direct evidence for such a derivation.

In modern French, the word ' means 'successive collision', currently used mainly in reference to or shots in billiards, and to multiple-vehicle car crashes.

Equipment

Table

The billiard table used for carom billiards is a pocketless version and is typically .

Most cloth made for carom billiard tables is a type of baize that is made from 100% worsted wool with no nap, which provides a very fast surface allowing the balls to travel with little resistance across the table .

The slate bed of a carom billiard table is often heated to about 5 °C (9 °F) above room temperature, which helps to keep moisture out of the cloth to aid the balls rolling and rebounding in a consistent manner, and generally makes a table play faster. An electrically heated table is required under international tournament rules 'in order to ensure the best possible rolling', although temperatures are not specified. It is an especially important requirement for the games of three-cushion billiards and artistic billiards, and even local billiard halls often have this feature in countries where carom games are popular. Queen Victoria (1819–1901) had a billiard table that was heated using zinc tubes, although the aim at that time was chiefly to keep the then-used ivory balls from warping. The first use of electric heating was for an 18.2 balkline tournament held in December 1927 between Welker Cochran and Jacob Schaefer Jr.

Balls

thumb|A set of modern standard carom billiard balls, comprising a red , a white for the first player, and a yellow cue ball for the second player.

In most carom billiards games, the set of three standard balls includes a white cue ball for the first player, a yellow cue ball for the second player, and a third red object ball. The balls are significantly larger and heavier than their pool or snooker counterparts, with a diameter of , and a weight ranging between with a typical weight of .

Billiard balls have been made from many different materials throughout the history of the game, including clay, wood, ivory, plastics (including early formulations of celluloid, Bakelite, and crystalate, and more modern phenolic resin, polyester, and acrylic), and even steel. The dominant material from 1627 until the early- to mid-20th century was ivory. The quest for an alternative to ivory was primarily driven by economic considerations and concerns for the safety of elephant hunters, rather than environmental or animal-welfare issues. The impetus for this search was, in part, the announcement by New York billiard table manufacturer Brunswick-Balke-Collender offering a $10,000 prize for the development of a substitute material. The initial successful alternative came in the form of celluloid, invented by John Wesley Hyatt in 1868. However, while celluloid was a viable substitute, it proved to be volatile and highly flammable, with instances of explosions occurring during its manufacturing process.

Cues

Carom billiard cues have specialized refinements making them different from cues used in other cue sports. Carom cues tend to be shorter and lighter overall, with a shorter , a thicker and , a wooden joint (in high-end examples), and wood-to-wood joint. They have a sharply conical , and a smaller diameter as compared with pool cues. Typical carom cues are in length and in weight – lighter for straight rail, heavier for three-cushion – with a tip in diameter. These dimensions make the cue significantly stiffer, which aids in handling the larger and heavier balls used in carom billiards. It also acts to reduce (sometimes called "squirt"), which is displacement of the cue ball's path away from the parallel line formed by the cue stick's direction of travel. It is a factor that occurs every time is employed, and its effects are magnified by speed. In some carom games, deflection plays a large role because many shots require extremes of side-spin, coupled with great speed; this is a combination typically minimized as much as possible, by contrast, in pool.

History of games

thumb|[[Louis XIV playing billiards (1694)]]

thumb|Historic print depicting [[Michael Phelan (billiards)|Michael Phelan's Billiard Saloon located at the corner of 10th Street and Broadway in Manhattan, 1 January 1859]]

Straight rail

Straight rail is thought to date to the 18th century, although no exact time of origin is known. The object of straight rail is simple: one point, called a "count", is scored each time a player's cue ball makes contact with both object balls (the second cue ball and the third ball) on a single . A win is achieved by reaching an agreed upon number of counts. Ultimately, however, despite its divergence from straight rail, the champion's game simply expanded the dimensions of the balk space defined under the existing crotch prohibition which was not sufficient to stop nursing. Additionally, rectangles are drawn where each balkline meets a rail, called anchor spaces, which developed to stop a number of nursing techniques that exploited the fact that if the object balls straddled a balkline, no count limit was in place.

In its various incarnations, balkline was the predominant carom discipline from 1883 to the 1930s, when it was overtaken by three-cushion billiards and pool. Balkline is still popular in Europe and the Far East.

Three-cushion

In three-cushion carom, the object is to carom off both object balls with at least three being contacted before the contact of the cue ball with the second object ball.

Three-cushion is a very difficult game. Averaging one point per is professional-level play, and averaging 1.5 to 2 is world-class play.

Wayman C. McCreery of St. Louis, Missouri, is credited with popularizing the game in the 1870s. At least one publication categorically states he invented the game as well. The first three-cushion billiards tournament took place 14–31 January 1878, in St. Louis, with McCreery a participant and Leon Magnus the winner. The high run for the tournament was just 6 points, and the high average a 0.75. The game was infrequently played, with many top carom players of the era voicing their dislike of it, until the 1907 introduction of the Lambert Trophy. By 1924, three-cushion had become so popular that two giants in other billiard disciplines agreed to take up the game especially for a challenge match. On 22 September 1924, Willie Hoppe, the world's balkline champion (who later took up three-cushion with a passion), and Ralph Greenleaf, the world's straight pool title holder, played a well advertised, multi-day, to 600 . Hoppe was the eventual winner with a final score in of 600–527.

Three-cushion billiards retains great popularity in parts of Europe, Asia, and Latin America,

Artistic billiards

180px|thumb|A [[Cue sports techniques#Massé shot|massé shot around a pin]]

In artistic billiards players compete at performing 76 preset shots of varying difficulty. Each set shot has a maximum point value assigned for perfect execution, ranging from a 4-point minimum for lowest level difficulty shots, and climbing to an 11-point maximum for shots deemed highest in difficulty level. There is a total of 500 points available to a player.

World title competition first started in 1986 and required the use of ivory balls. However, this requirement was dropped in 1990. The highest score ever achieved in competition overall is 427 set by Walter Bax on 12 March 2006, at a competition held in Deurne, Belgium, beating his own previous record of 425. The game is played predominantly in western Europe, especially in France, Belgium and the Netherlands.

Pentathlon: Straight rail, balkline (47.2 and 71.2), one-cushion, and three-cushion.

References

External links

Union Mondiale de Billard — world tournament sanctioning body
Archival Billiard Resource
Kozoom.com: Online Carom Billiard Magazine live streaming all UMB events
Animation showing the "rail nurse" with a description
USBA 3-Cushion Billiard Rules USBA 3-Cushion Billiard Rules
Billiard Diamond System Calculator simulates cue ball path on billiard table