Have you ever been out with your friends, having a few drinks at the bar, throwing some quarters into the pool table for a casual game of 8-ball, and thought “How cool would it be to have a pool cue with a laser shooting out of the tip”? Well, someone already has thought of that and they beat you to it. The CueSight Laser Cue has been around for over a decade now, but many people are still just now finding out about it since is has only been sold online by a highly specialized niche retailer.
The brainchild of an former engineering student at Georgia Tech, The CueSight was invented not for the training purpose, but for the coolness factor. Seriously, how cool is it that there is a pool cue that shoots a crosshair beam of light right onto the cue ball? While it may not be impressive to those old pros who salivate and croon every time Paul Newman, as Fast Eddie Felson, comes on TV, it certainly is impressive to us casual players who might only pick up a cue a few times a year when hanging at the right bar with our buddies.
Turns out though, the thing actually does a good job and teaching some solid fundamentals as well. Billiards coaches are always preaching about a smooth stroke and the laser cue helps you to see just how smooth your stroke really is (or isn’t). The targeted crosshair also helps to train your muscles where to hit the cue ball to get just the right English. Not a person I know doesn’t want to learn how to move the cue ball to set up for that perfect shot after making their current ball.
The CueSight has been recommended and featured by About.com’s billiards expert Matt Sherman. He has used it with his students and said “it has quickly become one of my favorite tools for sharpening your stroke, a masterpiece of pool design, with a crosshair laser sight to reveal imperfections in your stroke you cannot see with the naked eye.” If the billiards expert approves it, then it has to be good right?
So, it seems to serve a dual purpose. People really wanting to learn a few tips and tricks to improve their game will find some benefit to the CueSight as a training. For those of us recreational players who are really only concerned about looking cool and having a neat and unique gadget. It makes a great gift for a birthday or around the holidays, especially for anyone with a home table. It is a real conversation starter for parties, or just having the guys over to shoot some pool. Either way, the laser cue fits the bill perfectly!
