Shuffleboard Tips: The Basics of Shooting Shuffleboard Pucks

 In Shuffleboard Tips & Tricks

When you want to up your game, brushing up on some basic shuffleboard tips is a great first step. In order to become the grand champion of shuffleboard tables, you have to be an excellent player. Improving your skills requires understanding how shuffleboard pucks move across the board, which leads to figuring out why they slide, or fail to slide, in certain directions. As in many other tabletop games, the ability to control the direction of the puck is all in the hands.

Handling A Puck Properly

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Before we get into some more specific shuffleboard tips, let’s refresh the proper way to hold and shoot shuffleboard pucks. With your dominant hand, set the puck on the surface of the table and hold it there. Your palm should cover the top of the puck, with your thumb behind the puck and nearest to you. Lightly touch the sides of the puck, but don’t let your fingers touch the tabletop.

To get an idea of the table’s speed, slide the puck up and down a few times without releasing it. When you’re finally ready to shoot the puck, simply extend your elbow forward and move your hand in the direction you want to shoot. Release the puck and watch yourself land a coveted hanger.

Puck Placement

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Unless you’re a pro, you’re probably going to need some more practice before you can just throw hangers left and right. Basic mastery of shuffleboard is all about where your pucks land on the table and how they interact with your opponent’s pucks. This is why learning how to shoot shuffleboard pucks well is important for stepping up to the challenge of a good game. Although getting your pucks the furthest down the table is the main objective, you can also use your pucks in other ways to achieve more points for yourself or block your opponent from scoring.

Advanced Techniques

ShuffleboardTips1As your shuffleboard skills grow, you can begin to employ some more advanced techniques. The first thing you can do is learn how to play with both hands. Sometimes, you have a better chance on one side of the table rather than the other. Using both hands will give you free reign to develop angled shots.

Another method, particularly for improved accuracy, is a shuffleboard tip known as side-wheeling. This refers to shooting from an outside edge of the board instead of the middle. The third and fourth fingers of your shooting hand balance along the side of the table, acting as a guide for a more precise shot.

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A third technique you can employ is the English backspin, a move borrowed from billiards. Using your thumb and forefinger, the English acts like a brake on the puck, thus increasing the chances that your puck will stay on the board.

Shooting shuffleboard pucks may initially seem simple, but there’s more to the game than meets the eye. Since the surface of shuffleboard tables is coated with wax, pucks can slide great distances down the playing surface. Therefore, the importance of control over the puck is obvious. Try some of these shuffleboard tips and hopefully you will increase your command of the puck and turn into a shuffleboard powerhouse.

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Showing 16 comments
  • ROCKY
    Reply

    HOW FAR CAN YOU REACH UP THE TABLE BEFORE YOU LET GO OF THE PUCK?

    • Todd McClure
      Reply

      As far as you can reach but you have to keep one foot on the floor. One thing is you can not dust wax or sand the board during the game until the end of the game. Then you wipe the board clean, wax again and start a new round or game play.The shooter can however throw sand or shuffleboard wax from the gutter onto shuffleboard top but only again from behind the horse collar or end of the shuffleboard cabinet.

  • Rod Pugh
    Reply

    Using the side rail when shooting, It looks like, in a lot of videos, that the shooting hand touches the table top. Does this not create sticky spots on the surface?

    Thanx
    Rod

    • Todd McClure
      Reply

      Yes you are use the side edge as a guide for your hands, but unless you had some sticky material on your hands it will not make the board sticky. The side edge has the same finish at the top of the table. I guess you could spray some silicone on the side edges, like we do the table top to prepare for game play. This would lubricate the side if you feel the side getting sticky.

  • Rod Pugh
    Reply

    Edit: Touching the side of the table top when shooting, dragging a finger to guide you, It looks like, in a lot of videos, that the shooting hand touches the table top. Does this not create sticky spots on the surface?

    Thanx
    Rod

    • Todd McClure
      Reply

      The hand is usually not touch the top of the board we do often use the edge or side for guide the pucks. It may appear the hand is touch the table top but it is touching on the weights they are sliding back and forth on the top of the table. We have a powder like a snow called Shuffleboard wax on top of the board so if you hands touched the board it would be on the wax before it was on the surface of the board.

  • Neil
    Reply

    Is it possible to put swerve on a shuttleboard puck?

    • Todd McClure
      Reply

      Yes with English or spin on the puck or often use the concave shape of the shuffleboard play board if you have it set up where pucks break inside a common setting of the shuffleboard Plank most professional players prefer

  • Harry
    Reply

    Can you use the top of the board and the side wheeling technique during the same game?

    • Todd McClure
      Reply

      Yes they call this the Jersey shot when you use your hand along the side of the board to guide the shot

  • Renee
    Reply

    Hello, I’m new to the game.. I am trying to find good video’s on line to help me learn bow to shot.. I learned to shot both hands, both sides of the table.. i think i am good at taking off but want to learn bow to do more. Is there any videos out there that can help a new player.. i have a partner that has been workikg with me. But I have noticed with the women in our league it’s free hand or rale shots. I want to be able to do like to learn more. Anyone able to help me out.. please and thank you!!

  • Fisher
    Reply

    Can you throw a puck through the air?

    • Todd McClure
      Reply

      Would not recommend it if falls on the board will dent or crack polymer type boards

  • John Lawrence
    Reply

    Is it a penalty to drag your finger or hand on top of the board during the shot thus sweeping the wax away?

    Also, can a player hold the pucks in his hand while the other player shoots? It seems this would not be allowed as the shooting player would like to strategize based on the number of pucks your opponent has left.

    • Todd McClure
      Reply

      Not really but the shooter can toss powder from the gutter before shooting

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