24th Maximum

So my 24th maximum came on the very second throw of some brandnew darts, the 24 gram Bullets in fact. It occurred early last December but I failed to blog it at the time. That would have made it my last Ton-80 of 2007. I still have not hit one in 2008 but my goal for this year is to hit one in competition. Even if it is friendly competition, it has to be during a game. I have done that in soft tip (that makes me sound like a soft tipper which I am not) but never in steel tip. It is also worth noting that I only hit 2 maximums in all of 2007. That's fewer than even in 2004 which is the first year I ever hit one.

2004 - 3 Ton-80's
2005 - 6
2006 - 13
2007 - 2

The darts in the picture were brand spanking new at the time and I was still learning how to throw them. The grippage is the opposite of what my grip requires and I recall that on that particular throw I two fingered the darts and "pulled" them to the board. Odd feel throw with pleasing, but unrepeatable, results.

While I am going to give my Nobu's priority handling in the months to come my guess is that my next max will come off the 21 gram Assassins. They have been floating in there pretty good for me lately.

19 gram Nobu's

These are my 19 gram Nobuyuki darts from Voks. They are lighter than I am used to and they are significantly shorter in the barrel. I spent several hours trying different stem and flight combinations until I settled on th config in the picture. I am still learning how to throw them well but what attracted me to them in the first place: the rear and front barrel grippage, makes them a very good barrel for my grip style.

As of January 14, 2020, this is my best configuration of these darts:

Practice - Pre-Flight School

What do I want from practice? What is my goal? It is unequivocally to become a better dart player. I do not practice for the joy of the game (although I do enjoy it). Rather, my primary adjective of every practice session is to improve my accuracy and refine my mechanics. I do not race to see how quickly I can complete the doubles or hit a hundred bulls or whatever. Every throw is methodical, practiced, considered and there is a purpose behind it. I do not throw just for the sake of it. That is my practice mentality when I am practicing alone. When my buddies and I meet for team practice it is slightly different, but not by too much. I play to win, I think through strategy and I practice calculating out shots, but still every shot is focused. In theory.

It has not always been this way. I used to be a careless, even luckless, thrower and I got discouraged easily and wound up driving my confidence into the ground, but in the last four or five years my practice habits have slowly but steadily begun to change for the better. At this point I am of the attitude that I can compete aggressively at the A League level - all I need to do is perfect my mechanics and group my darts better! Imagine!! Those two little things are all that stand between me and my goal.

How do I practice? I mean, what specifically do I do? I have my routines of course. But I will divide this discussion into the two primary scenarios in which I practice. When I am with my buddies/teammates, and when I am alone.

When at the pub and with my teammates we usually spend the first beer going around on doubles and the occasional bull or 60. But mostly it is doubles and this is less practice than it is warm up. Once ready we commence playing games. Lately we have been playing Chicago rounds, but historically we would alternate between 01 games and cricket, and usually finish off the evening with a dozen or so 101 games. This is a tremendously enjoyable way to practice. Especially when well Scotched, and happily beered.

However when I am alone I am always completely sober, always relaxed, and the only distraction I have is my dog jumping around trying to get my attention, or deciding to camp out immediately in front of the oche. I start by getting out six or eight sets of darts that catch my eye, an then lay them out on my work bench so that I can alternate among them freely. Sometimes I start with a set and never pick up another, while other times I cannot settle on a single set. Regardless, my first series of throws is a process that I call "Calibration". I throw at the triple 20, the double bull and the double 16, in that order, until I hit one of the targets. If I hit the target then that target has been calibrated and I leave it out of the rotation. I continue this until I have hit all three targets, which usually doesn't take very long at all. Sometimes no more than a couple rounds. Then, I start 60's practice. I take slow focused shots at the triple 20 until I have hit 20 of them. Lately I have changed this just a bit. I used to focus on the entire triple. Now I try to pick out a spec of irregularity in the triple and strain my eyes at it. During 60's practice I usually hit many low tons, and when I am "on" a ton-40 or two. I almost never hit the coveted ton-80. I have only hit 25 in my life time.

After 60's practice, I do a round of doubles, in this order: 16, 8, 4, 2, 1, 20, 10, 5, 12, 6, 3, 18, 9, 14, 7, 19, 17, 15, 13, 11. I concentrate on the doubles but if I miss inside I will go to the next number if it is half the starting value, which is why I do them in this order. Also because that is the order of choice when leaving an out. While I consider myself to be a pretty good shot at the doubles, this portion of the practice usually takes the longest time to finish. I can usually take out a double every couple of rounds but sometimes I take out two (rarely three) in one round.

After doubles I toss bulls until I have hit 20 of them. Double bull counts for two. The only exception to this rule is if I get through 20 bulls without hitting a double in which case I continue until I do. If there is still time after all of this I will shoot the cricket triples but often my time runs out before I get this far. When it comes to cricket triples I will stay one one number until I hit four-ish of them and then move down the board.

I do not have a set time or even a set amount of time for practice. I practice at home whenever I can sneak in a few rounds. Sometimes I have as much as an hour or two, some times it is five minutes while waiting for my wife to get ready to go somewhere or something like that. If I had to estimate an average session length, I'd have to say about 20 minutes since it seems I am always sneaking in a little bit of time here and there.

When I am practicing is is quiet and cold (at least in the winter) and my only distraction is my dog, who is fairly large and who has a playful personality and a thunderous bark. Sometimes she will jump around while I am throwing or even jump up on me and put her paws on my shoulders. I use this as concentration practice. I always practice ignoring her and focusing on the board. Sometimes she will catch sight of a squirrel or something outside and she will really let the poor animal have it. She'll produce the loudest string of barks and growls you have ever heard. I use this as concentration practice too. I don't let any of it get to me. This concentration practice came in handy last Sunday at the pub during a Luck of the Draw shoot. There was an important football game going on at the time and the place was packed. From time to time the entire bar would erupt in cheer, but I did not let it affect me. I maintained my focus and stayed on target. My partner and I ended up winning that night.

My thinking cap is always on. What some people refer to as the Mental game is what I refer to as the Thinking Game and what some people refer to as the Emotional Game is what I think of as the Mental Game.

Thinking Game = Knowing the best out shots and having a solid cricket strategy.

Mental Game = Having superior focus, and being able to completely block out movement, noise, and distraction while on the oche. This also includes being able to recognize, and undermine, attempts at gamesmanship from your opponents.

When I am practicing at home alone I have no need to think about outshots or cricket strategy but when I am practicing with the team and we are playing Chicago rounds I always am careful about not making a mental blunder. I have been thinking about outshots for several years and I believe I know what I would do in most cases without having to sit and review options while at the oche. As far as cricket goes I believe I know good strategy but this belief will be tested when I get to A League next month.

I do not have much opportunity to practice my Mental Game. I have gotten pretty good at ignoring noise related distractions but I do get butterflies when I am up against a good player. This is something I need to work on. Starting late March when I enter A League though, I will have ample opportunity to "steel" myself against trepidation and doubt.

25 gram NT's

These beauties were custom made but not for me. They we commissioned by a guy in Canada who ended up deciding that he did not like them as well as he thought he would. The craftsmanship is remarkable, and the balance quite nice. So far in the 2 hours I have owned them I have hit several low tons and at least one ton-40. I am thrilled to have them. I call them NT's for the same reason I call my other similar set my "CT's". NT stands for Nickel Tungsten.

Update: these were sold to Gene (of SEWA) in May 2011. I hope he enjoys them!

Took First in Sunday Luck (and a double's trick to boot)

Had a successful Luck on Sunday. I was paired up with an A League shark with an attitude to win and we took first place. The whole day was a good day from the afternoon practice before the shoot to the shoot itself.

Messing around earlier in the day I picked up my Assassins for a casual toss and ended up nailing a 171 (this was actually a spot-shooting exercise) so I kept up with them for an hour and hit a couple 140's in practice, then a couple more Ton-40's during the actual luck of the Draw. Feels nice to hit some worthy numbers with on lookers. I hit a few other Ton's but nothing to write home about.

The highlight of the shoot was taking out the winning double in a three way tie for first place. My partner left me with 24 and I missed into the single 12 and then took out the double 6 with the next dart. There were some very good shooters in the Luck so it felt like a well earned win.

Also, Before the shoot I took out a nice doubles trick. d16 d8 and d4 on the
first round that I decided to do some doubles. After that I missed the double 2 several rounds in a row and hung up the doubles before my confidence waned.

In the first game hit a ton and I took out 40 for the win. Second game I hit some nice tight groups but never for more than 60 points. Still this was encouraging as I have been concentrating on taking a breath and throwing slow concentrated shots. And spot shooting.

In the next set of two games I hit a 140 and took out a 16 with a single dart for one more win (I believe my partner and I pretty much split the wins between us evenly). In The fifth game I hit shit and we lost but the sixth game I hit another ton-40 and also took out a 4 with one dart winning it for us. The round before I had 84 left and missed into the single one and then decided to go 51, 32. I hit the 51 but wired the 32 inside leaving 16.

A nice evening.

171

I hit this little gem while practicing my "spot shooting". I already had another set of darts grouped around (but not necessarily in) the triple 20 on Sunday afternoon before the Luck. I decided to pick a spec in the triple 19 and o my best. The first dart hit which pleased me greatly but then I couldn't find the spot I originally was aiming at, so I picked the spot where the point of the first dart hit the board and voila, another 57. I did the same thing with the third dart for a stylin' 171.

26 gram Bottelsens

These darts came in a trade. I'd never seen them before even on eBay and I am very curious what the model name of them is. They are definitely Bottelsen hammerheads of some variety, perhaps even a signature dart for all I know but whose I could not guess. I traded away my 24 gram Dimplex Powerpoint darts for them, and when we were doing the trade, the guy who had them sent me two sets to choose between. The other set I could have chosen were Rick Ney signature hammerheads which I have wanted a set for a long time but I opted for these as they throw better for me, and they are like nothing I have ever seen.

24 gram Bottelsens

These ebay beauties weigh in at 24 grams and they are Bottelsen Hammerheads for sure but what specific model name I do not know. They throw nice, and as is the case with all Bottelsen products, the craftsmanship is really top notch.

UPDATE: I traded these away for the Target Sport darts in July 2008.

22 gram Spectacular 1989's

These brass darts came in a box from my father along with a bunch of other wooden and "bar" darts. I have no idea who made them but at the time they must have be special enough to engrave "Spectacular 1989" on the barrels.

21 gram Assassins

These darts are nice little darts. I never knew what they were until a fellow dart geek immediately pegged them as 21 gram Assassins. Aside from being amazed that he could identify them so specifically within seconds, I was surprised because I never found the Assassin range to be that appealing. If these truly are those darts, though, they must be a much older version because these grooves are more widely spaced than the current version. I have not Ton-80'd with these, but I have hit a nine count in the 19 bed with them.

24 gram Bullets

These darts were made to order for me by Jeff Pickup in Canada. They are a Copper Tungsten simulacrum of some old Unicorn darts called 'Bullets'. The stems are 3ba which are not made anymore and this makes them hard to find. I have ton-80's with these darts. In fact the second round I ever threw with them was a maximum.

Hangdart

This little trick-shot:



came unexpectedly during a weekend practice session over at my buddy and teammate's house. We spent the afternoon alternating between practice Chicago rounds in preparation for the finals match (which we ultimately won) and fashioning inserts for impromptu dart cases. He has an old scalpel case that he likes and made a nice insert from foam that he bought in a garage sale and I have a pencil box that I am particularly fond of.

We Won!

We won the finals match last night, so we are are now the B League champions! Next season I am moving up to A League though. Time for me to reacquaint myself with the bottom of the rankings again :( This is how the match went:

I opened the evening against their captain who is ranked second in the league. Finals is different. There was no stage there but it felt a little bit like we were on one since there was a crowd of people who had gathered to watch. My game was solid enough to keep pace with him but I didn't throw any big scores. We got to our outs at about the same time but I took out mine first, a 16 with single 8 double 4.

Ars Gainne Mill up 1-0

My second game was a singles cricket against one of their mid ranked players. I opened with trip 20, a miss at the 19 bed and then a single 20. It turned into a point war early. He went for the 18s but didn't open them so I opened the 19s next round and then we both laid into our honeypots. I was a good 60 points up on him by the time we got those two beds closed. The rest of the game went by in an undramatic fashion but my last round, going for bulls I blocked the bull with my second dart. But I snuck one in around it anyway ;)

Ars Gainne Mill now up 7-1

My third game was doubles 501 and my partner was our highest ranked player. We were up against their captain, a true ringer, and another guy we had not seen all season, their second best player. We managed to stay apace and then my partner left me a 12 out which I took out with a miss into the single 6, and then I hit the double three.

Ars Gainne Mill now up 8-3

Fourth and fifth games were also doubles 501 and I was partnered with our fearless leader for both games. We won them both but the second game was stretched taught with lots of tension. The opponents could feel it too. At one point one of the opposing team accused Capitan (who was several feet to the right of the oche) of stepping backwards during his throw. A small tiff ensued and then civility was quickly re-established when my captain offered to scratch the entire leg and do it over. I thought that was a very magnanimous thing to do, even if it was clearly an unjustified complaint. I don't think it would have mattered to our opponent had it not been a finals match, or if it had not been the game that clinched the title for us.

Ars Gainne Mill wins, 12-3

It was a very satisfying evening to say the least

Finals Bound

So my dart team is headed for the finals next week and we are playing against a good (duh) team that is likely to put up really good fight. To get there we had to get past another really good team in the semifinals round.

The semifinals was a fun night. We smashed our opponents 11-3 which is a huge surprise considering that they are a strong team with at least two very strong players. Their captain as well as another guy who was B League's top player a few seasons ago. I guess part of it was that they were just off form but I think also there was a little bit of us being "on" too.

We played the team game first and I happened to take out the money shot, which was 20, with a miss and a hit (d10). Then in the singles 401 (Seattle seems to be the only place in the world which plays 401. Not sure why. Perhaps they figured since it was B League we couldn't handle the arduous extra 100 points?) I took on their captain and managed to hit my 36 out before he could hit his. By all rights I should have lost that game. My opponent have several turns at a single dart out and he could not hit it which was quite unusual for him. Then in Cricket I took on the former top player and beat him handily with 85 points to spare. I was a point ho that game but that is just the way you have to play cricket at higher levels of play. Point early, point often. I was surprised to do so well against him. I was hitting my triples pretty well but he normally beats me.

We never made it to the doubles cricket games. The semifinal match was decided during the doubles 501 games, and my partner and I had the honor of being in the deciding match. My partner took out the ten for us. All in all it was a fun night and I am happy to be moving onto the finals round against yet another tough opponent (duh).

26 Gram Fixed Point CT's

I call these CT's. They are not MP darts and they were made especially for me and are thus a unique one of a kind set.



The points are a little short for my taste so I may end up replacing the points (but to be fair I did ask for short points).



As you can see they are similar in shape and appearance to my 28 gram GT's.




These three darts are all made from 75% Copper Tungsten. The middle one I have had for about a year. The other two are brand new. The material darkens as it ages.

Thinning Out the Herd

I would be very happy if I could get my collection down to about 36 to 48 sets of darts. really this should not be too difficult considering that I have several sets of darts that I simply do not like and several other sets that I like well enough but feel no special attachment to, and which I never throw. The set below belongs to the later group. They are really good darts with an excellent grip but I never really throw them anymore. When I used to use them more I would dress them in hammerhead points and slim flights and they perform very nicely. the depressions in the barrel for the fingers are amazingly well thought out. The other night my buddy Byron came over and I used these guys and hit several low tons. I was happy. I'd also forgotten how well I like those spiraline flights!


In the above photo you can see the points that I currently have on them. They are ordinary plain (but oddly sharp) conversion points and their sole function is to help the dart stick in a bristle board. Not very aesthetically pleasing but that is not really a requirement (okay I don't really believe that). The flights are amazing although I freely admit that these days I use mostly plain slim flights. They have a lot of drag but that is compensated by how true they fly.

I think I'll throw some hammerhead points on them this week and reminisce a little bit before they gat bought up on ebay. If they get bought that is. This is my first bay offering and they is no garantee that they will be bought.

23rd Maximum

Here it is, like so many others it came while I was on the phone chatting away:

Nice Barrel Design from Jeff Pickup

This pic was included in a set of pictures Jeff sent me regarding the streamlined MP system. I just happened to notice the nice barrel design of this dart. It looks like an nice alternative to the typical "ultra-grip" barrel designs that focus on large knurls.


Like what you see? Email Jeff and ask about prices!

Offered for Trade

22 gram Unicorn Latinum Colin Lloyds - The entire package that you see is what is included. The darts themselves, in good condition, the stems currently attached to the darts, the flights that you see, the flight protector ring, none of which have been used, and the case.



The case was damaged in shipping to me but through a complicated exercise involving super glue and scotch tape I have managed to repair it, more or less.



I prefer to trade for something unique or interesting. I like copper tungsten darts, I like old Bottelsen offerings, I like old old Unicorn offerings, etc. I would even consider trading for non-latinum Lloyds. I prefer not to sell darts. I'd rather replace them with something interesting.

5 Count with Penetrators

This 5 count in the bulls came at the very tail end of another round of the PaulWilliamsDarts.co.uk April Challenge. The first dart hit the double bull (which was the 133rd dart in the the challenge) and I tossed the other two for tossing's sake. They landed well.

Super Streamlined Pickup Points

These are some photos that Jeff had sent me a while back that I never had the chance to put up on the blog. They are of his new MP design that does two things: First, it makes the o-ring more optional that it was before as you had to really dig in his old points to fish out the embedded o-ring, and Second, lathing down the collar to match your darts makes the MP dart close in weight length and balance to an FP dart. Take a look at the photo below. As you can see the collar is extremely small and it does not consist of enough material to house an internal o-ring groove. Secondly, if you want a more free moving point you can completely omit the o-ring entirely by sliding it off the back of the point.



Here is what the MP system looks like on the dart. In this picture the collar has been gently lathed smooth to the barrel. It looks quite nice.


Like what you see? Email Jeff and ask about prices!

Ozzie Doubles Trick

Well, not exactly 'Ozzie' but I was using the new darts I got in trade from Wazza, who is a darter friend from Down under and who posts to this blog occasionally. A doubles trick, for those of you who do not know, is when you hit all three doubles you are aiming at in the same round. This particular DT occurred in the thirteenth round of the April Challenge, and I was aiming at the 2, the 1 and the 20 in that order:


The darts are actually quite nice. They are short, probably 41 mm long, and have a nice feel to them with ample ringage and just a hint of taper. They are 18 grams and were designed for soft tip usage. Since I did not already have some 18 gram steel tip darts that I liked a lot I thought it would be a nice trade (and a nice trade it was!). One down side to them is that the threading is a little too tight. I cannot get steel conversion points in them all the way. This is fixable, however.

The darts themselves:


They are dressed in short spiraline stems and coal cracker dimplex flights. The practice routine I was doing is quite a good one for doubles practice and is a challenge posted over at Paul William's forum. The idea is simple: count how many darts it takes you to hit all of the doubles, including the double bull, and then post your results to compare with others. And of course try to beat your score!! Here is a link to the forum, the April Challenge is in the Dart Chat area:

http://mistadouble.proboards31.com/index.cgi

Have fun!!

Sleepy Darts

Not really, there is nothing to yawn about here!! In fact I have recently engaged in two different dart trading episodes with members of SEWA. One trade was with a gentleman down under, and the other with SLEEPYKRAMER.

SLEEPYKRAMER is a woman from California who seems to have a long history with darts. Her husband was some hot shot with his own signature dart line through Bottelsen. Anyway, many kudos and many thanks to SleepyK as she has sent me some really nice darts in exchange for some 23 gram John Part Latinums which I won in the SEWA trivia contest.


The Latties (as I call the JP Latinums) are really nice darts. However, since I am unlikely to use them very often they would just sit in my collection collecting dust. I did not want this to happen so to recycle them back into the SEWA family I decided to trade them away. Of all the offers that came in I liked what SleepyK had to offer the best. Here is what I got:

25 gram Accudart GF Penetrators:


23 gram Unicorn Hustlers:


The Penetrators are really interesting darts. Their tips appear to be steel but upon closer examination you can see they are not. They are actually Carbon Fiber. They flex a bit, and the will supposedly split if the hit a wire instead of bouncing out. Accudart has always made high quality darts and it is a real shame that they are no longer making all the steel tip darts they used to. They were a truly innovative company.

The Hustlers are interesting too. Brass bodies that give the false appearance of a skinny waist. They are 2BA threaded like most darts, but they are so wide near the nose that they have a GT-esk quality to them.

26 gram Accudart Unknowns

There are a few reasons why I know these are Accudarts. First, the stems that they came with appear proprietary and say "Accudart" on them. This combination nails it. Also, They came in an Accudart case. Last but not least, the collar of the moving point is extremely similar in design to the collars of the Accudart Penetrators that I have, although these move back and forth in the dart as well as spin. I am 99.9% certain that these are Accudart darts, I just do not know what model name belongs to it, or what "Line" it comes from.

This is a very skinny waisted dart and may have been Accudart's answer to the GT from Bottelsen. The thread size on the stem is a bit bigger than that of the GT but very very close. The GT scew in stems work on these darts. They are a bit loose but they do screw in tight enough that they will not come loose. However, the stems that come with these darts are just a hair too big to fit in the GT's. Additionally, their relatively small size compared to their 26 gram weight makes me think this is a 95% tungsten dart. This is not unreasonable given that the Penetrator line were also 95%.

Anyone with information regarding these darts, please let me know. Thanks!

First Ton-80 with Winter Line Up (22 Total)

This is the first maximum I have hit with my new winter league darts. I have three new sets of darts that I will be using in the new league I joined and they are all unified in stems and flights. More on that later. In the meantime, here is my 22nd lifetime ton-80.


The config: 22 gram fixed point Harrows Dimplex barrels with short Ti (titanium) stems from Unicorn and slim "Rising Sun" flights.

Twenty One and Counting

Here is my 21st Maximum:



The set up: 24 gram Pirhana II's with short black aluminum stems and poly slims. Cheers.

Dart Collections Online

Just wanted to bring your attention to a few different dart collections I have seen out there. The first collection belongs to Juergen who is a frequent commenter on this blog (and who also keeps track of his maximums). He has some really stunning darts and he apparently has quite a good camera. As you can see from his collection, too, he has a tendency to stick with the basic barrel designs that work for him, whereas I do not. Which may be why he has 115 Ton-80's this year and I only have 20!! Click the picture below to go to his page:



The other collection belongs to a darts enthusiast who also has quite a good board collection as well. In fact his dartboard collection is surely the envy of every dart collector out there with the possible exceptions of Christian and Beni Petris. However, this post is about dart collections so I will not link to his boards just yet. Alan has a really nice collection of antique darts, unusual darts as well as the occasional modern dart that he throws in competition. Again, click on the picture to go to his collection:

A Brave New World

These darts are my newest addition and I got them in a trade with crashfromboston. I sent him my 27 gram GT3's and he sent me these. Unlike my temporary exchange with mcvickj, however, this is a permanent trade. I encouraged him many times to consider carefully if he really wanted to make the trade as these darts seem to be a bit rare and definitely unique but he pushed for the trade and assured me that if he ever wanted to have some New World Darts back in his collection he knew where he could get some. So HURRAY!! I love my new darts!


Seen above are the darts in my Initial Preferred Configuration. They came with some longer stems and a triangular tube of other bits and pieces but I like my Dynastuff so I decided to go with these first. I might play around a bit with them before I settle into a config though. The throw a bit awkward to be honest but I think for people who grip a dart more forward on the barrel than I do they would do quite well. They have that mid barrel depression that invites a couple of fingers but I cannot grip a dart like that comfortably so I have my index finger and thumb on the back flutage and my middle finger on the forward flutage. This is how I grip all darts though despite my many different barrel styles.

The story of these darts is a good one and I hope I get it right. And if I do not I hope crash logs in and leaves some comments to correct my version of these unique darts. Apparently there was a guy in Massachusetts who wanted to start a dart making company and called it New World Dart Co. as seen in the label below. He attempted to patent many of his ideas but met with little success as the many of his ideas have been already patented by other entities. But his ideas were definitely unique and I have never ever seen any darts like these before. The label you see below is on the front of the large case that darts came in.


As you can see from the picture below the darts are designed with a brass outer sleeve that have 2ba threading on the stem end and different threading up front. The point is attached to a tungsten insert that slides into the brass sleeve and then screws into place. Oddly, though he did not make this 2ba. Nor is it 1/4" threading. If he had made the forward threading either of these sizes he could have made this a convertible dart. A light brass soft tip dart or, a steel tip dart with a tungsten insert to make it just a little bit heavier for steel tip play. Unfortunately this is not the case and so the darts are a fixed 22 grams and steel tip only. I am willing to bet that if his fledgling company had survived the first frost he would have eventually adapted his design to accommodate both dart worlds. The key you see below, is an old Ford truck key he converted to a point chuck. Very inventive!


Seen below is the original configuration of the darts as they came to me. I have no idea how they were sold new or even how much they cost. But the medium stems are hard to use for most barrels. Only the shortest barrels can take a medium stem and I have never seen a good occasion to use a long stem. Thus, I did not keep this config.



The case is huge for a single set of darts and yet it is another instance of the creativity that went into his whole enterprise. It is a converted gun case. He cut the foam to take the three fully assembled darts, extra flight and stem combos and then there are holes for stems only, a long triangular tube. some slots for some unopened flights, and the place where he put the ford key-chuck. I of course will preserve this as is with all of the contents because it is now a piece of darting history. But the darts themselves, will likely live in a little wooden stand near my dartboard for casual throwing.

All in all I am very happy with this trade and I wish I could make similar trades with some of the darts I have that I do not like as much. That was not my feeling with the GT3's though. Those GT3's really held a very special place in my heart as they were purchased used, and modified by Jeff Pickup to take a screw in stem. I really liked those GT3's. Also, they threw extremely well. I never ton-80'd with them but I have lots of good games with them all the same.

Dardi, chiunque?

Wow. Dart blogs are popping up all over the internet and the latest look about reveals a few that I would like to point out for everyone's benefit. "Dardi, chiunque?", according to my very good friend Google Translation, means "Darts, anyone?" in Italian... Yep you guessed it: time to brush up on your Italian reading skills so you can enjoy the following dart blog:


This blog, as soon as I saw it went straight to the top of my dart blogs bookmarks. Looks like this blogger posts some really good content including some videos. I look forward to similar quality content in the future. The only catch is that I do not speak Italian. But I speak Spanish, so I am confident that I can pick up written Italian in no time at all. After all, I already know the subject matter, right?

First SEWA Ton-80: 20th Lifetime

This is the first Ton-80 I have hit with any darts wearing my new Team SEWA flights (and my 20th lifetime maximum to date). For give the funky camera angle I wanted to make sure the Team SEWA flights were prominently displayed. It really is the 20 bed and not the 12 bed:


I am quite happy about it. The story of how I got the Team SEWA flights is a nice one too, but is best reserved for a future post. Cheers!

Nineteen's a Pretty Number

Or maybe it's just the darts that are pretty. I hit Ton-40's galore this last week while I was visiting Seattle, more than I remember ever hitting in a single week. I wish I'd kept count. Monday through Friday I was using my friend's darts and was doing well no matter what I was throwing. But it wasn't until I was back home that I hit my nineteenth ton-80:


These darts are 30 gram Bottelsen Original Hammerheads. I bought them mid way through a Luck from a bar owner in Seattle and unfortunately didn't win a single game after that! What was I thinking??? This is what I was thinking: Once I picked them up I immediately threw a Ton-40. Then another. Then I told the bar owner I would buy them (committed) and I threw three more Ton-40's while we were waiting for the other half of the luck to finish up their games. It was like I couldn't miss.

I don't know where my ton-plus scores went after the luck entered the final-four stage (we ended up taking fourth) but the darts seems to still be working for me. When I was evaluating the darts, I knew immediately what they were model-wise. After all I've seen the Hammerhead originals on the internet hundreds of times and I knew I liked Hammerhead darts and I think Bottelsen is a terrific dart maker. I casually glanced at the model number and saw it started with 23... which means the darts were supposed to be 23 grams. Since this put them within my acceptable grammage I decided that maybe I would buy them. When I got home I found that they were 30 grams! Whoa! Wait a minute. I have firmly believed for some time now that anything over 24 grams was not likely to provide sustainable performance but here I am throwing my 19th lifetime Ton-80 with a whopping 30 gram set of darts.

Whodathunkit? So 19 is definitely a pretty number. Here's a thought: perhaps it is good I did not count my ton-40's in Seattle. This way I can assume I tossed 19 of them.

DynaDag Reconfiguration

After a couple of weeks of playing with the DynaDags and have mostly mediocre success, I have decided to make a few changes to them. I have swapped out the really long points Jeff Pickup put on them with some really short ones I bought a while back from somewhere online. I then put on some longer Proline stems and changed from the Pear shaped flights to the slightly smaller Slim Flights, otherwise known as "Coal Cracker". Check them out:


I had had some minor success with the other config as well but I think the longer points and the shorter stems reduced the forward weightedness of the dart too much. I found myself lobbing the darts instead pushing them and they started ending up with a high up angle in the board. Despite all the talk of the longer points benefiting the hitting of the triple ring I think I prefer shorter points for my tapered darts. I shall test that, anyway, in the weeks to come. If I change my mind I can always pout different points in them as that is easy to do.

Keyless Conversion

No, that's not an SSH option.


Rather, it is a method of converting your MP darts to FP without anyone being the wiser.

The DynaDag

My newest creation, implemented by the talented Jeff Pickup in Canada's Ontario Province, is officially dubbed the DynaDag. "Dyna" because it was designed for exclusive use with Dynastar flights, and "Dag" because it is a member of the Dagnabit family of darts.


Here they are pictured with the short Proline stems and red pear shaped Dynastar flights. The points are longer than I normally wear them and I am considering swapping them out for some short points but I wanted to give these a go for a few league nights to see how they perform. There is a lot of talk on the forums about longer points and how they can help you squeeze more darts into the trebles (as if I need help with that! Sheesh!).

The barrels themselves are 75% Copper Tungsten which took a long time for Jeff to get but was well worth it. The lower tungsten percentage allows for a fuller body without making the dart too heavy. It is completely smooth with just a friction-fit hole to take a fixed point and a tiny threaded hole designed for the Proline stems. The Barrel is 2" long and 9/32" wide at its widest point.

The stems you can buy anywhere but I got them from www.a-zdarts.com, which is where I buy most of my darts supplies. They are designed for Pro-Line's line of soft tip darts but they sell 2ba adapters for them as well. The flights are Dynastar, and you can get those absoultely anywhere. I hope the new owners of the line do not do anything bad with them, if so I will have to stock up!!

First 9 Count with DynaDags

Doing a round of triples practice I aimed for, and hit, three triple 19s:


Normally such a shot includes at least one lucky slop shot but not this time. This is a true to like round of nine. Now.. On to the 18s...

I Was the Geek (18th Max)

Tonight in league I personally did so-so but during warm up I did hit my 18th lifetime Ton-80. I was very happy about it for a couple reasons but first, if you are wondering how I got this shot of it...


Yes, I was the geek taking a picture of the dartboard!

So what were the cool things about this particular ton-80? Well for starters, I ton-80'd with this very set of darts, configured for soft tip, so that make it the only set of darts I have ever maximumed with on both steel tip and plastic tip boards. I don't know why that is significant. It just feels significant. But also, most of my maximums have been at home practicing alone and with no witnesses. It feels nice to be able to point to the boards and say "Hey. Look what I did."

I hope next time the Ton-80 comes in an actual match.

Also tonight I doubled in on the double bull in a DIDO 401 game. We lost the game but the 85-in on the DB sure felt nice.

17th Ton-80

Next year's new years resolution is gonna be a toughy.


These are the Dags wearing short nylons with Pear shaped dimplex flights. I was just gonna throw one of them cause it was on top of something I wanted. But when it hit the Sweet Spot I dug out the other two darts to see what would happen.

Ha! Look what happened!

16th Lifetime Ton-80

With this hit I have accomplished my first new years resolution and considering the season I better get a move on with the other ones!!



Just some sloppy practice to wind down after the final game of the Cards Padres series. I hit some scattered crap preceeding this and slowly started to zero in on the prize. These are the 16 gram Radarts I used in League so much last year and I also used them in league last Tuesday as well. I used these darts to beat the other teams best guy in a singles Chicago match.

It felt good.