Dartitis: Is there a cure?

[Paddy McGinty]

My son has developed dartitis, he was coming along nicely practicing his darts in his bedroom then the other day I asked him to play for our team but he told me he couldn't play anymore because he couldn't let go of his darts.

It's not the first time I have seen the effects of this strange phenomenon several of my darts friends from have suffered with this disorder with varying amount of degrees.

Why does it suddenly appear?
Is there a cure?

Regards Paddy

[nikkiboy]

Its a strange thing and I think I had it about 7 or 8 years ago, went through a bad patch and ended up with a little pause before I released the dart, never that bad compared to some people I have seen and it went away on its own so I guess I was lucky.

I think its all down to confidence, a bit like the alcohol question, you get it in your head and it becomes very difficult to shift it.

No cure Paddy just get him to play in a more relaxed atmosphere without pressure for a while, then once the darts flow freely again in a mess around slowly get back into a more serious competetive game.

[Booji Boy]

My dad had it yonks ago and he said the only way he could play was to not think about darts at all when he was playing. He would purposely think about work, the garden, football etc etc and he claimed that this helped no end.

[Paddy McGinty]

A long time ago when I used to play darts for Steve Messer's pub, a mate of mine suffered so badly with it that when he threw he just couldn't let go of the dart, sometimes he would nearly fall over, this is the worst case that I have witnessed, although he continued playing and has gotten a lot better, he still shows signs of the symptoms. This hasn't prevented him from achieving County standard, but who knows how good he could have been without it.

[Grubby]

A player from Bristol who I knew had it found a cure that worked for him.....
50 sets of flights and stems. Stand in front of a mirror, at the correct distance, and throw them one at a time at your reflection in the mirror, after a week or so he forgot about the problem and began to throw normally at the board. He reckons that he threw thousands of stems at the mirror! BUT IT WORKED FOR HIM!

[Dazman]

I have had it for the past year or so. I go through spells where i will throw fine for a few weeks and then all of a sudden, it comes back. Whether it is a case of over-thinking things or trying to be too precise, I don't know, but it is really demoralising when you can't do what seems such an easy thing to do as throw a dart. You think to yourself that there is no coming back from it etc, but if you keep trying to relax, I have found that over time, it does get better but you need to be prepared not to get yourself down if it doesn't come straight back.

When I first got it last year, you just feel embarrassed because you look an idiot! lol I remember one game where when we was throwing for the bull, and I ended up throwing it just above the D20 because my arm wouldn't release. It's like there is something in front of you that is stopping you throwing or something is pulling your arm back. I actually won that game after a couple of lucky of T18's and a lucky D2 but I knew then I would need to be determined that I could get over it.

Nearly a year on, whilst still going through stages where it does come back, it has got better (touch wood). I wouldn't neccessarily say there was a cure for it, but it is definately manageable. When I last had it in April, I tried throwing a different dart for a couple of days and when I picked up my usual ones afterwards, I was backing throwing normal. Not completely accurate at first but it got better as I went on. That was about nine weeks ago and 90% of the time since, I have been fine.

Another key thing is to try and keep your action the same even if it doesn't feel natural. I have been trying to do that as well and even though some darts end up outside the board, I haven't gone back to how bad I was ages ago.

Good luck.

[Rudy]

I recently read something about the Let's Train Darts system by Santino Broers which appaers to be used to gradually overcome dartritis.
See the following link

http://www.santinobroer.nl/lets-train-d ... steem.html

For English choose the "vertalen" option.

[Lurgan]

What about that guy from africa or somewhere that AndyF used to be sparring with on the old SOD. Cant rememebr his name but he used to write endless posts about his cure for dartitis.

[Paddy McGinty]

What about that guy from africa or somewhere that AndyF used to be sparring with on the old SOD. Cant rememebr his name but he used to write endless posts about his cure for dartitis.

What is he a witchdoctor or someting?

[Gringo]

What about that guy from africa or somewhere that AndyF used to be sparring with on the old SOD. Cant rememebr his name but he used to write endless posts about his cure for dartitis.

Bojangles

[Gringo]

What about that guy from africa or somewhere that AndyF used to be sparring with on the old SOD. Cant rememebr his name but he used to write endless posts about his cure for dartitis.

What is he a witchdoctor or someting?

No he said he was writing a book on how to cure dartitis, he said he could help out the likes of Bristow and other sufferers, or something along the lines of that.

[Lurgan]

What about that guy from africa or somewhere that AndyF used to be sparring with on the old SOD. Cant rememebr his name but he used to write endless posts about his cure for dartitis.

Bojangles

haha the very one

[Lee Taylor]

BoJangles is now on another forum offering "the cure"...

[The Crusader]

Think I read that Mark Walsh threw in the dark to overcome this, another I heard is throwing other things like bean bags at the board for a laugh.

[Lee Taylor]

Think I read that Mark Walsh threw in the dark to overcome this, another I heard is throwing other things like bean bags at the board for a laugh.

Would love to hear Mark Walsh's story, as he is probably the biggest named player to have overcome this dreaded affliction and return better than ever.

Any of the pro's on here, that know Mark, know how he overcame dartitis?

[Ross]

Keep practicing and practicing and practicing.

Never stop playing, Keep going like normal. If you stop your normal routine it will be hard to get it back.

I had it quite bad, but didn't stop practicing or believing and one day I work up and had it all back.

[Gringo]

Merv King had it too, thats were his twist of the dart evolved in his throw as it help him overcome it

Im sure I read somewhere that Richie Burnett had it also, but thankfully he seems to have got ridden of it altogether....

[Sean Casey-Poole]

Hi folks, I help people all of the time with Dartitis. I have suffered with it myself and as a trained Hypnotherapist and Master practitioner of NLP ( Neuro Linguistic Programming ) There are lots of things you can do to change your mindset and get back on track. http://www.dartsmc.com

[Paddy McGinty]

Hi folks, I help people all of the time with Dartitis. I have suffered with it myself and as a trained Hypnotherapist and Master practitioner of NLP ( Neuro Linguistic Programming ) There are lots of things you can do to change your mindset and get back on track. http://www.dartsmc.com

Who have you cured from dartitis? anyone famous?

[spaceman70]

I heard a cure for dartitis recently.

What the fella did was cover the entire board in paper with one half shaded black. He then threw at the board not aiming at anything but just hitting the dark side then the light side. After a few weeks he shaded the board in 'quarters' and did the same for the next few weeks then halved it again into 'eighths' and continued to do this until he had a normal board.

He swears it worked for him!