What Is Your Oche Positioning?

When you are playing darts, where do you stand in relation to the centre of the oche?

Many people don't even think about this and when they are shown where they actually stand they are quite surprised that they are not dead centre.

Many of the pro's do stand dead centre. Phil Taylor to this day still stands bang centre, as does Michael Van Gerwen, Adrian Lewis and current World Champion Gary Anderson just to name a few.

Of course, standing in the middle means you are closer to the target. Moving left or right means you are further away because the oche line from which you throw is straight.

There are of course, many pro's who throw from either side of centre such as Raymond Van Barneveld and he has won 5 world championships. The player that springs to mind for standing the most off centre is twice world champion, Ted "The Count" Hankey. He stands waaaay to the right and the tip of his right foot only just touches the very right hand side of the throwing line.

The reason that I mention Ted Hankey is that I had never really considered where I stood although it had been brought to my attention that I also stood way to the right, ala Mr Hankey. Now you might think it doesn't matter where you stand as you are used to it and practice from that position etc and usually you would be correct and that's what I always thought too.......but boy was I in for a shock one day.

It was the night of the 7th league game of the season and we were playing away at a pub with a brand new team. I had never ever been in this pub before and by all accounts, they hadn't had a team for many years. Imagine my horror when I saw where the dartboard was positioned. It was right in the corner of the room. There wasn't any room on the right hand side of the dartboard to mark the scores so the chalkboard was on the left. All I could do was stand central on the oche. If I tried to move anywhere near my usual position, I was pressed up against the wall. I felt like I was standing much closer to the dartboard than I was used to and I played very poorly on the night.

I went home cursing after that match and have forced myself to stand dead central ever since. It took awhile to get used to it and my league form suffered but eventually it became second nature and my form picked up again.

So.....do you know where you stand at the oche and if it's not central, how would you cope if what happened to me also happened to you?