Practice routines
What is the best darts practice routine?
Doubles, because doubles decide legs and almost nobody practises them. Three darts at every double from 1 to 20 and then the bull, counting your hits out of 63, gives you a number you can compare week to week. If you only ever do one thing, do that.
15 routines, grouped by what they train, with what each one measures and what a decent score looks like. Every one of them is scoreable here, so the number gets kept without you writing anything down.
The routines
Doubles
The half of the game that decides legs, and the half almost nobody practises.
Three darts at double 1, then double 2, all the way to double 20 and the bull. Move on whether you hit it or not. Count the hits out of 63.
What to aim for. Ten is normal when you start. Twenty is a solid league standard. Thirty and your checkout percentage will be worth looking at.
The same trip round the doubles, but you start on 27 points. A hit adds the double, a round with no hit takes it away, and below zero the drill is over. The early doubles are worth so little that a slow start can end it by double 5.
What to aim for. Getting through all 21 rounds is a good session for a casual player. Around 400 is a solid league standard, and the 600s are exceptional.
Count down from 420 by hitting each double from 1 to 20, then the bull. A hit takes the double off and moves you straight on, so the scorer knows whether the first, second or third dart found it. It never ends early.
What to aim for. Lower wins. Half the doubles leaves you around 210, and clearing the board to zero is the standard to chase. Watch the first-dart rate: it is the one closest to a real checkout.
Play Killer with three or four seats and take all of them yourself, one hand each if you like. You end up throwing at a different double every turn, which is much closer to a real checkout than practising double 16 forty times.
What to aim for. The rules decide what each dart was thrown at, so the scorer counts qualifying on your own number separately from what you did once you were armed. How often you qualify is the number to watch.
Scoring
Where the darts go when you aim at a treble, counted honestly.
A hundred darts at the treble 20 and nothing else. Count trebles, and count how many landed in the 5 or the 1 rather than the 20 bed at all.
What to aim for. The second number matters more than the first. Trebles come with time; darts in the 5 and the 1 tell you your aim is drifting rather than your timing. The scoring drill counts both and gives you the average as well.
Throw ten visits and add up everything you score. No target is fixed and nothing ends the game early. Your total divided by ten is your 3-dart average, so a 650 means you averaged 65.
What to aim for. The same number your 501 average is measured in, so compare it with that. A best over ten rounds is kept apart from a best over eight, and an electronic board usually plays eight.
A set number of darts at each treble you use, counting the hits, rather than throwing until one goes in. Nine darts each at the 20, 19, 18 and 17 is a common session.
What to aim for. Thirty darts at a target gives you a hit rate worth comparing week to week. There is no published standard, so the number to beat is your own from last week, treble by treble.
Checkouts
The finish as a match gives it to you: a number, a visit, then the next.
Start on 100 and finish it in one visit of three darts. Finish or bust, you go back to 100. Twenty goes, and count the checkouts.
What to aim for. A third of them, seven in twenty, is decent. It also teaches the routes, because you will stop looking them up after about the fourth go.
Start on 121 and check it out in nine darts, finishing on a double or the bull. Do it and your next number is 122; miss and you go back. Check a number out in three darts or fewer and it becomes your floor.
What to aim for. After ten attempts your score is the highest number you checked out. No published standard: the number to beat is your own highest, and the darts you spend at a finish once one dart could have taken it.
Check out every number from 61 to 100 in turn, with two visits at each. Two darts scores 3, three darts 2, four to six darts 1. No finish scores nothing and you move on.
What to aim for. The best possible score is 120. The finish screen splits the forty into four bands, so the number to watch is whether it is the bigger finishes that go wrong or all of them.
Twenty finishes drawn at random from a range, or a list you write, one visit of three darts at each. Count how many you check out.
What to aim for. Split by range. A rate from 2 to 40 and a rate from 101 to 170 are measuring different things, so the scorer never puts them on the same line.
Everything else
The whole board, or a game that is practice without feeling like it.
Work from 1 to 20 in order and count every dart it takes. Write the number down. That single figure is the cleanest measure of your aim there is, because unlike an average it cannot be flattered by one lucky 180.
What to aim for. Under 60 darts is respectable. Under 45 is good. Under 35 and you are better than most people in your league.
Three darts at treble 10, then treble 11, and on up to treble 20, moving on whether they land or not. Count the trebles. Ten to twenty is eleven numbers, so it is 33 darts and the best score is 33.
What to aim for. There is no published standard for this one, so the number to beat is your own best out of 33. Look at the low numbers as well as the total. If treble 14 and treble 17 land far less often than the 20, those are the finishes you keep setting up badly.
Play Shanghai from 15 to 20 rather than 1 to 7, so every round is a number you will meet in a real leg. Set "15 to 20" on the board and it keeps the score.
What to aim for. A game, rather than a drill, which is the point. Practice you will actually do beats practice you should do.
Shanghai on 10 to 15, one dart at every double and the bull, then Shanghai on 15 to 20, which is 57 darts. Only the round's number scores. A single, a double and a treble of it in one visit adds 100, and every double hit is worth 50. The three sections add up to one number.
What to aim for. The Junior Darts Corporation grades that number by shirt colour. Under 150 is White, the beginner grade, 450 is Green for league standard, 700 is Red for super league, and 850 or more is Black, county standard. Source: the JDC's routine sheet, archived copy
Write the number down
Unmeasured practice is just throwing. Without a number you cannot tell a good session from a bad one, so you drift towards whatever felt comfortable, which is usually the thing you were already best at.
One number per session is enough. Darts to get round the clock, hits out of 63 on the doubles, attempts to hit ten checkouts. Any of them, written somewhere you will see it next week.
If you sign in, the scoreboard keeps them for you and works out the things that are tedious by hand: your average across every game rather than one, your doubles rate in Killer next to your checkout percentage in 501, and which numbers your darts actually land on when you miss.
Two things that waste practice time
Practising only the 20. It is the biggest number and it feels productive, and it is also the reason a leg falls apart the moment a finish leaves you on 7. Around the Clock exists to fix exactly this.
Throwing while half-watching something. Twenty deliberate minutes moves your game further than two distracted hours, and the distracted hours quietly teach you a worse throw.
Questions
- What is the best darts practice routine?
- Doubles practice, because doubles decide legs and most players neglect them. Three darts at every double from 1 to 20 and the bull, counting your hits out of 63, gives you a number you can compare week to week. Around the Clock counting darts is the best all-round measure, because it makes you throw at all twenty numbers rather than the three you like.
- How long should you practise darts for?
- Twenty focused minutes beats two distracted hours. Throwing darts while half-watching something is how you practise your mistakes. Pick one routine, write the number down, and stop while it still feels like a game.
- Why is my practice not improving my game?
- Usually because it is not measured. If you do not write the number down you cannot tell a good session from a bad one, and you end up repeating whatever felt comfortable. The other common reason is practising only scoring: most legs are lost on doubles, and most practice is spent on the 20.