C is for carnality

Darters, like a lot of top athletes, can be a superstitious bunch. If Stevie Wonder was a professional darter he’d be very superstitious, and, let’s face it, luck would have to be on his side.

All players will have lucky darts, some players will have lucky darts’ shirts that remain unwashed as a tournament progresses, one can only assume that the smell has a damaging effect on the opponent’s concentration. Some players might have favourite jewellery or maybe a lucky sequence of events prior to a big match, perhaps half a dozen pints of lager and 10 Benson’s – that sort of thing. So when the next scheduled meet for Dart Club fell in a week that contained a Friday the 13th, there was no alternative. Dart Club would have to tempt fate.

It was always going to be risky. But the chairmen didn’t form Dart Club to play it safe, they formed it to play darts. Irrespective of ridiculous calendarical superstitions.

Last week at the Champion Dart Club had swelled to the majestic total of 10 members. When it was announced that the next meet would be Friday 13th half of the new members pulled out!

Could it be the terror of arrows on such a doom-forsaken date that was putting them off? Could it be that they were young men really and wanted to go out chasing tail on a Friday night like everyone else? Well a couple opted for a night in with their wives and another couple went to Alton Towers. It was looking like the magic was gone. Friday the 13th was doing its stuff.

Fate, as we all know, is a fickle mistress. So it came as no surprise to discover the Red Lion on Kingly Street, the proposed site of the next Dart Club meet, had only recently been refurbished. And part of that so called refurbishment involved the removal of the dartboard. DO NOT EVER DRINK IN THE RED LION.

Upon entering the boozer to book the board an ashen-faced Finisher asked the witless Aussie barman where the board has gone.

“It’s not there,” said the witless Aussie barman.
“I can see that.”
“There aren’t really any round here” said a voice from the side.”
“You’d be surprised,” said the Finisher, exiting stage left, down the stairs and back out into London’s seedy Soho, nose to the air and darts on his mind.

Well if that Red Lion didn’t have one, maybe the Red Lion near Shaftsbury Avenue on Great Windmill Street would. The Darkness had sent the Finisher an email earlier saying he was sure he’d chucked there before, so it was worth a try.

But no. It looked nice in the Great Windmill Street-based Red Lion, much nicer than the one on Kingly Street for example, which is a dump. However, nice doesn’t cut the mustard when it comes to darts.

The Bull and the Finisher left the nicer Red Lion and figured that they’d have to head back to the drawing board rather than the darting board, when the Bull said: “Oh well, why don’t we check out that pub?” Pointing to a small unassuming Irish boozer called the Lyric. And so they did.

On entering the pub, there is no immediate dartboard on display. Friday the 13th, oh how you taunt. However, by simply asking the jovial landlord Richard he’ll point you in the direction of the ladies toilet upstairs and there in a pokey yet comfortable back room, featuring a pool table and money gobbling juke box, is a knackered old dartboard. But by gum there it is, all round and lovely, doubles and trebles ahoy, out of the window happy darters can also ‘check out’ the Windmill Club, which is London’s seedy Soho’s seedier equivalent, presumably, of Paris’s notorious Moulin Rouge.

Every major city has a red-light district and London is no exception. Indeed as far as London is one of the first modern centres of civilisations, it goes without saying that it probably leads the way in many seedy areas, although how that can be proven is unclear unless, like an adult-movie equivalent of Dart Club, there’s an International Porn Club out there.

But London’s seedy Soho seems to exist solely for the purpose of watching embarrassed business men going hurriedly in and out of dirty video shops or indeed going hurriedly in and out of busty models that are new in town and live upstairs. Whereas other sex centres may be gloriously liberated in this age of tolerance, the repressive English sexual attitudes will mean that porn houses will always remain seedy, downstairs places full of people embarrassed to be there and hoping they can fit enough gay porn videos in their overstretched briefcases without being spotted on the way out. Let’s hope it never changes.

Incidentally, the Lyric is an Irish pub, but not like O’bloody Neil’s which has Australian barstaff, oh no, the Lyric has Irish bar staff 100 per cent. Imagine a London boozer with no Antipodeans, sounds like heaven. Then when you combine that with the fact that it serves Kronenburg, you’re laughing. The nearest tube is Piccadilly Circus, come out of station walk up Shaftesbury Avenue and Great Windmill Street is on your left, you can’t miss it there’s a massive picture of the bottom half of a scantily clad lap dancer directly opposite.

Dart Club had the room booked all night, at no cost, just as long as it could guarantee at least a dozen thirsty punters. Despite the fact that Dart Club was happening on Friday 13th and half of what were assumed to be keen and avid new darters would not be in attendance, Dart Club would go ahead, throwing caution to the wind, like a small piece of tungsten at the sisal board of life.

Not too many new darters had been in touch in the run up to Dart Week Three. Not to worry, it was 17:45 and the Bull and Finisher had left work in the company of two Dart Club firsts. The records do not show who was officially the first, so the pair will have to share the honour of being the first lady darters at Dart Club - dartettes. And what a lovely pair they were.

The Power and the Sidewinder

The Power and the Sidewinder had already added significantly to the glamour factor of Dart Club, if nothing else at least the papers might now be interested, after all, sex sells. In fact some sex is also for sale on Great Windmill Street, where certain ‘models’ are available for hire, indeed three bewildered oriental gentlemen were asked within earshot of the Lyric, whether they would like sex for a staggering 75knicker. She was no oil painting either.

Before the Finisher and Bull could road-test the new game, American football, they had to ascertain where the oche should be, since there are no obvious oche markings on the floor in the Lyric. Now, by some strange quirk of nature the Finisher and the Bull make almost ideal human oche markers. The bull’s-eye should be 5’8” (1.73m) from the floor and the darter should stand 7’9”1/4 (or 2.37m) away from the board.

The Bull taller than the bull?!

So with the Bull standing at 5’8” at the board and the Finisher at 6’1”, with his arms up, lying on his back, it describes a rough approximation of the required measurements of the dartboard and oche positions. The chairmen placed two bar stools with a pool cue between as a makeshift oche, covered and moved the pool table and were ready to start.

American football, or gridiron as it is often called for some inexplicable reason, is nothing whatsoever like rugby – but your dad probably says it is. He is very wrong, and not for the first time. The real thing involves getting dressed up in fancy outfits, there are three teams per side, one is offensive, one defensive and the other special. Each team takes it in-turn to move the rugby ball-shaped ball forward at least 10 yards in four goes called ‘downs’, with the ultimate aim of carrying the ball into the end-zone, thereby scoring a touchdown, although curiously the player doesn’t need to touch the ball down.

This game is probably best played with a clear head. Americans love it because of the fancy outfits and high scoring. It goes on all afternoon usually enabling plenty of time for booze, which is why it is really a good game. Oh, and there are often cheerleaders.

The darts version, which is an Ivy League favourite, is not quite as complicated as the real thing, and while it involves less fancy outfits and cheerleaders it does hold plenty of potential for drinking beer all afternoon.

Be warned! This game should only really be attempted by two people with time on their hands. And maybe a Dart Club meet was not the kind of place for American football. Still, rules is rules and for the third Dart Club in a row the Finisher was closest to the bull’s-eye with his opening shot, which meant he was in the diving seat.

The Bull was the defence and so kicked off by throwing three darts into the board, thus determining the line of scrimmage (or the running total). The defence then throws another three darts – this is the ‘down’ total. The offence then tries to beat the down total with three darts. If the offence is successful the difference in scores is taken away from the running total. If the offence is not successful, move onto the next down. In other words the defence sets a new down total with three darts. And the offence tries to beat this new down total, with the aim of reducing the running total to zero or beyond in four downs. If the offence gets the running total to zero or below in four turns (12 darts), he scores a touchdown, worth six points. After which, he may go for the point after touchdown by throwing just one dart and getting it into the pub score zone (five, 20 and one) worth one point.

If the offence is not confident that he will beat the defence by enough to secure a touchdown, before the beginning of the fourth down, he must announce that he is going to go for a field-goal. In the real thing, a field-goal is an attempted place kick through the goal posts worth three points. In darts, it is an attempted throw with one dart at a given target as follows: If the running total is 25 or below, the target area is that described by the circle of trebles (not including the trebles), if the running total is between 26 and 50 the target area is the 25/bull. If the running total is 51+ the offence may not elect to go for a field-goal.

It is important that the offence declares his intention to attempt a field-goal prior to the defence’s fourth down setting throws. Defence always sets the down score to beat, in order that the offence gets the adrenal rush of scoring the touchdown. The player who just scored becomes the defence for the next game, i.e. he sets the new running total.

If all this is a bit much, to help simplify matters, here are scores of the very first game of American Football that the Bull and the Finisher played at Dart Club. Now remember the Finisher was closest bull so was in the driving seat setting the running total (scoring 63).

The Finisher	The Bull	Running Total
-	63	63
13	68	63
50	45	58
71	16	3
80 (TOUCHDOWN) +1	60	-17 (TOUCHDOWN)
26	-	26
26	55 (TOUCHDOWN)	-3 (TOUCHDOWN)
-	45	45
37	18	28
81 (TOUCHDOWN) +1	40	-13 (TOUCHDOWN)
19	-	19
41	21	19
55	26	19
50	30	19
-	Field-goal	-
-	61	61
26	47	61
30	15	46
36	66	46
Failed FG	-	-
23	-	23
1	63 (TOUCHDOWN) +1	-62 (TOUCHDOWN)

In summary, the Finisher scored two touchdowns, as did the Bull, but the Bull also converted a field goal so won the match by three points.

As the pair were road-testing the new game a number of twitchy Dart Clubbers arrived, including the Clinician, the Darkness, Danny Boy and the Specialist – all of whom were sporting new darts.

The Clincian’s were not exactly new, more repaired, the Darkness had invested £6.99 in some Crafty Cockneys, while Danny Boy and the Specialist had bought some for an undisclosed sum that had gimicky spinning flights.

The Specialist tried to hide his gimickry by attaching Notts Forest flights. A technique that would probably win him a number of friends, at that time Notts Forest was the most widely supported football club within the ranks of Dart Club with four followers.

Over the previous two chapters statistical analysis has proved a problem. It’s all well and good listing endless reams of numbers about drunken darts games and for those that were involved it no doubt proves an interesting insight into the very fabric of their dartology. But for the average punter it represents nothing more than some meaningless numbers. And, what’s more, the authors are both mathematical fuck-wits.

The Finisher is the greater of the fuck-wits on the maths side and particularly struggles with subtraction when it involves going between groups of hundreds. Amusingly, he can be easily irritated by being told the answer to his mental arithmetic tasks while he slowly calculates the same problem in his head.
“I was just getting there,” he normally responds. He never is though.

Crap at the maff

Given the co-chairmen’s fuckwittedness, there is every likelihood that most of the stats from the previous two weeks are inaccurate. However, it has to be accepted that darts is a numbers game, the numbers are not meaningless, they are everything. What’s more, certain numbers are more everything than other numbers, and that’s the beauty of the game. The quest for the holy numbers is everything.

It is no coincident that darters resemble the knights of King Arthur’s reign. For round table read round dartboard, for lances and arrows read ..er..darts, for Camelot read Circus Tavern in Purfleet, for King Arthur read Phil Taylor. For darts read chivalry, courage and defence of the realm. Obviously there is Excalibur and it could be contended that everyone has their own three individual Excaliburs (except for those of you yet to draw them out of a stone that is your local sports shop). As for the Holy Grail, it could only be the hallowed 180 (it could be the 501 nine dart finish or even 170 exit, but..well…let’s be slightly realistic).

The third incarnation of Dart Club featured only one more game of American football which, for the record, was won by the Clinician and four more games of American cricket, the only point of interest being that the tightest finish so far occurred when Danny Boy overcame the Darkness by a mere eight points.

Nine more games of 301 were played, with points of major interest including a 10 dart finish by the Finisher, scoring a 120 and 98 with consecutive throws – leaving the Bull on 124 at check out. At this level, that’s good darts! The Darkness broke his Dart Club duck and finally won a game of 301, avenging his earlier American cricket defeat at the hands of Danny Boy with a 31 dart finish.

By the third week, Dart Club’s glamour quotient had shot through the roof, as no less than six ladies participated in one of the most gruelling games of 301 to date.

The Enigma is not best pleased

Split into pairs, it took the best part of three quarters of an hour to play a game, ONE GAME of 301, 45 minutes… which was eventually won by the Sidewinder and the Enigma. Much to the annoyance of the Clinician, whose misogynistic character came to the fore, relentlessly pacing the length of the room cursing under his breath every time the ladies failed to check out.

Danny Boy, however, was more than sympathetic and it did not go unnoticed by certain sections of Dart Club that the Irish crooner had an altogether different kind of check out in mind. Sitting in full view of the Windmill Club was always going to be dangerous for Danny Boy, darts is a passionate game.

All that remained was to play the 501 challenge, which due to the staggering numbers that Dart Club had attracted started at about 22:00doors. As last orders passed by the barmaid started to get a little bit narky, then closing time rang out, Dart Club was given 10 minutes to get out. It looked like Friday 13th would have the last laugh after all. Without completion, the £5 that everyone had staked would have to be given back the night would have been ruined. The Clinician was scoring and reduced everyone’s total by 100 and was keen to eliminate all those players not yet below 200 – namely the ladies.

However, Dart Club is not in the business of restricting ladies’ darts. With the clock at 23:15 and the bar maid now threatening violence, the pressure intensified. With the time at 23:25 she gave us one last throw, one last hurl of the arrow. And one man rose to the challenge, one man alone was equal to mistress fate – the Black Bomber, scooped the 75bigones on the table, then he scooped up his good lady the Bite and presumably scooped up a large burger with fries before retiring for a night of love.

The Black Bomber is quite happy	Dart Club celebrates last orders

B is for… let’s form a band

Two weeks later with anticipation hanging in the air like a lingering fart, it was time for the second Dart Club meet. Spirits were high on leaving the One Tun. On that night of nights, friends were made, rivalries formed, promises made only to be broken. Was it just the beer talking? Like all climaxes though, there has to be an anti-climax. It’s not just swings and roundabouts, it’s slides too. One down 25 to go.

At 17:00 doors the Finisher and the Bull went to the Champion, which stands proud on the corner of Wells Street and Eastcastle Street. Wells Street is about half way between Oxford Circus and Tottenhamhotspur Court Road, running north off Oxford Street.

The Champion comes heartily recommend. This fine public house is notable for its beautifully rendered stained glass windows, featuring great British sporting heroes (and curiously Florence Nightingale) – although no dartsmen as such. It is a Sam Smiths boozer so serves a wide selection of Teutonic lagers, the prince of which (or should that be Baron?) is Ayinger Brau Weiss, which is German for wheat beer.

Being a wheat beer it comes in a funny shaped glass and knocks your socks off. It is a perfect accompaniment to the bangers and mash of the day, a sporting pun, which the Aussie bartender didn’t understand (although he assured us that they do sometimes have garlic mash, but on this occasion it was just “normal”). The bar staff it turns out are about 80% Australian. They start serving food at 17:30, but if you’re hungry have a fag – rather refreshingly the fag shop is right next door, so there’s no need to get change for a machine that over charges and dispenses packets of 16.

The next game on the list was Cricket. Ironicallistically enough, this game was unearthed by the Finisher in a bar in New York, on w58 between 8-9th Av, where the locals are friendly and the darts goes on all night. And with a double stroke of ironicalisticalness in the UK the game also goes by the name Mickey Mouse (and Tactics), but for the purposes of even less clarity we decided to call it American Cricket. It has very little in common with another darts game also called Cricket, which is based on the British summer sport that sports the same name: other than it is a game played by gentlemen. Players should mark out on the score board the following list:

20
19
18
17
16
15
25/bull

Players might like to add to the lists, D and T, standing for double and treble. However, Dart Club didn’t bother.

Once it has been established who goes first. Players take it in turns throwing three darts per go (but not all at once), aiming at the various targets shown above – in any order. When a target has been hit three times it is shut out – doubles and trebles count – and if you have added D and T you may elect to strike these targets out, or score on the points. If one player shuts out a target before the other, then that player may score points on the target until the other player shuts it out too. When it comes to shutting out the bull’s-eye, players need to hit it either three times in the 25, or one 25 and one bull, or two bulls.

When both players have shut out the target, i.e. it has been hit at least three times by both players, no one can score points on it. When all the targets have been shut out, the points are tallied, with the winner being the one with the most points. There is a slight twist in that if both players shut out the bull, the game ends there and then.

Standard marking practice is to strike a diagonal mark when a target has been hit, thus: /. When a target has been hit twice players should mark it thus: X. And when shut, the target is traditionally marked with a O. Unless a player shuts the target out with a clean treble, the chances are that the marking on the scoreboard will look like this: ∅, or this: ⊗. In some regions players choose to chalk up a line per hit i.e I for one hit II for two and, yep, III for three, but the other way is more aesthetically pleasing. And Dart Club is all about sexy darts.

This gives rises to the third rule of Dart Club: Dart Club is all about sexy darts.

The Finisher was closest to the bull’s-eye, thus casting further doubts over the Bull’s assertion that he be named the Bull. However, 156 darts later the Bull won the game by 12 points. A real nail biter.

The Bull is bullish in victory

The Finisher failed to register a successful dart on 10 occasions, two more than the Bull. Which gave the Bull an accuracy coefficient of an impressive 89.7%, some 2.5% more accurate than the Finisher. The best man won, justice was done, a score had been settled.

It was still early doors and any form of tactical nous had yet to establish itself as the pair set off on a second game. The Bull was to swiftly learn a great piece of advice – whatever you do, don’t let your opponent close off 20 without closing it off yourself. If your opponent closes it and starts scoring left, right and centre you are truly fucked. While there is something to be said for spreading yourself around the board, there is also something to be said for getting 20 closed if your opponent does, particularly if your opponent is quite good at getting 20s. The next game was something of a rout. And the least said about it the better, despite the fact that the Bull went one better than before scoring 89, the Finisher was victorious racking up the largest score of the night with a whopping 393 points and all because the Bull neglected the 20. He wouldn’t do it again, that’s for sure.

Finisher looks like one of the illiteracy gremlins

Now Dart Club is a place for experimentation (no – not that kind Danny Boy!!). So it was that the club attempted a multi-player variant. Under the rules laid out above, three or more players tends to devolve into an exercise in persecution and bullying – i.e. two gang up against one. Usually this is the best bit about most games but it’s not Dart Club’s style. So it was lucky that only a few days earlier the club had come across a rival gang of darters in the Champion, playing a cricket-based game, which they erroneously called killer. Only with their version, any number of players can be accommodated.

Where in the original points go on the scorer and the aim is to score the highest number of points, in American cricket mkII, wrongly aka killer, the aim is to escape receiving any points. Once a player closes a number, say 20, he can then start scoring. And for every 20 he scores he can allocate those points onto whichever of his opponents he chooses – provided that they have not closed that number. Obviously, if you are last to close a popular number you are likely to clock up a hefty score. Similarly if you are hitting your targets regularly you could well escape unblemished until you get to the bull.

Upon arriving at the bull, darters have to score a full 50, aka an Hawaii (either one bull or two outer bulls), before using the 25 and bull to whittle down their own personal total. The winner is the first player to get his score down to zero (note that if you get to bull with no points then you simply have to hit bull once or outer bull twice to win the game).

After the Finisher and Bull played out a couple of games of American cricket Dart Club received two new members, the Bubble and the Animal – both friends of the Specialist. One of which, the Animal, it turned out is a drummer – in other words, the Holy Grail for anyone who wants to form a band. After only two weeks, it was already apparent that Dart Club had some serious musical clout. Most members had at least some heavy metal skeletons, and most metallers join a band at some stage. The link between playing great darts and rock music is well established, Dart Club 7 was born.

The demographics of Dart Club being white middle class 30somethings, dictate that a) everyone has a copy of Appetite for Destruction and b) everyone has played in a dodgy rock band at some point. Now whereas this usually means that you end up with a band with nine guitarists and a bloke that uses a settee for a drumkit, Dart Club 7 would be different. It’d be a damn sight different from 1970s band Dart, who actually made Showaddy Waddy look good.

First up, on drums, and with his own drum kit to boot, new member The Animal.
Turntable terrorist is Danny Boy
Ivory tinkler and spandex duties fall to the Light with the Darkness (if he can play keyboards that is) as his evil alter-ego in ..er… black spandex and a cloak (and possibly a mask). The two opposite forces will have epic keyboard contests in a neo-classical style at regular intervals.
The Bull, the Finisher and the Clinician will share axe duties with the short straw playing bass and the big straw getting all the solos.
And the Specialist (specialist indeed) will be playing the throat.

So that was the band sorted. Now for the songs. Initial discussions centred on any song with the word ‘heart’ (or a rhyming derivative thereof) being supplanted by the word ‘dart’. This produced a setlist of:

Dartbreaker
Dartbreak Hotel
Burning Dart (Theme from Oche IV)
Don’t Go Breaking My Dart
Total Eclipse of the Dart
Poison Arrow (To My Dart)
Young at Dart
Dart of Glass
Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Dart Club Band
A Good Dart (Fergal Darty – oh dear)

That would do for starters, but the world of music and crap word-play means that a number of alternative tracks could be selected, including:

Saturday Flight Fever
Black Flight
In the Still of the Flight
Under the (dart)Boardwalk
Oche Mountain Way
Bull’s Gold
Ob Li De Ob Li Dart
Love Will Tear us Adart

It is not beyond the realm of possibility that there could be a touring musical, the Oche Horror Picture Show. And if Dart Club ever launch into film production its first feature will be a white, middle-class remake of Shaft, the opening gambit in the brave new cinematic world of dartsploitation movies.

After getting hot under the creative collar the darts came back into focus. The two new members were welcomed with open arms. Mi casa su casa. The Finisher and the Animal prevailing over the Bubble and the Bull in the next game of American cricket and while it was a fairly pedestrian game, it was played in the spirit that darts was meant to be played. All of the players were incompetent, it has to be said, but there was a noticeable difference in incompetence between the new blood and the old hands. It would seem that practise was starting to pay off.

The learning curve for darts is like no other sport. It is so slight that to the naked darter’s eye it seems to be non-existent. Age over enthusiasm is the key though, experience counts for everything in darts. This theory was borne out later in the evening when the Animal and the Bubble (combined age 44) teamed-up to take on the Bull and new arrival the Black Bomber (combined age 58) when the youngsters tabled the lowest score that night with a poultry 34. It’s not the winning though, it’s the taking dart.

The Animal executes the Bubble

Two behemoths of Dart Club clashed in the next game of American cricket, the Clinician and Danny Boy. The pair had both managed three victories during the first week’s 301 challenge, and with a new game to master it was always going to be tight. Danny Boy sealed the victory by the tightest margin of the night – a mere nine points.

With sufficient games of American cricket under their collective belt Dart Club was free to go and re-visit previous dart variant games. Under the stringent and very much written rules of Dart Club it is strictly forbidden to play a virgin game until road-tested at a previous Dart Club.

The fourth rule of Dart Club is: it is strictly forbidden to play a game at Dart Club that hasn’t been road-tested at a previous Dart Club.

So the Club was left with little alternative than to play a few games of 301, the Finisher managed a 140 – the highest score so far. But a bigger prize went to the Clinician who scooped 50bigones in the grand finale 501 challenge.

Mmmmm lovely fags

A is for...And then there were darts

The following email invitation was sent to a select band of men (well, actually it was sent to our email address book):

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Email Bulletin
---------------------------------------------------------
From: Undisclosed source
Sent: 05 August 2002 17:28
To: Undisclosed recipients
Subject: Dart Club
---------------------------------------------------------

Ladies and gentlemen

You have been hand selected because you are men (and women) of honour, men (and women) of courage, but most importantly of all, men (and …oh, who are we kidding?) who like darts.

You are being presented with the opportunity to put something back into the game you love, drink beer and play a part in the journey of a lifetime.

Over the next 12 months Dart Club will visit 26 different central London-based public houses, all with one very important thing in common. That's right. In each of these pubs Dart Club will play a game of darts, but it will not be a normal game. Well, it will be a few times, but the other times it will be a dart-variant game.

Each event will be captured and noted down, culminating ultimately in the production of a book. We might even take some photos, if we remember to buy a camera.

You and you may or may not have met each other, but that's not the point. You might not be able to play a part in all 26 games, but that's not the point either. As far as we can tell, there are three points, and they’re all going to be thrown with varying degrees of accuracy at London’s dartboards over the next year.

All that remains to be said is, we'll see you in the One Tun, on Goodge Street in London's glitzy West End on Tuesday 13th if you fancy a game of arrows - unless the board is busy, then we'll find somewhere else.

May the best man win.

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The One Tun is within easy walking distance of Goodge Street tube, just come out of the station, turn right and right again, and it’s about two hundred yards on the right, the sign has a man holding a barrel and One Tun in big writing, you can’t miss it.

When it comes to premium lagers this is a Stella pub, but with the time of arrival at an early doors of 17:30 it was too early for wife beater, so with the evening stretching out before us like a mysterious trip into the darts unknown we, the Dart Club co-chairmen, ordered a pint of Carling and a pint of Fosters from the Australian barmaid. The bar staff, it turns out, are at least 60% Australian.

A little nervous, not quite knowing what to do was slightly unusual, we’ve played darts many a time in various pubs across London, but we knew that something big was just about to start. There would be some pretty complicated games to learn over the course of the year, and rather than put off our darting companions by subjecting them to some bizarre darts version of American football, we thought it wise to keep it simple, so chose 301, because every darter knows how to play it.

The classic and most widely played darts game in the world is basically a race down to zero, from a predefined total. Three oh one is usually played by beginners, while 501 tends to be played by the more experienced dartists, or amateurs with time on their hands.

Deciding who goes first is almost always settled by seeing who can get nearest to the bull’s-eye with a single dart – middle for diddle. Once a game is underway competitors take it in turns to throw three darts at the board, taking the sum of the three darts away from the current score, 301 or 501 at the beginning.

Some regional variations have it that players must start out by scoring a double. But hitting the doubles is bloody difficult when you’re crap and so you’re probably better off playing ‘straight in’. Anywhere on the board is fair game.

The game starts at one over the ton so darters are forced at some stage to go for an odd number – although with pub darters deviating from the 20 segment is not usually an issue. A top tip for those requiring an odd number is the section of the board featuring 7, 19, 3 and 17 – this area of the board has such a high concentration of odd numbers it is affectionately known in some quarters as Old Compton Street.

Starting out on a double is not widespread darting practice, but finishing on a double most certainly is. The ‘check out’, as it is known, means finishing exactly on zero with a double, and that includes the bull’s-eye. If a player finishes on minus figures, he is ‘bust’ and retains his current running total score. Likewise, if a player finishes on one, he is bust, because there is no 0.5 segment on the board - although it is fairly common practice to either split the 11 when faced with this predicament or go for a bull’s-eye.

One hundred and seventy is the highest check out and 159 is the lowest score that a darter cannot check out on with three darts (a bloke down the pub told me that. Nice bloke. Fat bloke. And he was related to Oliver Cromwell).

Double 20, denoted T for tops when chalking, is the most glamorous out shot (apart from bull’s-eye) that most darters will go for. However, tops is riddled with danger for the mere amateur. It might seem innocuous at first glance, sitting up at the crest of the board, after all it’s surface area is just the same as any other outer double so why not give it crack?

Here is why: because if you miss you are likely it hit a 1 or a 5, thus leaving yourself without an out shot. Or should you score a straight 20 that’ll leave you requiring double 10 – well, that’s an out shot fair enough, but hit the straight 10 and it’s double 5 left, which could easily leave you requiring 5 to finish – not nice. Plus, you might find yourself on 5 earlier than you think, since 10 lies adjacent to 15.

The more sophisticated darter will probably try to leave himself requiring 32. This target has a number of advantages, should you hit a straight 16, you’ll need double 8, which is the adjacent segment, a straight 8 will leave you double 4, a straight 4, a double 2, a straight 2, double 1 – they are all out shots.

Going back to double 16, if you strike the 8 (remember, it’s right next door), you’ll need double 12, a straight 12 leaves double 6, which lies at 3 o’clock and for most right handed darters is favourable – although it could leave you requiring double 3, which should probably be avoided, since getting left needing double 3 is worse than double 5.

But don’t take my word for it:
“Double 3!…Nasty that. Worst double on the board. Never go near it less you’ve fucked double 12 and then come inside on double 6. Murder. 3’s the double all darters dread. Right down at the bottom like that, at six o’clock, you’re sort of dropping it in. And if you come inside it’s 1, double 1. Pressure darts,”
Keith ‘the Finisher’ Talent, London Fields

The doubles that make up Old Compton Street, 7 through to 17 should all be avoided if possible, since a straight in any leaves no out shot. (And that last sentence works on two levels.) If all this is getting a bit complicated (or boring), you should check out the Check Out Chart in Appendix I (unless it’s getting boring, then you should probably put this book down and pick up a good novel).

A quick gambling game, known as Dublin, sees both darters start on 101, an initial stake is made on the game, darters must start and end on a double. If one darter checks out before the other starts, the stake is doubled. Hence, Dublin – doubling – geddit? It should be a quick-fire game in which darters can win or lose cash quickly, however, since it concentrates on the trickier aspect of darts, namely hitting doubles, it’s not actually that quick-fire.

Chasing down from the predefined total is often more fun than the painstaking finish. In much the same way that driving down a motorway is often more fun than reverse parking into a space that looks decidedly too small, while traffic backs up behind you on a busy high street. With that in mind there are a number of alternative end-game scenarios.

The simplest variation is known as ‘the girls’ finish’, here competitors are not required to finish on a double. An even easier finish is ‘the busty girls’ finish’, where players are merely required to get down beyond zero. The ‘draw finish’ or ‘equal darts’ lets fellow darters complete the round, ensuring everybody has had the same number of throws, which means that two or more darters can finish equal, although some darters are more equal than others.

In some instances players can find themselves up against inferior opposition. For example, when a gentleman challenges his spouse at the oche. Mostly, this is great news. However, this being a very British game, competitors may wish to enforce some sort of handicap system, thus enabling female darters to taste sweet victory.

Handicaps include: letting ladies stand a bit closer; making the gentleman darter throw one or more of his three darts using his cackhand; making the man start on a higher number; and allowing the woman anyone of the non-double finishes outlined above. This is an excellent way of patronising the little lady, plus should you lose, you save face, since really you “let them win” and when all is said and done, “they are not bad for a bird”.

The final piece of darting etiquette that one should be aware of is known as ‘muggs off’. Put simply, this means the loser of the last game, starts the next game.

Before proceedings get underway it is suggested that players pick suitable darts names. Over years of darting around London we the authors had settled on the Finisher and the Bull. The Finisher in homage to his darting hero, Keith Talent, and the Bull because standing at a height of 5’8” he is exactly the same height as the bull’s-eye should be from the floor. They were ready to sDart.

Opening the very first game at Dart Club of the very first night of the voyage onto the high seas of the darts unknown, the Finisher was closest to bull’s-eye, and purely for the purposes of clarity here’s how it went.

The Finisher	301	The Bull	301
12,5,1	283	5,60,20	216
9	274	12,5,3	199
20,15,9	240	20,20,25	129
20,1,1	218	20,25,9	75
5,1	212	5,18,19	28
36,12,5	159	9	19
20,1,12	126	17bust	19
5,1,15	105	2,7	10
1,1,5	98	5bust	10
5,5,2	86	5,1	4
40,5,9	32	bust	4
Double 16	Check out

If you can be bothered to analyse the above results, you have problems. So for those of you without problems here is a quick overview of the conclusions that someone with problems might draw.

1. The Bull was better down to bull.
2. The Finisher was the better finisher.

The Finisher finishes

Our darts names are, it seems, quite appropriate after all.

You are considered to be of professional standard if you average 31 per dart. The Finisher’s average of 25.8 per three darts meant that he was far from professional, it was obviously dragged down by the eight 1s tabled. Perhaps he would have been better placed standing slightly to the left.

The pub was already starting to fill up with the time at an early doors of about 18:00 and Dart Club learnt a valuable lesson much to the chagrin of some less fortunate standers-by: Get in the pub early and don’t leave the oche.

A further consideration for the darter is to disguise your crapness. This is very difficult to do in a game like darts as it is a very visual beast, but there are a number of approaches at hand. One is to play the game very quickly and not let the darts linger in the board – unless you score particularly well, then it is time to go to the bar or toilet, or do some other time consuming trick like lighting a fag so that they can be left for viewing. The downside to playing quickly is (and this is a bit of a truism that your girlfriend might agree with) everything gets very rushed and you are liable to be even worse than you feared you would be.

The second and safer alternative when crap is to make it look like you don’t care – this technique gets most of us through secondary school, so you should be well versed. If you make it look like you don’t care you will be immune to the schadenfreudic wishes of onlookers – i.e. “he thinks he’s really good, I hope he fucks it up. Oh good he has. But alas he seems not to give gypsy’s kiss”. The downside to this is that no one will take you seriously. The upside to this is that no one will take you seriously. To perfect this approach a number of things have to be remembered. Fancy darts in fancy darts cases are out. It may be necessary to borrow darts from the bar – even if you don’t actually use them.

The third and most popular approach to crapness is to drink heavily. This way you can play as seriously as you like and still not care. And if you display lots of signs of heavy drinking, no one will expect you to be able to play well either. There is one serious downside – that you act like a wanker and become very unpopular. But everything has its price……

With one game under their belts the Bull and the Finisher returned to their drinks to contemplate life and await the imminent arrival of their darting companions.

They wouldn’t have to wait long, for the man who invented FridgeChess walked through the door. Wow! Dart Club had its first whacky entrepreneur. Not bad. If this book never takes off, maybe one day the FridgeChess bloke will invent fridge darts and we’ll be able to buy it in WH Smith instead. In honour of his fridge-based profession he was dubbed ‘the Light’.

“Big turn out” said the Light with a cheeky glint in his eye. “You’ll see” said the Finisher, and he did. Before you could say “Jocky Wilson is a hermit” in walked a journalist colleague of Dart Club’s authors, a grim, worrisome chap, who only ever drinks Guinness, he dubbed himself the Darkness and quickly decided he was the sworn enemy of the Light. The Darkness got himself a pint of Guinness.

Three more dartists arrived. The first a PhD vivisectionist, who at first chose the charming title ‘the Butcher of Bloomsbury’, but then in the interests of not getting Dart Club firebombed by PETA opted for the Clinician. The second a larger than life Cockney City boy type who due to his Irish heritage chose the name of the song he always sings at the end of the night as his moniker, Danny Boy. The third of these new arrivals opted for ‘the Specialist’ since he specialises in being rubbish at darts.

Dart Club was ready for its first game of doubles. But before the first game of doubles could be played the first rule of Dart Club had to be outlined to the assembled players:

The first rule of Dart Club is, you must tell everyone you know about Dart Club.

Without getting into the deeper analysis of who scored what, what can be revealed about the next game of doubles played is the Specialist and the Finisher won the game, with the Finisher finishing on his favourite of double one – his natural propensity to stand slightly too far to the right coming in handy. And, interestingly enough, the pairing’s average score was 29.9 was a distinct improvement on the Finisher’s earlier 25.8. Showing that darts can be a team game after all.

Dart Club progressed with a number of singles matches. When it comes to watching mano y mano 301 challenges with a group of mates, side betting on the outcome is strongly recommended, this greatly enhances the fun of watching someone else having fun. Not a major revelation admittedly, but after about eight pints of lager, epiphanies are commonplace, and usually involve kebabs.

The Light hands the Bull his winnings	Abrakababra it's Danny Boy

A further ten games of 301 followed, of which Irish crooner Danny Boy and the Clinician won three (including an impressive three dart finish complete with a double top exit from the Clinician), the Finisher won two, the Bull and the Light won one a piece. With the Specialist and Darkness specialising in not winning any. There were a number of 100s scored throughout the evening, however, the Finisher took the top score prize with a 105.

Despite a hat-trick of wins, including one with an average score of 56.2, Danny Boy tabled the lowest score in open play with a miserly two, the lowest average in a game was scored by the Darkness with 21.5. And just for the record the Dart Club average average was 37.55769.

The night was capped off with a massive seven darter play-off game of 501. Each player placed a fiver into the ring and the Bull claimed his glittering prize with a 30 dart finish (approx) and an impressive average score of about 48.3. Under duress he pledged to funnel the money back into darts. Which gave us the second rule of Dart Club.

The second rule of Dart Club is: you have to plough your winnings back into Dart Club.

The Bull wins the 501 challenge

Conclusions to be drawn are that booze settles the nerves, since with a clear head the Bull only managed an average of thirty one point bloody two. Still, that’s darts. The night had been a success even though we came only fourth out of ten in the quiz, Dart Club was still a winner and Danny Boy’s Danny Boy was something else.