A van driver called Les

WORLD Ladies doubles champion Pam Wood was snookered at the UK Championships in September after working her way through three cues.

Pam Wood

The 38-year-old legal secretary from Newcastle kicked off the 2007/08 World Ladies Billiards & Snooker Association season at the North East Derbyshire Snooker Centre but only managed two frames before losing her tip in a freak accident.

“I was playing Vicky Ashby in the first round,” explained Wood. “I won the first frame and then lost the next one. I came back from outside and knocked my cue against the light. I saw something out of the corner of my eye fly off.

“I had to borrow Vicky Ashby's husband's cue. I didn’t have time to stick [the tip] back on because it would take a while to dry. But, funnily enough, with his cue I won the next frame, which is a bit worrying.”

Wood lost the first-round match 3-2 but, with Ashby - and her husband Darren - needing to leave, was forced to play her Plate match with a club cue. In the semi-finals, Wood lost 2-1 to Hong Kong’s Jaique Ip-Wan In, the 2006 International Billiards & Snooker Federation ladies runner-up.

Wood started playing pool aged 17 and has won many titles in the region. While working at the University, aged 23, she was taught to play snooker by “a van driver called Les”.

Wood, who has a high break of 56, partnered Chris Sharpe (Chelmsford) to the WLBSA doubles title in Cambridge earlier this year.