THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 16, 1994 TAG: 9409160642
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TOM ROBINSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 102 lines
Robin Bell is 38 now, 18 years removed from the last heroin to assault her body. Eighteen years from the day when, in desperation, she rediscovered her Christianity, ditched the pool cue she used to gamble for drug money and, as an unwed mother of an infant son, moved into a church-sponsored home to save her life.
It was so long ago, though. Such a different person. It's what she was, a ghost of what she is. And if the story of Robin Bell begins there, framed by teenage stupor in Southern California pool halls and back streets, it certainly is not where it should end.
Of course, Bell, who reclaimed her cue in 1983 and became a two-time world 9-ball champion, will have something to say about the ending. She has sold the rights to her life story to a screenwriter who hopes to turn it into a movie. Bell, in town this weekend to defend her U.S. Open 9-ball championship at the Holiday Inn in Chesapeake, will be the technical adviser.
``It's a victory story,'' Bell said this week from her home in Garden Grove, Calif., waiting for her two young sons to return from their first day of school. Her 20-year-old is in college.
``It's a little like pool itself. It's come from smoke-filled rooms to the professional respect of the media. It's like my coming from drug addiction to becoming a Christian and rising to the top. Pool and I graduated to the good life.''
It all hasn't been great. Bell has been divorced. Her mother died last March of cancer. But she is seeing someone again, ``going through all the emotions of being in love,'' that she said makes it hard to leave home to play pool.
Yet leaving has been so lucrative for Bell, one of the few women who can make a comfortable living in billiards.
By far the largest earner on the Women's Professional Billiards tour from 1991 to '93 - at more than $105,000 in winnings - Bell made about $48,000 last year from three championships and five second-place finishes.
But fees from endorsements, exhibitions and $50-an-hour private lessons - she runs a pro shop at a billiards room near her home - pushed her income beyond $80,000.
Last month Bell, who is ranked fourth on the tour, pocketed the largest prize for a women's event, $20,000, at the Gordon's 9-ball Championship in California.
One of 10 select players in the field, Bell beat Ewa Mataya in the final. She will shoot for a $5,500 first prize in Chesapeake, where she captured the event in 1992. (It was not held last year.)
Of the 48 players, Bell won't be the most likely to catch a spectator's eye on a quick glance around the ballroom's seven tables. A lefthander, Bell is described as among the more workmanlike performers, with no interest in flamboyance or crowd-pleasing. But give her a rack and watch them fall.
``She's never out of the top three or four,'' Mike Panozzo, editor and publisher of Billiards Digest in Chicago, said of Bell's ranking. ``She's had a number of terrific years and someone else has played out of their mind and Robin would end up runner-up. But Robin's the most consistent year-in and year-out.
``She's very aggressive and a terrific shotmaker. She'll fire at tough shots, bank shots, regardless of the score. She's a fun player to watch.''
The roots of Bell's game were set in the early '70s while playing against boys in Westminster, Calif. Naturally gifted, she was a three-time California women's champ by the time she was 18. That was when years of drug use led her to search for a faster high, which produced the heroin habit she supported with pool-hall gambling.
``I would do what I had to do to get out of there and get high,'' Bell said.
It took about three years before the personal realization of her physical bankruptcy, the Christian counseling of a cousin and a haven called Harvest House, where she lived 1 1/2 years, redirected Bell's life. She kicked drugs, gave up pool for more than five years and poured herself into Bible study.
She married, and finally found that her calling truly was pool, as a vehicle to sharing her faith.
``I realized God was saying, `Don't bury the talent. Let's go use it the right way,' '' she said. ILLUSTRATION: BILL TIERNAN/Staff [color] photos
WOMEN'S 9-BALL
What: 1994 Women's U.S. Open 9-ball Championships.
When: Today through Sunday.
Where: Holiday Inn, Chesapeake, 725 Woodlake Ave. in Greenbrier
area.
Phone: 523-1500.
Purse: $32,000; first prize $5,500.
Field: 48 players, including the five top-ranked players: Loree
Jon Jones, Vivian Villarreal, Jeanette Lee, Robin Bell, Belinda
Bearden.
Defending champion: Robin Bell.
Times: Matinees: 11:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m., 3:30 p.m.; Evening
sessions: 7 p.m., 9 p.m., 11 p.m.; Finals: 9 p.m. Sunday.
Tickets: Tournament pass: $30 ($50 VIP); Matinee: $5 ($8 VIP);
Evening: $7 ($10 VIP).
Seating: Bleachers and VIP seats for 800.
More information: 499-8900 after 10 a.m.
by CNB