This was more of an off the cuff remark than it was a guided estimate, though his reasoning was fairly valid: He expects a Starship successful orbit in 6 +- 3

This was more of an off the cuff remark than it was a guided estimate, though his reasoning was fairly valid: He expects a Starship successful orbit in 6 +- 3 months. Demonstrating human capability with non-reusable hardware means building and throwing away hardware 10 times. A rocket capable of rapid reuse would be able to do about 3 flights a day (due to orbit time + needing to align to landing site again + some downtime) Even at the "low" rate of 1 a day, that's less than two weeks of flights. If they're way off their mark, one launch a week is 2.3 months. Not that I would take your bet, but it's not unthinkable.