16 ms·

Can a complete novice become a golf pro with 10,000 hours of practice?

297 points by plinkplonk 16y ago

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- Afton 16y ago
  He's not self-taught. He has a coach.
- scott_s 16y ago
  He's not self-taught, he has a coach. They actually have what looks to me to be a non-orthodox system where he only practices shots from x feet when he is good at shots from x-1 feet. A depth-first approach to learning the game as opposed to a breadth-first approach.
  - jerf 16y ago
    What I find interesting about that is that you can only pursue it if you are really committed in advance. Someone who doesn't know that they are going to stick with it has to try to learn everything at once. Since he "knows" (for some suitable value) that he's sticking with it for 10,000 hours, if the first 1,000 are spent on putting, no problem. I don't know if this is optimal, but it's interesting.
    - scott_s 16y ago
      I agree, and it's also unlikely that most people would even stumble upon this approach. Most people pursue golf because they enjoy it, on some level. I assume that would involve actually playing full games of golf pretty early on. Although, now that I think about it, his approach is how we teach many academic subjects. A freshmen physics major often has no idea what it looks like to be a practicing physicist, much in the same way that someone who only works on short-range putting would know what a full game of golf is like. (Aside from cultural awareness, of course.)
      - lasonrisa 16y ago
        It is how we teach traditional martial arts too. You do a lot of kata repetitions when you learn Karate.
        scott_s 16y ago
        But it's not how Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is usually taught. Yeah, people may not do any live rolling their first few classes, but they usually get to it after several. While people are often encouraged to focus on one aspect of their game, free live rolling is there from the beginning.
    - ctdonath 16y ago
      It is interesting. I'm contemplating writing a book on beginning programming, and am tempted to do such a "depth first" approach, but the problem is indeed how to do so without losing most who want to start at Hello World and get to writing applications in 16 weeks flat with minimal effort. When the student and teacher are moving at right angles, what to do? This guy, if he follows through will be a guide and inspiration to many. If.
- kenjackson 16y ago
  Golf certainly lends itself to this versus other vocations. Why do you say that? I can't think of many that don't lend itself to that. Programming? Math? Chess? Plumbing? Carpentry? Tax accountant? Table tennis? Nurse? I think the vocations where this seems unlikely to work are rare. Basketball -- due to height, and sprinting, due to the pure athleticism required, being probably the biggest ones I can think of.
  - fjh 16y ago
    > Why do you say that? I can't think of many that don't lend itself to that. Programming? Math? Chess? Plumbing? Carpentry? Tax accountant? Table tennis? Nurse? Golf probably has the advantage that it is easier to measure or judge someone's performance than some of the things you mentioned. While practice certainly helps with all of them, I would think that it would be quite hard to objectively evaluate the skill of a mathematician or a plumber in comparison.
  - xiaoma 16y ago
    Mathematics is notoriously famous for being dominated by the young. In more recent times, as more depth is required to break new ground, mathematicians have been making breakthroughs at slightly older ages... but they started just as young. In a sense, it's even more exclusive now. The current experts are still extremely bright people who developed exceptional abilities in their 20's, but then they had to keep on grinding further just to get caught up with the current state of their specialty. In fact, the situation with chess is very similar. I'd say go with either nurse, or tax accountant since they are in demand and still pay well even if you don't have sufficient talent and/or early training to become the best.
- bayleo 16y ago
  Yeah, he definitely optimized on his choice of sport by selecting one of the few where the advantages of age and genetics are minimized.
  - jpwagner 16y ago
    not a golfer?
    - jordan0day 16y ago
      I have to presume you're taking some offense at a perceived slight against golf? Of all sports, I think it's fair to say age and genetics are less important in golf than, say, football. bayleo's statement seems fairly accurate to me.
    - hugh3 16y ago
      If you're implying that age and genetics do play a big role you're right, but what other "proper" sport is comparable? Most sports nowadays are dominated by folks who are clearly genetic freaks.
      - jpwagner 16y ago
        so because you cannot "see" the genetic advantages and it's not a "proper" sport, the original comment is not ridiculous?
  - SlipperySlope 16y ago
    Actually there are a number of sports in which are age and genetics are far less important than golf, e.g. the Olympic sports of curling, bob sled racing, archery, equestrian, target shooting and sailing. Anyone's reflexes will decline with age, so Dan's choice is of golf is a good one with respect to his slower reflexes as a potential golf pro in his late 30s, as compared to the reflexes of 20 year old potential golf pros, are not such a big deal.
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kenjackson 16y ago
Here's his blog with some updated info: http://dannychampion.com/blog.php http://dannychampion.com/blog.php His improvement seems to be fairly rapid. I guess if this is your sole pursuit, not that surprising. But nevertheless makes I'm rooting for him. I think it would be testament to the theory.
- alecco 16y ago
  Sports training usually shows diminishing returns. In particular, if you overtrain you plateau or get worse.
  - scott_s 16y ago
    Overtraining is different from people's tendency to plateau. Overtraining is what happens when an athlete's training frequency is greater than their body's ability to recover. That is, by the time the next training sessions comes around, they haven't yet recovered from the last one. This can harm overall performance for obvious reasons. That may lead to a plateau, but I think plateau's happen more often when the athlete ceases to learn from training sessions. And that happens when they're just doing the same thing, over and over. All practiced activities show diminishing returns. If you practice 5 days a week (assuming your body can handle it), the benefit of practicing 6 days a week (assuming your body can handle it) is not going to be the same as going from 1 to 2 days. But if your body can handle it, you probably will still improve.
  - jwb119 16y ago
    do you have a citation or any evidence for this?
    - alecco 16y ago
      Are you being funny or are you implying results can be linear? Have you ever seen personal bests charts? Save specific cases of breaktrhoughs, it plots very logarithmic for everybody. That is diminishing returns, more or less.
kmgroove 16y ago
This is such a fluff article. Why is it interesting that someone is attempting to "try really hard at something for a lengthy period time"? Looks like he is pitching for a book deal and a spot on Oprah. When you consider how much time 10k hours is I don't think it will blow anyone away that practice of that magnitude will bring success.
- joezydeco 16y ago
  If I was going to quit my job and golf for 6 years straight, I'd probably plan a secondary income source as well.
bobabooey 16y ago
Six hours a day, six days a week, for six years? Golf can take it's toll on the wrists, forearms, shoulders, lower back, and knees. I predict he'll give up due to overuse injuries long before he reaches 10,000 hours.
- SlipperySlope 16y ago
  If you read Dan's blog, you'll see that he has a physical therapist coaching him. His team of advisors have a good plan and it seems to me that avoiding injury is a big part of that plan. For example, Dan currently is not using any big clubs - the largest a chipping wedge. If his spends most of his practice time near the green how is going to injure his shoulders, lower back or knees? In a recent blog post Dan mentions that his physical therapist will prescribe a certain weight lifting program to strengthen his muscles enough to achieve the driver head speed that his golf coach plans that he should achieve. I suppose that today's golf pros, those actually on the tour, have each put in those thousands and thousands of hours of practice, regardless of whatever athletic gifts they received at birth. So are injuries the reason most near-pros never make the tour? That would be the case if your point is true. I think that they don't make the tour because it is simply too much effort and dedication to put in all those hours of practice. And that's the wonderful thing about Dan's challenge. If valid, it means that any of us may achieve outstanding results if we put in the hours required to gain the expertise. Golf, in this regard, is a model for any skill we need to satisfy our aspirations.
chops 16y ago
This reminds me of a blog I read a few years ago called "Scratch to Scratch". The point of the exercise was to go from being an ultrabeginner golfer to a par golfer in a year of serious practice and training. Here's the about page from his blog: http://breakparblueprint.com/blog/about-2/ http://breakparblueprint.com/blog/about-2/ That is apparently, his new blog migrated from the original, found here: http://scratchtoscratch.wordpress.com/ http://scratchtoscratch.wordpress.com/ The big thing was the time and effort investment: over 70,000 practice balls, and 2,000 hours in a year (that's close to a full-time job). He actually ended up writing a book about it: http://www.amazon.com/Dream-Hack-Golfers-Challenge-Break/dp/1616080264 http://www.amazon.com/Dream-Hack-Golfers-Challenge-Break/dp/...
- oldstrangers 16y ago
  You can also count on this "Dan Plan" becoming a book. Ultimately, that's the entire point of this project anyways. Not to be a golf champion, but to sell a lot of books.
  - diegob 16y ago
    I thought the entire point was to become a PGA golfer ...
alecco 16y ago
I'm not fond of all these attention grabbing hotshots. Gladwell's theory is completely bogus. A guy in UK tried to do that for Marathon and aimed to become an olympian. He did a lot of media and called his upcoming documentary "The Road to Beijing". He didn't make it, and wasn't even close (from what I remember it was 2:40 or 2:45). Then he went to Ethiopia and picked a protege. His protege was fast but didn't win a thing. He is now a motivational speaker. I guess blatant self promotion always works. He used to be the running joke in UK runner's forums but he is the one laughing now.
- DanielStraight 16y ago
  The theory isn't about becoming the best in the world. It's about achieving "greatness" or "success." Most people can't even run a marathon, much less do so in under 3 hours. I don't see how you could call someone unsuccessful who can do so.
  - alecco 16y ago
    This kind of crazy promise sidelines real athletes working hard for many years. Many athletes working hard were in his shadow in the media. Media spots are very important for non-professional athletes as they depend on sponsorships and donations. I find it very disrespectful.
    - DanielStraight 16y ago
      How is someone practicing 6 hours a day, 6 days a week for 6 years with the intention of going pro not a "real athlete working hard for many years?" That's what I don't understand about all the negative replies in this thread. What defines a "real athlete" if it's not a whole lot of hard work? How does quantifying the effort make it less real?
  - pbhjpbhj 16y ago
    >"Most people can't even run a marathon, much less do so in under 3 hours." // Most people don't try. I think that most healthy people could walk (you said "run") a marathon if they desired to. even if you walked for 2 miles an hour and had a 10 minute break that would be 17 hours of effort. 3mph is the usually quoted walking speed. Perhaps I'm wrong.
dfan 16y ago
To me there's a sort of a Bayesian logic working against any hypothetical "adult novice puts in 10,000 hours of work and becomes a pro" story, which is that anyone who has the willpower and passion to put in that much work probably has already. If you are so excited about a sport/instrument/game/hobby that you're willing to put 10,000 hours into it starting from scratch, why weren't you working on it before? I recently mentioned reading an amazing music theory book and someone asked me if it had lots of prerequisites or if he could understand it. My response was "It doesn't really require previous theory knowledge, but if you weren't excited enough about music theory to have acquired that other knowledge already, I doubt this book is going to be that interesting to you."
- austintaylor 16y ago
  What was the name of the music theory book? Seriously interested.
  - dfan 16y ago
    "A Geometry of Music: Harmony and Counterpoint in the Extended Common Practice" by Dmitri Tymoczko.
- scythe 16y ago
  This seems logical. It doesn't seem shocking to propose that considering the way he went about this 10000-hour experiment decision, he'll soon find something new to worry about and quit before he finishes.
- axefrog 16y ago
  Sounds reasonable, but what about the fact that there are a great many more pursuits in life that one might enjoy, but simply hasn't had enough time to investigate, or simply has not yet been exposed to sufficiently to recognise the enjoyment that comes from pursuing it?
  - dfan 16y ago
    Well, there is a pretty large difference between enjoying something and dedicating a giant chunk of your life to it. But in any case, I'm not saying it's impossible, I'm saying why it's unlikely.
rickmode 16y ago
There's an unstated assumption that excellence equals pro in this article. I'd say excellence is a necessary precursor to going pro, but is itself not sufficent. That extra push is some magic combination of genetics, upbringing and opportunity (nature and nurture coming together just so) - all along with the drive and experience to become excellent.
rsbrown 16y ago
There's a lot of armchair speculating going on about this. What I love about this guy's mission (and why I'm rooting for him) is because he is simply and intensely applying a theory. Succeed or fail, he won't prove (or disprove) the theory, but it will be a fascinating data point for us all.
jasonwilk 16y ago
I have been playing golf since I was 6 years old (I am now 25, running a YC company and whiteyboard). I've played competitively, going all over the country and even got a full scholarship to a NCAA Division 1 university for the sport. I can honestly say that this guy does not stand a chance, and here is why. 1. Golf, especially when it comes to playing professionally, is more of a mental sport than physical (both strength and muscle memory). Even if this guy can learn to hit the ball 300 yards, it will take him at least 10 years if not longer to get the mental comfort required to play effectively in front of thousands of people and successfully place or win an event. 2. The 10,000 hour rule is best applied to things like coding or langauge learning, in other words, low pressure learning environments that have structured guidelines to success. Golf, beyond mental and physical, requires great feel. To be able to know that in 15 mile an hour wind, with your ball half buried by sand, and water in front of the green, how would one hit that shot? There are millions of variations of what you could end up with on the golf course, none that could be figured out in 10,000 hours. We haven't even talked about the putting green yet. Yikes 3. I've seen this before, over a dozen times. Guy gets tired of his job, has some talent and decides to take a ton of golf lessons and practice hard to go for the tour. At least the guys Im referring to played college golf. This guy didn't so much as do that. 4. Golf is seriously hard and the difference between the best players and the mediocre pro players most of the time is just an average difference of a few shots. To shave off those few shots is next to impossible once you've reached your peak potential. Golf is not for everyone. This guy is wasting his time. Update ( I forgot something): Here is another reason why this is a pointless ambition. 5. 10,000 hours of golf is a lot different than 10,000 of something like...learning a language (we'll use this again). To become good at golf does not mean that you can sit on the driving range and hit golf balls every day until your hands bleed. To become a great player, one must get great at playing the golf course. To play one round of golf takes between 3-5 hours (depending on where you play), and there is no guarantee that those 5 hours spent on the course are in any way productive to your progress. That is not a good use of time spent in his quest for 10,000 hours. Someone could certainly guarantee that in 5 focused hours of a spanish tutoring session that they have progresses. With golf, a bad round could send you right back to the drawing board.
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stray 16y ago
Depends on the novice, right? After all, Tiger Woods was once a novice.
- m_myers 16y ago
  Yeah, but he could barely walk at the time. That's pretty raw material right there.
Keyframe 16y ago
It depends on the sport. For example Javier Sotomayor (high jumper) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Sotomayor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Sotomayor - made it from 0 to no.5 in 4 years, and there are other examples in this particular sport where people made it in 2 years or so. That's one of the reason I don't appreciate any sport, it depends on lots of factors apart from your mental discipline (golf is more or less only mental discipline OTOH).
scythe 16y ago
This is assuming the 10-year / 10000-hour rule can both a: drop that first bit and b: is not dependent on critical periods of learning early in life.
ignifero 16y ago
I 'll probably be buried for this, but how is this "hacker news"? I thought HN was moderated
- iamwil 16y ago
  Do you not find it an intellectually curious topic?
  - ignifero 16y ago
    Without trying to be condescending, no. I am not a golf fan, and I already know that practice makes perfect. If I were to devote 10000 hours of my life in something it would be more "cerebral" than a motor skill/sport. Just my point of view. For example: if this guy decided to devote 10000 hours to make a machine that would connect and download golf into his brain, now that would be cool.
    - jamesbkel 16y ago
      Certainly practice approches perfect. The interesting part here is to quantify the practice to perfection radio in the context of the well known 10,000hr rule. Golf works well for this since it's fairly objective at the individual level. I'm not interested in golf, but I found it interesting to read through the article and see I thought his use of golf as a skill had some merit, but also where I think he's a bit off. Regardless of the outcome, I hope he follows through and documents well. That said, I definitely pick up what you're putting down on the 'cerebral' aspect.
      - ignifero 16y ago
        See i think his choice of golf (or most sports where you rely mostly on repetitive physical training) is a bad one. It's like a brute force attack - effective, but not much of an achievement.
- flatline 16y ago
  Not so much moderated - some links are occasionally killed, usually as spam. How is setting out on a new venture to both succeed technically and profesionally - and test a hypothesis that has been bandied about HN quite a bit - not hacking related?
num1 16y ago
Something I recently realized is that if this theory is true I have a big problem on my hands. See I love flying, and it is one of my life's goals to fly in professional competitions. However flight time in airplanes routinely cost $100 or even $300 an hour. My goal might end up costing me a few million dollars.
- dpifke 16y ago
  At the the skydiving drop zone I used to help run, almost all of our jump pilots were hired with 500-1000 hours. They were all building time to "move up" to bigger aircraft, better paying jobs, etc. Most easily were able to accumulate 500+ hours in a summer. (We flew under Part 91, which does not have a duty time limitation, so they could fly literally from sunup to sundown on a busy day.) So really all you have to afford out of your own pocket is enough time to get your commercial certificate and be employable for flight instruction, skydiving, crop dusting, banner towing, or any of the other "entry level" pilot jobs out there.
  - num1 16y ago
    You are absolutely correct there, once somebody has their commercial license it becomes easier and cheaper to build hours. I guess it comes down to how effective the practice is, as acrobatic maneuvers are frowned upon in most commercial settings. :P Certainly getting your license doesn't mean you have mastered controlling the airplane, but I'd imagine that after a thousand hours of doing basic maneuvers and tightening your tolerances there's not much more you can do without buckling down and getting time in an acrobatic.
- jordan0day 16y ago
  You just have to get good enough within the first few hundred (or first thousand, if you've got quite a bankroll) hours to convince someone else to subsidize you.
gcheong 16y ago
Here's one of the original papers that put forth the theory of deliberate practice and the 10,000 hour rule (though in the paper it is given as a 10-year rule): http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracticePR93.pdf http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracti... The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance also covers a wide range of research on performance and expertise in various areas http://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Expertise-Performance-Handbooks-Psychology/dp/0521600812 http://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Expertise-Performance-Handbo...
waterside81 16y ago
This is right out of the book "Talent is overrated"[0]. Given enough time and the proper amount of coaching & practice, a person can become a star. The key isn't to just play golf, but rather to get proper feedback from a trained professional who knows how to practice. [0] http://www.amazon.com/Talent-Overrated-Separates-World-Class-Performers/dp/1591842247 http://www.amazon.com/Talent-Overrated-Separates-World-Class...
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- unreal37 16y ago
  If you read the book "Talent is Overrated", the theory being put forth alongside "10,000 hours to master something" is there is no such thing as natural talent. Every baby has the same talents at birth. Tiger Woods was not born great. His father had him swinging a golf club from before he could walk.
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  - jacques_chester 16y ago
    In many sports physical characteristics matter because they set the ultimate limits to performance.
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jaredmck 16y ago
The thing about golf is that practicing six hours doesn't mean you got six hours of practice- you need to play rounds, which take several hours but are only really ~30 minutes of "golf practice" at most...golf is interesting because the athletic prerequisites are minimal compared to most other sports, but this doesn't mean that 10,000 hours is sufficient. I don't doubt that he'll be near-pro level after the 10,000 hours, but I do doubt that he will be good enough that it will be really worth the complete dedication of these six years. He'll be scratch+ for sure, but until you get close to that level, it isn't easy to predict who will have the ability to step up to the true professional level, and who will lose a ton of money traveling on minitours with little chance at ever reaching a PGA/Nationwide tour level (i.e. what most mean when they say "pro"). My perspective on this is based on my experience in playing tennis for 10,000+ hours (not apples-to-apples, obviously, but still relatively close) and becoming good enough to know that there would be absolutely no point in trying to play full-time professionally, because I was too slow to ever reach a level where I could make money while touring. There's a lot more money in golf, but it also is a lot more expensive (many golf mini-tours pay prize money out of the sizable entry fees they charge...$1k/tourney entry fee is common for small pro golf tourneys) and there's a lot more marginal pro-level players around for the golf tournaments since there aren't nearly as many physical factors in golf as there are in tennis.
- tokenadult 16y ago
  The claim of the mainstream scholarly development of expertise literature http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/ericsson/ericsson.exp.perf.html http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/ericsson/ericsson.exp.perf.ht... and especially the most classic paper in the literature http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracticePR93.pdf http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracti... is not that 10,000 hours is enough, but rather that deliberate practice is strictly necessary for expertise, and that 10,000 hours (in round figures) is also necessary to achieve what can properly be called expertise in any adult domain of performance. K. Anders Ericsson, the leading researcher in this field, distinguishes "playful engagement" from "deliberate practice" and distinguishes being at the journeyman level of performance from the rarer case of being at the expert level of performance. What needs more testing is whether 10,000 hours of deliberate practice is not only necessary but also sufficient. Many critiques of Ericsson's findings evoke an ill-defined latent quality labeled "talent" to make the claim that many members of the general public would fail to achieve expertise even if they engaged in 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. But such a showing would not be a direct refutation of Ericsson's claim. Rather, it would be necessary to show that someone who is properly called an expert lacked opportunity to engage in lengthy deliberate practice. Mozart didn't write any music composition that musicologists call a "masterpiece" until he had had ten years (and at least 10,000 hours) of intensive study of music guided by his father, who was an author of innovative books on music instruction and a continual guide to young Wolfgang's musical development.
SeanDav 16y ago
It Depends.... I have a friend who can do anything with a golfball. He is literally amazing. As an amateur he was one of the very best, but he freely admits he cannot succeed as a golfer because he just does not have the right mental makeup. He will sink 6 foot putts all day in practice but ask him to sink a six footer with a tournament at stake and he just cannot do it reliably. Being great at something is often not just about skill or love of the activity but also you "gotta have the right stuff"
- neilk 16y ago
  Yeah, but you're just drawing the line between "result of effort" and "inner nature" in a different place. What if you decided to test the hypothesis that it was inner nature which allowed you to deal with tournament stakes? What if that was learnable after all? Maybe the top performers just had a different set of experiences, one that allows them to be more detached.
  - SeanDav 16y ago
    I have no doubt that inner nature can be learned or at the very least improved. People are complex and the stated reasons are very seldom the real reasons. My friend may just be saying what sounds logical rather than the real reason. In any case I hope this guy makes it!
ebiester 16y ago
I would believe it were he 20. However, most golfers start fading in their thirties, having lost the extra power that their bodies could provide when younger. While I don't doubt that he will be an excellent golfer (thus "proving" that 10,000 hours of dedicated practice will indeed make you great) I certainly doubt he will be a PGA golfer. That said, he might have a chance for a lesser tour. And that, for sure, will lead him to his true goal: motivational speaking! (Oh... come on, like it isn't obvious...) I've certainly thought about doing similar, outrageous things. It seems to be a current pattern: do something seemingly outrageous and interesting, write about it, derive income.
- cygwin98 16y ago
  I believe your comment is spot on. The debates here is basically about what "professional level" careful training and hard work can bring this guy up to. The "nay-sayers" (including myself) agree on that he might become much more proficient than amateur golf players, maybe even "have a chance for a lesser tour" (as you put it), but he won't be able to make it into the top level games such as PGA tour tournaments. This is the case for almost all competitive sports.
ikono 16y ago
It's far more reasonable to change this to a challenge to become a scratch golfer or something similar. I don't think Gladwell meant that anyone could become one of the best in the world at anything with 10,000 hours of work. Such a statement is somewhat insulting to those that have devoted their life to their craft. Instead, that with 10,000 hours you could become very good at anything. Enough so that you could be considered very skilled/knowledgable in that craft/field.
- jbri 16y ago
  The "challenge" isn't to become a PGA golfer or anything like that. There isn't any predetermined mark of how "good" he needs to become in order to succeed. It's an open-ended experiment into how far 10,000 hours can take you. Setting one milestone as your "goal" hinders your ability to reach the thousands of other possible milestones.
  - ikono 16y ago
    But the title is can he become a golf pro. There wouldn't be over a 100 comments here if it simply said "How good of a golfer can you be with 10,000 hours of practice?"
    - dbalatero 16y ago
      I guess, but that title seems to be chosen by the submitter/publication. To quote directly from the article: "Basically," he told the people at the conference, "what I'm trying to do with this project is demonstrate how far you're able to go if you're willing to put in the time.
kenjackson 16y ago
I never thought I'd be tempted to donate to someone so they could focus on playing golf!
jhowell 16y ago
Probably want to start with a few amateur tournaments like club championships, city championships and state championships before moving onto national championships (US Public Links, US Amateur, etc.) If you can't beat the 13 year olds at these tournaments who are breaking par, you probably aren't going to do very well against the adults who use to win those tournaments as kids. The next argument I hear from a lot of my golfing buddies is that they'll practice hard and play the Senior Tour (Champions Tour). Beating Bubba Watson, for example, in 20 years when he's eligible for the Champions tour is like beating Usain Bolt in a 100 yard dash after giving him a 3 second head start. Won't make good television. A few books have been written on the subject where reporters try to qualify for the tour. That being said, it's actually doable, highly unlikely, but doable. I like his chances at becoming a pro golfer (not on the PGA Tour, but maybe the Hooters or Tar Heel Tour) better than his chances of becoming a starting pitcher, running back, point guard, goalie or professional driver in other pro sports. Golf, the game is tremendously "fair".
- fredleblanc 16y ago
  Agreed, just think of the number of "golf pros" out there that can't even make the tour. Every course has at least one, and these days most driving ranges have them. Unless he discovers that he happens to have some hidden raw talent, his chances are slim-to-none.
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hartror 16y ago
I think the key here could be this: > "He had almost no experience and even less interest in the sport." How can someone truly excel in a vocation they don't love. Without that love is his practice going to be effective compared to that of someone who loves golf and wants to submerge themselves in it every waking hour?
- scott_s 16y ago
  Read his current blog. He loves it now.
wmboy 16y ago
Cool story. My question is, if you were going to do the same thing, what skill would you try and master?
petegrif 16y ago
I have a different theory. When it comes to seriously major ambitions e.g. PGA tour, chess GM forget 10,000 hours because it is way simpler - if at first you don't succeed...give up. You probably don't have the freakish level of god given talent required.
utoku 16y ago
The first study I know of is the 1996 book "The Road to Excellence" http://www.amazon.com/Road-Excellence-Acquisition-Performance-Sciences/dp/0805822321 http://www.amazon.com/Road-Excellence-Acquisition-Performanc... . I got it after I read Peter Norvig's essay on "Teach Yourself Programming in 10 Years." http://norvig.com/21-days.html http://norvig.com/21-days.html . So here are the numbers, in short, for mastery: It takes about 10k hours of practice. It takes about 10 years. That means about 3 hours of practice everyday. Everyday.
perlgeek 16y ago
I doubt that he'll be able to get to a professional level when he's not passionate about golf. At least I never excelled at things I wasn't passionate about.
paulus 16y ago
Something missing from this story: money. How does this guy pay for six years of training (doing what he wants) with no income? I guess the lecture circuit and some Nike sponsorship, but will that be enough to pay rent, food, travel and maybe support a family?
rdkls 16y ago
I contacted Dan and suggested he try to find interested neurosci guys to scan his brain as he progresses, he's going to do so (local uni) tomorrow, very cool.
johnconroy 16y ago
I don't see why not. Rory McIlroy went from pro to amateur overnight.
pbhjpbhj 16y ago
From the article >'Dan spent last month in St. Petersburg because winters are winters in the Pacific Northwest. "If I could become a professional golfer," he said one afternoon, "the world is literally open to any options for anybody."' // The world is 'open to any options for anybody' who can write a novel book, do a lecture and has $100,000 USD to fall back on whilst they train for their new venture ... If he's done the experiment first, then written the book and done the lectures it would have a greater validity IMO.
gadders 16y ago
I just wish he'd tried this on an actual sport. braces for down votes from Golf fans
maguro 16y ago
What the heck is this doing here on Hacker News?!?!?!

297 points by plinkplonk 16y ago

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Afton 16y ago
He's not self-taught. He has a coach.
scott_s 16y ago
He's not self-taught, he has a coach. They actually have what looks to me to be a non-orthodox system where he only practices shots from x feet when he is good at shots from x-1 feet. A depth-first approach to learning the game as opposed to a breadth-first approach.
- jerf 16y ago
  What I find interesting about that is that you can only pursue it if you are really committed in advance. Someone who doesn't know that they are going to stick with it has to try to learn everything at once. Since he "knows" (for some suitable value) that he's sticking with it for 10,000 hours, if the first 1,000 are spent on putting, no problem. I don't know if this is optimal, but it's interesting.
  - scott_s 16y ago
    I agree, and it's also unlikely that most people would even stumble upon this approach. Most people pursue golf because they enjoy it, on some level. I assume that would involve actually playing full games of golf pretty early on. Although, now that I think about it, his approach is how we teach many academic subjects. A freshmen physics major often has no idea what it looks like to be a practicing physicist, much in the same way that someone who only works on short-range putting would know what a full game of golf is like. (Aside from cultural awareness, of course.)
    - lasonrisa 16y ago
      It is how we teach traditional martial arts too. You do a lot of kata repetitions when you learn Karate.
      - scott_s 16y ago
        But it's not how Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is usually taught. Yeah, people may not do any live rolling their first few classes, but they usually get to it after several. While people are often encouraged to focus on one aspect of their game, free live rolling is there from the beginning.
  - ctdonath 16y ago
    It is interesting. I'm contemplating writing a book on beginning programming, and am tempted to do such a "depth first" approach, but the problem is indeed how to do so without losing most who want to start at Hello World and get to writing applications in 16 weeks flat with minimal effort. When the student and teacher are moving at right angles, what to do? This guy, if he follows through will be a guide and inspiration to many. If.
kenjackson 16y ago
Golf certainly lends itself to this versus other vocations. Why do you say that? I can't think of many that don't lend itself to that. Programming? Math? Chess? Plumbing? Carpentry? Tax accountant? Table tennis? Nurse? I think the vocations where this seems unlikely to work are rare. Basketball -- due to height, and sprinting, due to the pure athleticism required, being probably the biggest ones I can think of.
- fjh 16y ago
  > Why do you say that? I can't think of many that don't lend itself to that. Programming? Math? Chess? Plumbing? Carpentry? Tax accountant? Table tennis? Nurse? Golf probably has the advantage that it is easier to measure or judge someone's performance than some of the things you mentioned. While practice certainly helps with all of them, I would think that it would be quite hard to objectively evaluate the skill of a mathematician or a plumber in comparison.
- xiaoma 16y ago
  Mathematics is notoriously famous for being dominated by the young. In more recent times, as more depth is required to break new ground, mathematicians have been making breakthroughs at slightly older ages... but they started just as young. In a sense, it's even more exclusive now. The current experts are still extremely bright people who developed exceptional abilities in their 20's, but then they had to keep on grinding further just to get caught up with the current state of their specialty. In fact, the situation with chess is very similar. I'd say go with either nurse, or tax accountant since they are in demand and still pay well even if you don't have sufficient talent and/or early training to become the best.
bayleo 16y ago
Yeah, he definitely optimized on his choice of sport by selecting one of the few where the advantages of age and genetics are minimized.
- jpwagner 16y ago
  not a golfer?
  - jordan0day 16y ago
    I have to presume you're taking some offense at a perceived slight against golf? Of all sports, I think it's fair to say age and genetics are less important in golf than, say, football. bayleo's statement seems fairly accurate to me.
  - hugh3 16y ago
    If you're implying that age and genetics do play a big role you're right, but what other "proper" sport is comparable? Most sports nowadays are dominated by folks who are clearly genetic freaks.
    - jpwagner 16y ago
      so because you cannot "see" the genetic advantages and it's not a "proper" sport, the original comment is not ridiculous?
- SlipperySlope 16y ago
  Actually there are a number of sports in which are age and genetics are far less important than golf, e.g. the Olympic sports of curling, bob sled racing, archery, equestrian, target shooting and sailing. Anyone's reflexes will decline with age, so Dan's choice is of golf is a good one with respect to his slower reflexes as a potential golf pro in his late 30s, as compared to the reflexes of 20 year old potential golf pros, are not such a big deal.

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kenjackson 16y ago

Here's his blog with some updated info: http://dannychampion.com/blog.php http://dannychampion.com/blog.php His improvement seems to be fairly rapid. I guess if this is your sole pursuit, not that surprising. But nevertheless makes I'm rooting for him. I think it would be testament to the theory.

alecco 16y ago
Sports training usually shows diminishing returns. In particular, if you overtrain you plateau or get worse.
- scott_s 16y ago
  Overtraining is different from people's tendency to plateau. Overtraining is what happens when an athlete's training frequency is greater than their body's ability to recover. That is, by the time the next training sessions comes around, they haven't yet recovered from the last one. This can harm overall performance for obvious reasons. That may lead to a plateau, but I think plateau's happen more often when the athlete ceases to learn from training sessions. And that happens when they're just doing the same thing, over and over. All practiced activities show diminishing returns. If you practice 5 days a week (assuming your body can handle it), the benefit of practicing 6 days a week (assuming your body can handle it) is not going to be the same as going from 1 to 2 days. But if your body can handle it, you probably will still improve.
- jwb119 16y ago
  do you have a citation or any evidence for this?
  - alecco 16y ago
    Are you being funny or are you implying results can be linear? Have you ever seen personal bests charts? Save specific cases of breaktrhoughs, it plots very logarithmic for everybody. That is diminishing returns, more or less.

kmgroove 16y ago

This is such a fluff article. Why is it interesting that someone is attempting to "try really hard at something for a lengthy period time"? Looks like he is pitching for a book deal and a spot on Oprah. When you consider how much time 10k hours is I don't think it will blow anyone away that practice of that magnitude will bring success.

joezydeco 16y ago
If I was going to quit my job and golf for 6 years straight, I'd probably plan a secondary income source as well.

bobabooey 16y ago

Six hours a day, six days a week, for six years? Golf can take it's toll on the wrists, forearms, shoulders, lower back, and knees. I predict he'll give up due to overuse injuries long before he reaches 10,000 hours.

SlipperySlope 16y ago
If you read Dan's blog, you'll see that he has a physical therapist coaching him. His team of advisors have a good plan and it seems to me that avoiding injury is a big part of that plan. For example, Dan currently is not using any big clubs - the largest a chipping wedge. If his spends most of his practice time near the green how is going to injure his shoulders, lower back or knees? In a recent blog post Dan mentions that his physical therapist will prescribe a certain weight lifting program to strengthen his muscles enough to achieve the driver head speed that his golf coach plans that he should achieve. I suppose that today's golf pros, those actually on the tour, have each put in those thousands and thousands of hours of practice, regardless of whatever athletic gifts they received at birth. So are injuries the reason most near-pros never make the tour? That would be the case if your point is true. I think that they don't make the tour because it is simply too much effort and dedication to put in all those hours of practice. And that's the wonderful thing about Dan's challenge. If valid, it means that any of us may achieve outstanding results if we put in the hours required to gain the expertise. Golf, in this regard, is a model for any skill we need to satisfy our aspirations.

chops 16y ago

This reminds me of a blog I read a few years ago called "Scratch to Scratch". The point of the exercise was to go from being an ultrabeginner golfer to a par golfer in a year of serious practice and training. Here's the about page from his blog: http://breakparblueprint.com/blog/about-2/ http://breakparblueprint.com/blog/about-2/ That is apparently, his new blog migrated from the original, found here: http://scratchtoscratch.wordpress.com/ http://scratchtoscratch.wordpress.com/ The big thing was the time and effort investment: over 70,000 practice balls, and 2,000 hours in a year (that's close to a full-time job). He actually ended up writing a book about it: http://www.amazon.com/Dream-Hack-Golfers-Challenge-Break/dp/1616080264 http://www.amazon.com/Dream-Hack-Golfers-Challenge-Break/dp/...

oldstrangers 16y ago
You can also count on this "Dan Plan" becoming a book. Ultimately, that's the entire point of this project anyways. Not to be a golf champion, but to sell a lot of books.
- diegob 16y ago
  I thought the entire point was to become a PGA golfer ...

alecco 16y ago

I'm not fond of all these attention grabbing hotshots. Gladwell's theory is completely bogus. A guy in UK tried to do that for Marathon and aimed to become an olympian. He did a lot of media and called his upcoming documentary "The Road to Beijing". He didn't make it, and wasn't even close (from what I remember it was 2:40 or 2:45). Then he went to Ethiopia and picked a protege. His protege was fast but didn't win a thing. He is now a motivational speaker. I guess blatant self promotion always works. He used to be the running joke in UK runner's forums but he is the one laughing now.

DanielStraight 16y ago
The theory isn't about becoming the best in the world. It's about achieving "greatness" or "success." Most people can't even run a marathon, much less do so in under 3 hours. I don't see how you could call someone unsuccessful who can do so.
- alecco 16y ago
  This kind of crazy promise sidelines real athletes working hard for many years. Many athletes working hard were in his shadow in the media. Media spots are very important for non-professional athletes as they depend on sponsorships and donations. I find it very disrespectful.
  - DanielStraight 16y ago
    How is someone practicing 6 hours a day, 6 days a week for 6 years with the intention of going pro not a "real athlete working hard for many years?" That's what I don't understand about all the negative replies in this thread. What defines a "real athlete" if it's not a whole lot of hard work? How does quantifying the effort make it less real?
- pbhjpbhj 16y ago
  >"Most people can't even run a marathon, much less do so in under 3 hours." // Most people don't try. I think that most healthy people could walk (you said "run") a marathon if they desired to. even if you walked for 2 miles an hour and had a 10 minute break that would be 17 hours of effort. 3mph is the usually quoted walking speed. Perhaps I'm wrong.

dfan 16y ago

To me there's a sort of a Bayesian logic working against any hypothetical "adult novice puts in 10,000 hours of work and becomes a pro" story, which is that anyone who has the willpower and passion to put in that much work probably has already. If you are so excited about a sport/instrument/game/hobby that you're willing to put 10,000 hours into it starting from scratch, why weren't you working on it before? I recently mentioned reading an amazing music theory book and someone asked me if it had lots of prerequisites or if he could understand it. My response was "It doesn't really require previous theory knowledge, but if you weren't excited enough about music theory to have acquired that other knowledge already, I doubt this book is going to be that interesting to you."

austintaylor 16y ago
What was the name of the music theory book? Seriously interested.
- dfan 16y ago
  "A Geometry of Music: Harmony and Counterpoint in the Extended Common Practice" by Dmitri Tymoczko.
scythe 16y ago
This seems logical. It doesn't seem shocking to propose that considering the way he went about this 10000-hour experiment decision, he'll soon find something new to worry about and quit before he finishes.
axefrog 16y ago
Sounds reasonable, but what about the fact that there are a great many more pursuits in life that one might enjoy, but simply hasn't had enough time to investigate, or simply has not yet been exposed to sufficiently to recognise the enjoyment that comes from pursuing it?
- dfan 16y ago
  Well, there is a pretty large difference between enjoying something and dedicating a giant chunk of your life to it. But in any case, I'm not saying it's impossible, I'm saying why it's unlikely.

rickmode 16y ago

There's an unstated assumption that excellence equals pro in this article. I'd say excellence is a necessary precursor to going pro, but is itself not sufficent. That extra push is some magic combination of genetics, upbringing and opportunity (nature and nurture coming together just so) - all along with the drive and experience to become excellent.

rsbrown 16y ago

There's a lot of armchair speculating going on about this. What I love about this guy's mission (and why I'm rooting for him) is because he is simply and intensely applying a theory. Succeed or fail, he won't prove (or disprove) the theory, but it will be a fascinating data point for us all.

jasonwilk 16y ago

I have been playing golf since I was 6 years old (I am now 25, running a YC company and whiteyboard). I've played competitively, going all over the country and even got a full scholarship to a NCAA Division 1 university for the sport. I can honestly say that this guy does not stand a chance, and here is why. 1. Golf, especially when it comes to playing professionally, is more of a mental sport than physical (both strength and muscle memory). Even if this guy can learn to hit the ball 300 yards, it will take him at least 10 years if not longer to get the mental comfort required to play effectively in front of thousands of people and successfully place or win an event. 2. The 10,000 hour rule is best applied to things like coding or langauge learning, in other words, low pressure learning environments that have structured guidelines to success. Golf, beyond mental and physical, requires great feel. To be able to know that in 15 mile an hour wind, with your ball half buried by sand, and water in front of the green, how would one hit that shot? There are millions of variations of what you could end up with on the golf course, none that could be figured out in 10,000 hours. We haven't even talked about the putting green yet. Yikes 3. I've seen this before, over a dozen times. Guy gets tired of his job, has some talent and decides to take a ton of golf lessons and practice hard to go for the tour. At least the guys Im referring to played college golf. This guy didn't so much as do that. 4. Golf is seriously hard and the difference between the best players and the mediocre pro players most of the time is just an average difference of a few shots. To shave off those few shots is next to impossible once you've reached your peak potential. Golf is not for everyone. This guy is wasting his time. Update ( I forgot something): Here is another reason why this is a pointless ambition. 5. 10,000 hours of golf is a lot different than 10,000 of something like...learning a language (we'll use this again). To become good at golf does not mean that you can sit on the driving range and hit golf balls every day until your hands bleed. To become a great player, one must get great at playing the golf course. To play one round of golf takes between 3-5 hours (depending on where you play), and there is no guarantee that those 5 hours spent on the course are in any way productive to your progress. That is not a good use of time spent in his quest for 10,000 hours. Someone could certainly guarantee that in 5 focused hours of a spanish tutoring session that they have progresses. With golf, a bad round could send you right back to the drawing board.

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stray 16y ago

Depends on the novice, right? After all, Tiger Woods was once a novice.

m_myers 16y ago
Yeah, but he could barely walk at the time. That's pretty raw material right there.

Keyframe 16y ago

It depends on the sport. For example Javier Sotomayor (high jumper) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Sotomayor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Sotomayor - made it from 0 to no.5 in 4 years, and there are other examples in this particular sport where people made it in 2 years or so. That's one of the reason I don't appreciate any sport, it depends on lots of factors apart from your mental discipline (golf is more or less only mental discipline OTOH).

scythe 16y ago

This is assuming the 10-year / 10000-hour rule can both a: drop that first bit and b: is not dependent on critical periods of learning early in life.

ignifero 16y ago

I 'll probably be buried for this, but how is this "hacker news"? I thought HN was moderated

iamwil 16y ago
Do you not find it an intellectually curious topic?
- ignifero 16y ago
  Without trying to be condescending, no. I am not a golf fan, and I already know that practice makes perfect. If I were to devote 10000 hours of my life in something it would be more "cerebral" than a motor skill/sport. Just my point of view. For example: if this guy decided to devote 10000 hours to make a machine that would connect and download golf into his brain, now that would be cool.
  - jamesbkel 16y ago
    Certainly practice approches perfect. The interesting part here is to quantify the practice to perfection radio in the context of the well known 10,000hr rule. Golf works well for this since it's fairly objective at the individual level. I'm not interested in golf, but I found it interesting to read through the article and see I thought his use of golf as a skill had some merit, but also where I think he's a bit off. Regardless of the outcome, I hope he follows through and documents well. That said, I definitely pick up what you're putting down on the 'cerebral' aspect.
    - ignifero 16y ago
      See i think his choice of golf (or most sports where you rely mostly on repetitive physical training) is a bad one. It's like a brute force attack - effective, but not much of an achievement.
flatline 16y ago
Not so much moderated - some links are occasionally killed, usually as spam. How is setting out on a new venture to both succeed technically and profesionally - and test a hypothesis that has been bandied about HN quite a bit - not hacking related?

num1 16y ago

Something I recently realized is that if this theory is true I have a big problem on my hands. See I love flying, and it is one of my life's goals to fly in professional competitions. However flight time in airplanes routinely cost $100 or even $300 an hour. My goal might end up costing me a few million dollars.

dpifke 16y ago
At the the skydiving drop zone I used to help run, almost all of our jump pilots were hired with 500-1000 hours. They were all building time to "move up" to bigger aircraft, better paying jobs, etc. Most easily were able to accumulate 500+ hours in a summer. (We flew under Part 91, which does not have a duty time limitation, so they could fly literally from sunup to sundown on a busy day.) So really all you have to afford out of your own pocket is enough time to get your commercial certificate and be employable for flight instruction, skydiving, crop dusting, banner towing, or any of the other "entry level" pilot jobs out there.
- num1 16y ago
  You are absolutely correct there, once somebody has their commercial license it becomes easier and cheaper to build hours. I guess it comes down to how effective the practice is, as acrobatic maneuvers are frowned upon in most commercial settings. :P Certainly getting your license doesn't mean you have mastered controlling the airplane, but I'd imagine that after a thousand hours of doing basic maneuvers and tightening your tolerances there's not much more you can do without buckling down and getting time in an acrobatic.
jordan0day 16y ago
You just have to get good enough within the first few hundred (or first thousand, if you've got quite a bankroll) hours to convince someone else to subsidize you.

gcheong 16y ago

Here's one of the original papers that put forth the theory of deliberate practice and the 10,000 hour rule (though in the paper it is given as a 10-year rule): http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracticePR93.pdf http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracti... The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance also covers a wide range of research on performance and expertise in various areas http://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Expertise-Performance-Handbooks-Psychology/dp/0521600812 http://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Expertise-Performance-Handbo...

waterside81 16y ago

This is right out of the book "Talent is overrated"[0]. Given enough time and the proper amount of coaching & practice, a person can become a star. The key isn't to just play golf, but rather to get proper feedback from a trained professional who knows how to practice. [0] http://www.amazon.com/Talent-Overrated-Separates-World-Class-Performers/dp/1591842247 http://www.amazon.com/Talent-Overrated-Separates-World-Class...

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unreal37 16y ago
If you read the book "Talent is Overrated", the theory being put forth alongside "10,000 hours to master something" is there is no such thing as natural talent. Every baby has the same talents at birth. Tiger Woods was not born great. His father had him swinging a golf club from before he could walk.
- deleted 16y ago
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- jacques_chester 16y ago
  In many sports physical characteristics matter because they set the ultimate limits to performance.

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jaredmck 16y ago

The thing about golf is that practicing six hours doesn't mean you got six hours of practice- you need to play rounds, which take several hours but are only really ~30 minutes of "golf practice" at most...golf is interesting because the athletic prerequisites are minimal compared to most other sports, but this doesn't mean that 10,000 hours is sufficient. I don't doubt that he'll be near-pro level after the 10,000 hours, but I do doubt that he will be good enough that it will be really worth the complete dedication of these six years. He'll be scratch+ for sure, but until you get close to that level, it isn't easy to predict who will have the ability to step up to the true professional level, and who will lose a ton of money traveling on minitours with little chance at ever reaching a PGA/Nationwide tour level (i.e. what most mean when they say "pro"). My perspective on this is based on my experience in playing tennis for 10,000+ hours (not apples-to-apples, obviously, but still relatively close) and becoming good enough to know that there would be absolutely no point in trying to play full-time professionally, because I was too slow to ever reach a level where I could make money while touring. There's a lot more money in golf, but it also is a lot more expensive (many golf mini-tours pay prize money out of the sizable entry fees they charge...$1k/tourney entry fee is common for small pro golf tourneys) and there's a lot more marginal pro-level players around for the golf tournaments since there aren't nearly as many physical factors in golf as there are in tennis.

tokenadult 16y ago
The claim of the mainstream scholarly development of expertise literature http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/ericsson/ericsson.exp.perf.html http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/ericsson/ericsson.exp.perf.ht... and especially the most classic paper in the literature http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracticePR93.pdf http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracti... is not that 10,000 hours is enough, but rather that deliberate practice is strictly necessary for expertise, and that 10,000 hours (in round figures) is also necessary to achieve what can properly be called expertise in any adult domain of performance. K. Anders Ericsson, the leading researcher in this field, distinguishes "playful engagement" from "deliberate practice" and distinguishes being at the journeyman level of performance from the rarer case of being at the expert level of performance. What needs more testing is whether 10,000 hours of deliberate practice is not only necessary but also sufficient. Many critiques of Ericsson's findings evoke an ill-defined latent quality labeled "talent" to make the claim that many members of the general public would fail to achieve expertise even if they engaged in 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. But such a showing would not be a direct refutation of Ericsson's claim. Rather, it would be necessary to show that someone who is properly called an expert lacked opportunity to engage in lengthy deliberate practice. Mozart didn't write any music composition that musicologists call a "masterpiece" until he had had ten years (and at least 10,000 hours) of intensive study of music guided by his father, who was an author of innovative books on music instruction and a continual guide to young Wolfgang's musical development.

SeanDav 16y ago

It Depends.... I have a friend who can do anything with a golfball. He is literally amazing. As an amateur he was one of the very best, but he freely admits he cannot succeed as a golfer because he just does not have the right mental makeup. He will sink 6 foot putts all day in practice but ask him to sink a six footer with a tournament at stake and he just cannot do it reliably. Being great at something is often not just about skill or love of the activity but also you "gotta have the right stuff"

neilk 16y ago
Yeah, but you're just drawing the line between "result of effort" and "inner nature" in a different place. What if you decided to test the hypothesis that it was inner nature which allowed you to deal with tournament stakes? What if that was learnable after all? Maybe the top performers just had a different set of experiences, one that allows them to be more detached.
- SeanDav 16y ago
  I have no doubt that inner nature can be learned or at the very least improved. People are complex and the stated reasons are very seldom the real reasons. My friend may just be saying what sounds logical rather than the real reason. In any case I hope this guy makes it!

ebiester 16y ago

I would believe it were he 20. However, most golfers start fading in their thirties, having lost the extra power that their bodies could provide when younger. While I don't doubt that he will be an excellent golfer (thus "proving" that 10,000 hours of dedicated practice will indeed make you great) I certainly doubt he will be a PGA golfer. That said, he might have a chance for a lesser tour. And that, for sure, will lead him to his true goal: motivational speaking! (Oh... come on, like it isn't obvious...) I've certainly thought about doing similar, outrageous things. It seems to be a current pattern: do something seemingly outrageous and interesting, write about it, derive income.

cygwin98 16y ago
I believe your comment is spot on. The debates here is basically about what "professional level" careful training and hard work can bring this guy up to. The "nay-sayers" (including myself) agree on that he might become much more proficient than amateur golf players, maybe even "have a chance for a lesser tour" (as you put it), but he won't be able to make it into the top level games such as PGA tour tournaments. This is the case for almost all competitive sports.

ikono 16y ago

It's far more reasonable to change this to a challenge to become a scratch golfer or something similar. I don't think Gladwell meant that anyone could become one of the best in the world at anything with 10,000 hours of work. Such a statement is somewhat insulting to those that have devoted their life to their craft. Instead, that with 10,000 hours you could become very good at anything. Enough so that you could be considered very skilled/knowledgable in that craft/field.

jbri 16y ago
The "challenge" isn't to become a PGA golfer or anything like that. There isn't any predetermined mark of how "good" he needs to become in order to succeed. It's an open-ended experiment into how far 10,000 hours can take you. Setting one milestone as your "goal" hinders your ability to reach the thousands of other possible milestones.
- ikono 16y ago
  But the title is can he become a golf pro. There wouldn't be over a 100 comments here if it simply said "How good of a golfer can you be with 10,000 hours of practice?"
  - dbalatero 16y ago
    I guess, but that title seems to be chosen by the submitter/publication. To quote directly from the article: "Basically," he told the people at the conference, "what I'm trying to do with this project is demonstrate how far you're able to go if you're willing to put in the time.

kenjackson 16y ago

I never thought I'd be tempted to donate to someone so they could focus on playing golf!

jhowell 16y ago

Probably want to start with a few amateur tournaments like club championships, city championships and state championships before moving onto national championships (US Public Links, US Amateur, etc.) If you can't beat the 13 year olds at these tournaments who are breaking par, you probably aren't going to do very well against the adults who use to win those tournaments as kids. The next argument I hear from a lot of my golfing buddies is that they'll practice hard and play the Senior Tour (Champions Tour). Beating Bubba Watson, for example, in 20 years when he's eligible for the Champions tour is like beating Usain Bolt in a 100 yard dash after giving him a 3 second head start. Won't make good television. A few books have been written on the subject where reporters try to qualify for the tour. That being said, it's actually doable, highly unlikely, but doable. I like his chances at becoming a pro golfer (not on the PGA Tour, but maybe the Hooters or Tar Heel Tour) better than his chances of becoming a starting pitcher, running back, point guard, goalie or professional driver in other pro sports. Golf, the game is tremendously "fair".

fredleblanc 16y ago
Agreed, just think of the number of "golf pros" out there that can't even make the tour. Every course has at least one, and these days most driving ranges have them. Unless he discovers that he happens to have some hidden raw talent, his chances are slim-to-none.

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hartror 16y ago

I think the key here could be this: > "He had almost no experience and even less interest in the sport." How can someone truly excel in a vocation they don't love. Without that love is his practice going to be effective compared to that of someone who loves golf and wants to submerge themselves in it every waking hour?

scott_s 16y ago
Read his current blog. He loves it now.

wmboy 16y ago

Cool story. My question is, if you were going to do the same thing, what skill would you try and master?

petegrif 16y ago

I have a different theory. When it comes to seriously major ambitions e.g. PGA tour, chess GM forget 10,000 hours because it is way simpler - if at first you don't succeed...give up. You probably don't have the freakish level of god given talent required.

utoku 16y ago

The first study I know of is the 1996 book "The Road to Excellence" http://www.amazon.com/Road-Excellence-Acquisition-Performance-Sciences/dp/0805822321 http://www.amazon.com/Road-Excellence-Acquisition-Performanc... . I got it after I read Peter Norvig's essay on "Teach Yourself Programming in 10 Years." http://norvig.com/21-days.html http://norvig.com/21-days.html . So here are the numbers, in short, for mastery: It takes about 10k hours of practice. It takes about 10 years. That means about 3 hours of practice everyday. Everyday.

perlgeek 16y ago

I doubt that he'll be able to get to a professional level when he's not passionate about golf. At least I never excelled at things I wasn't passionate about.

paulus 16y ago

Something missing from this story: money. How does this guy pay for six years of training (doing what he wants) with no income? I guess the lecture circuit and some Nike sponsorship, but will that be enough to pay rent, food, travel and maybe support a family?

rdkls 16y ago

I contacted Dan and suggested he try to find interested neurosci guys to scan his brain as he progresses, he's going to do so (local uni) tomorrow, very cool.

johnconroy 16y ago

I don't see why not. Rory McIlroy went from pro to amateur overnight.

pbhjpbhj 16y ago

From the article >'Dan spent last month in St. Petersburg because winters are winters in the Pacific Northwest. "If I could become a professional golfer," he said one afternoon, "the world is literally open to any options for anybody."' // The world is 'open to any options for anybody' who can write a novel book, do a lecture and has $100,000 USD to fall back on whilst they train for their new venture ... If he's done the experiment first, then written the book and done the lectures it would have a greater validity IMO.

gadders 16y ago

I just wish he'd tried this on an actual sport. braces for down votes from Golf fans

maguro 16y ago

What the heck is this doing here on Hacker News?!?!?!