The Dan Plan - 10,000 Hours to Become a Pro Golfer (Dan McLaughlin)

[mchepp]

I did not know this. I wonder if the professor had some influence on the decision. And since he was in the kind of public eye with his blog, he must have gotten many of e-mails and comments about that method - it should have raised flags. But I see your point and agree.

The comments on his blog are noise. They say everything from he is a crap human being to he is going to be walking stride for stride with Tiger. I would advise him to ignore most of the comments on his blog because you just never know who is commenting.

I could make an argument that he should have gone to 10-15 different professionals and ask all of them how they would teach a beginner from scratch. After interviewing as many people as he could, decide the best way forward. This might have made more sense than what he did.

[Lihu]

Is there any stats or does anyone know how good a putter Dan actually is? Did putting for six months make a difference?

http://thedanplan.com/statistics-2/

He's 7 strokes better than me at putting, so I can't argue that.

[plara31480]

This is a very cool story, unfortunately, I think his lack of sponsorship or funds along with lack of tournament play will ultimately be his downfall. Does anyone know where his current handicap is?

[newtogolf]

The idea which he started with was that he should start at the hole and progressively move backwards. This idea was not Dan's. It was the pro who he first sought out for advice. Dan would later drop him and admit that the strategy of starting with putting one foot putts was a bad one. I don't think we should knock Dan for this. He knew nothing about golf walked up to a professional golfer and asked him the best way to improve. The pro said start from the hole and move back. I cannot blame him for listening to someone who should know this kind of thing. He would post months later after struggling in a tournament with his driver that the approach he took was wrong. He was nice about it and said something like maybe it didn't work blah, blah, but if he was being blunt he just would have said it didn't work and he shouldn't have done it.

If I were Dan I would just tell this guy that I already covered this, I started wrong, took the advice of someone who should know and it was a mistake. He has to move on now. He cannot change history.

I have been critical of Dan and his plan. But I give him a pass on this topic. I followed tons of really bad instruction throughout my career in golf. So I cannot fault him for this. Now he must find a filter so he can find where the good information is coming from and soak up as much as he can get from those people.

I didn't know that, thank you for clarifying.  I thought the strategy was co-designed by Dan and his instructor based on the premise discussed in The Talent Code.

If it was just bad information from a poor instructor I can completely relate as I'm still trying to fix parts of my swing thanks to poor instruction.

[nevets88]

I think we can all agree from his and our collective experience that for all the theory and good intentions, how key good instruction and data are, how hard it is to filter out the noise and the cr@piness of instruction overall.

[garybbq]

http://thedanplan.com/statistics-2/

He's 7 strokes better than me at putting, so I can't argue that.

Interesting, so it seems that the putting did pay off some what and possibly the short game. However his full swing is still a long way off.

Would any instructors here say that starting golf by chipping and putting is actually a bad thing?

[newtogolf]

Interesting, so it seems that the putting did pay off some what and possibly the short game. However his full swing is still a long way off.

Would any instructors here say that starting golf by chipping and putting is actually a bad thing?

The question is can he putt as well outside his home course.  The greens at my home course are pretty fast (10-12) and I've learned how they play them but struggle on slower greens.

[Lihu]

This is a very cool story, unfortunately, I think his lack of sponsorship or funds along with lack of tournament play will ultimately be his downfall. Does anyone know where his current handicap is?

We're guessing in the 5-10 range. Mainly because of his long game which is strange given that his Trakman combine score put him in line with the average PGA players.

Interesting, so it seems that the putting did pay off some what and possibly the short game. However his full swing is still a long way off.

Would any instructors here say that starting golf by chipping and putting is actually a bad thing?

Not according to his combine scores. Curious that he can play so poorly during a tournament.

[garybbq]

We're guessing in the 5-10 range. Mainly because of his long game which is strange given that his Trakman combine score put him in line with the average PGA players.

Not according to his combine scores. Curious that he can play so poorly during a tournament.

I am not that familiar with what the combined score on trackman means, but when I look at the numbers and dispersion chart (or whatever its called) it looks like anything over 140 yds he is all over the place.

It doesn't surprise me that in any average length course he is often in trouble.

[Lihu]

I am not that familiar with what the combined score on trackman means, but when I look at the numbers and dispersion chart (or whatever its called) it looks like anything over 140 yds he is all over the place.

It doesn't surprise me that in any average length course he is often in trouble.

http://thedanplan.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Dan-Plan-2013-06-21-Multi-Group-Report.pdf

Yeah, looking at his numbers they appear much worse than even mine past 140 yards. He has a lot of overlap in his clubs from 140 yards to 180 yards. 5i is pretty tight. Plus, he does hit his 9i 140 yards though. I only hit mine about 130 (46 degree loft) with a full swing. He might be over swinging to get the distances up. IDK.

Information on combine:

http://mytrackman.com/public/trackman-combine-intro

I must have misinterpreted the data at one point. He's on par with a 5 handicap according to the combine score, and not a PGA. I though I read somewhere where he was 80s. Oh well.

http://thedanplan.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Combine-Test-for-Dan-Plan-2013-11-07.pdf

[Pretzel]

http://thedanplan.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Dan-Plan-2013-06-21-Multi-Group-Report.pdf

Yeah, looking at his numbers they appear much worse than even mine past 140 yards. He has a lot of overlap in his clubs from 140 yards to 180 yards. 5i is pretty tight. Plus, he does hit his 9i 140 yards though. I only hit mine about 130 (46 degree loft) with a full swing. He might be over swinging to get the distances up. IDK.

Information on combine:

http://mytrackman.com/public/trackman-combine-intro

I must have misinterpreted the data at one point. He's on par with a 5 handicap according to the combine score, and not a PGA. I though I read somewhere where he was 80s. Oh well.

http://thedanplan.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Combine-Test-for-Dan-Plan-2013-11-07.pdf

Something interesting is how wildly different his dispersion with each club is. He has ovals slanting in both directions, and no general miss pattern. It's tough to play tournament golf when you don't know if your miss will go left or if it will go right.

[iacas]

Would any instructors here say that starting golf by chipping and putting is actually a bad thing?

Yes, if too much time is spent doing it. Dan spent way, way, WAY too much time doing that stuff.

[garybbq]

Yes, if too much time is spent doing it. Dan spent way, way, WAY too much time doing that stuff.

Interesting, I know you cant speak for Dans coach but would you guess his theory is/was that the short game especially chipping and pitching is a version of the full swing and that's why he made him do that?

[Lihu]

Interesting, I know you cant speak for Dans coach but would you guess his theory is/was that the short game especially chipping and pitching is a version of the full swing and that's why he made him do that?

Good point, and if he had started with chipping and pitching he might have been better off than putting. I think the issue is that he started off putting for months. He probably should have started off pitching for months.

[newtogolf]

Good point, and if he had started with chipping and pitching he might have been better off than putting. I think the issue is that he started off putting for months. He probably should have started off pitching for months.

I think he should have started off learning the full swing properly, but I'm a crappy golfer so what do I know.

[Lihu]

I think he should have started off learning the full swing properly, but I'm a crappy golfer so what do I know.

You know a lot about golf.

We're both talking about developing a full swing, but I only meant as a first stage. Since the pitch shot is something from (3:00 position to 9:00 position), it might be a good starting point. This half swing drill is the one that Mike and Dana gave me to do to rebuild my swing. So, starting off with that is not such a bad idea. Then you gradually work your way back to 2-10 then 1-11, etc.

[RFKFREAK]

not necessarily.. it is very hard to find people to actually play straight up for enough cash to matter. Then you are using it to keep a public plan going which could effect your amateur status since it isn't necessarily under the radar cash. Then you have guys who want strokes and sandbag or you get guys who are scratch or better who are going to play you for enough money. This kind of money I have only seen exchange hands at country clubs where 300-500 bucks is no big deal..

He should consider setting up somewhere on his page a, "play a round of golf with me," and charge like $1k to get some funds. They say that there's a sucker born every minute.

[iacas]

He should consider setting up somewhere on his page a, "play a round of golf with me," and charge like $1k to get some funds. They say that there's a sucker born every minute.

Not a bad idea (the whole thing has turned out to be a bad idea or a bad implementation, I just mean in this circumstance, if he's trying to raise money, this seems like a good idea…).

Maybe even $250 for a single, $350 for two, and $400 for three to join. After all, even $250 is about $50/hour and/or $1250/5-day-week.

Heck, if I lived within reasonable driving distance (3-5 hours tops), I'd be tempted to do it as a cynic so that I could share my opinion of how well he's doing. I believe some other golfers would do so too.

If Dan believed in himself, he could even have a standing offer of a bet where if he loses he pays nothing, but if he wins he gets the $250 or whatever. (It would be silly for someone trying to make cash who believes he has an honest handicap to wager and pay out when he loses, because he should win and lose roughly half of his matches.)