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

[iacas]

The fact is, the theory would be proven if he makes scratch.

It would not have, not by a long shot, no.

For two reasons:

1. Sample size (of one?!?!).
2. Maybe he was just good.

Greg Norman getting to scratch in a year or whatever it took him doesn't prove that any human who follows his schedule will do what he did.

You're moving the goalposts, @Lihu.

[Lihu]

It would not have, not by a long shot, no.

For two reasons:

1. Sample size (of one?!?!).
2. Maybe he was just good.

Greg Norman getting to scratch in a year or whatever it took him doesn't prove that any human who follows his schedule will do what he did.

You're moving the goalposts, @Lihu.

I agree that in general a sample size of one is ridiculous, but my thinking is that in Dan's particular case it would pretty much prove the theory. He seems to be a reverse Greg Norman outlier. I could be totally wrong, of course.

[iacas]

I agree that in general a sample size of one is ridiculous, but my thinking is that in Dan's particular case it would pretty much prove the theory. He seems to be a reverse Greg Norman outlier. I could be totally wrong, of course.

You are wrong, and as a scientist yourself, you shouldn't need to have this explained to you. A sample size of one will almost never "prove" a theory correct.

Plus, Dan's stated goal was to get on the PGA Tour level. We can change the definition of "elite" but something a few hundred thousand people in the world can do (when not everyone even tries to do it) probably isn't what I would call "elite."

[natureboy]

Interesting stuff and yes - the hours you've estimated for Faldo (and it is an estimation, neither of us actually know how many hours he practiced prior to winning the English amateur) is more than I estimated.

But while we're debating how much time one or other golfer took to get to a given level you're still talking about talent. Surely the whole point of the Dan Plan is to prove talent is not required. In order to reach mastery in a given field a person doesn't require talent, they just need to put in (on average) 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. Talent is at best over-rated at worst totally unrequired. That's the premise of the 10,000 hours rule and what the Dan Plan is trying to prove. The moment you start talking about talent you're saying the Plan (not Dan, the Plan itself) has failed to prove it.

My take on it - talent is in fact required to reach mastery in a given field. 

Yes, unknown for certain, but it could even have been more. Faldo had a reputation for 'driven' grinding practice and this may have reflected his early approach.

That may have been Dan's intent, but if so, I'm not sure he understood Malcolm Gladwell's and Ericsson's points. Gladwell in 'Outliers' seems to extrapolate a bit from his own example of building up a professional skill set and expertise that translated into 'success' as a writer. Was he an 'elite' pulitzer or nobel prize winner, no. Did he achieve big things, yes. Did he have innate talent - probably though hard to define what blend of elements were determinant (curiosity, research ability, storytelling, etc.). I get the sense from the summary of his book that he (and others) didn't view him as 'talented' at a younger age and part of the book is looking at 'how did I get here'? Gladwell also emphasized the role of opportunity and chance for high achievement. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outliers_(book).

The 10,000 hours study has been replicated and found a bit lacking. These links reference some critiques as well as some misconceptions about the follow-up study that actually reinforces elements of the original 10,000 hours thesis (read the comments at the bottom of the web page). The type of pursuit matters in how much contribution practice makes. Does golf have a low 'intellectual demand'? Maybe in IQ requirement (some might even view us like the mountain climbers who 'rope together to keep the smart ones from going home' ), but not for spatial awareness or proprioception ability.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/10000-hour-rule-not-real-180952410/?no-ist

http://psycnet.apa.org/?fa=main.doiLanding&doi=10.1037/e633262013-474

Personally, I am more interested in the how much and why for talent / work out of Dan's journey rather than a simplistic 'talent is meaningless' test, which I discounted outright immediately. Yet I still have an interest in it. Some view 'nature' vs. 'nurture' as a Manichean dualism, when I think it is more like two overlapping bell curves. I'm interested in how much they overlap. Perhaps others of his followers share some of that outlook?

We can change the definition of "elite" but something a few hundred thousand people in the world can do (when not everyone even tries to do it) probably isn't what I would call "elite."

That seems like a huge number (300 K), but it's .5% of the world golfing population of about 60 M. That's roughly 2.5 standard deviations above the mean on a normal curve. Do you think 'elite' starts at 3-sigma (.1%) or 6-sigma (.0000001%)? I would personally doubt that 6-sigma is the level of the tour 'field'. Maybe Tiger or Jack in their prime, but I'd be open to data that says otherwise.

Opinions and definitions about 'mastery' and 'elite' vary. Like professional musician - soloist - 'genius' soloist - or Bach. Depends a bit on the population you are comparing to, yes? You may have been a 'long way' from the tour yourself, but maybe don't give yourself enough credit for where you got to relative to 'golfers' (including dubs) as a whole.

Edited October 19, 2015 by natureboy

[iacas]

That seems like a huge number (300 K), but it's .5% of the world golfing population of about 60 M. That's roughly 2.5 standard deviations above the mean on a normal curve. Do you think 'elite' starts at 3-sigma (.1%) or 6-sigma (.0000001%)? I would personally doubt that 6-sigma is the level of the tour 'field'. Maybe Tiger or Jack in their prime, but I'd be open to data that says otherwise.

Opinions and definitions about 'mastery' and 'elite' vary. Like professional musician - soloist - 'genius' soloist - or Bach. Depends a bit on the population you are comparing to, yes? You may have been a 'long way' from the tour yourself, but maybe don't give yourself enough credit for where you got to relative to 'golfers' (including dubs) as a whole.

I'm not going to pretend that my choice of the use of the word "few" implied anything more than about 100k people. I could have said "a couple" and it would have been 200k or so, but said "few" as the more ambiguous. 300k would be about the cap, given more thought.

Even if it's 100k people out of the 60M golfers in the world, I don't consider 100k elite.

Without much thought, "elite" would be Web.com, European Tour, or PGA Tour level. I don't know where that'd rank on Std. Devs but again, spitballing, 0.001% seems okay.

[Pretzel]

Yes, unknown for certain, but it could even have been more. Faldo had a reputation for 'driven' grinding practice and this may have reflected his early approach.

That may have been Dan's intent, but if so, I'm not sure he understood Malcolm Gladwell's and Ericsson's points. Gladwell in 'Outliers' seems to extrapolate a bit from his own example of building up a professional skill set and expertise that translated into 'success' as a writer. Was he an 'elite' pulitzer or nobel prize winner, no. Did he achieve big things, yes. Did he have innate talent - probably though hard to define what blend of elements were determinant (curiosity, research ability, storytelling, etc.). I get the sense from the summary of his book that he (and others) didn't view him as 'talented' at a younger age and part of the book is looking at 'how did I get here'? Gladwell also emphasized the role of opportunity and chance for high achievement. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outliers_(book).

The 10,000 hours study has been replicated and found a bit lacking. These links reference some critiques as well as some misconceptions about the follow-up study that actually reinforces elements of the original 10,000 hours thesis (read the comments at the bottom of the web page). The type of pursuit matters in how much contribution practice makes. Does golf have a low 'intellectual demand'? Maybe in IQ requirement (some might even view us like the mountain climbers who 'rope together to keep the smart ones from going home' ), but not for spatial awareness or proprioception ability.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/10000-hour-rule-not-real-180952410/?no-ist

http://psycnet.apa.org/?fa=main.doiLanding&doi=10.1037/e633262013-474

Personally, I am more interested in the how much and why for talent / work out of Dan's journey rather than a simplistic 'talent is meaningless' test, which I discounted outright immediately. Yet I still have an interest in it. Some view 'nature' vs. 'nurture' as a Manichean dualism, when I think it is more like two overlapping bell curves. I'm interested in how much they overlap. Perhaps others of his followers share some of that outlook?

That seems like a huge number (300 K), but it's .5% of the world golfing population of about 60 M. That's roughly 2.5 standard deviations above the mean on a normal curve. Do you think 'elite' starts at 3-sigma (.1%) or 6-sigma (.0000001%)? I would personally doubt that 6-sigma is the level of the tour 'field'. Maybe Tiger or Jack in their prime, but I'd be open to data that says otherwise.

Opinions and definitions about 'mastery' and 'elite' vary. Like professional musician - soloist - 'genius' soloist - or Bach. Depends a bit on the population you are comparing to, yes? You may have been a 'long way' from the tour yourself, but maybe don't give yourself enough credit for where you got to relative to 'golfers' (including dubs) as a whole.

For you to truly becomeone of the elite, I should hope you're testing with an alpha level of at least 99.9%, if not 99.99%. Elite means the people who truly are the best at it, bar none. The people on tour are elite. As the population size goes up, the alpha level must also correspondingly go up to account for the fact that the number of the elite is still exceedingly small while the population grows. 

[Lihu]

You are wrong, and as a scientist yourself, you shouldn't need to have this explained to you. A sample size of one will almost never "prove" a theory correct.

Plus, Dan's stated goal was to get on the PGA Tour level. We can change the definition of "elite" but something a few hundred thousand people in the world can do (when not everyone even tries to do it) probably isn't what I would call "elite."

Yeah, I that's very true.

Often times we do experiments with something called "corner conditions" in an attempt to avoid long and costly regressive testing. So, I was just thinking that Dan is one of those corner conditions on then opposite end of the spectrum as someone like Greg Norman. So, it would take a minor miracle for him to make scratch, and implied is that he play to that level under any circumstances.

Obviously, the situation is pretty uncertain, because we have no real measurements from his actual capabilities. His anecdotes and recorded history are too vague.

I'll agree that making scratch is not good enough in the context of this project, and it is only a first step.

[newtogolf]

For you to truly becomeone of the elite, I should hope you're testing with an alpha level of at least 99.9%, if not 99.99%. Elite means the people who truly are the best at it, bar none. The people on tour are elite. As the population size goes up, the alpha level must also correspondingly go up to account for the fact that the number of the elite is still exceedingly small while the population grows. 

II believe @‌lihu was qualifying his use of elite to apply to non-pro golfers, which is why I compared them to division 1 athletes versus semi-pro and pro athletes.   

[Nosevi]

Yeah, I that's very true.

Often times we do experiments with something called "corner conditions" in an attempt to avoid long and costly regressive testing. So, I was just thinking that Dan is one of those corner conditions on then opposite end of the spectrum as someone like Greg Norman. So, it would take a minor miracle for him to make scratch, and implied is that he play to that level under any circumstances.

Obviously, the situation is pretty uncertain, because we have no real measurements from his actual capabilities. His anecdotes and recorded history are too vague.

I'll agree that making scratch is not good enough in the context of this project, and it is only a first step.

This is one area where I think the Plan (or at least the record of it) has fallen short. Truth is we have no real data about Dan's skill set at all other than a handicap (which some believe while others don't). We've got a few Gamegolf rounds from a year ago from when his handicap was at it's lowest, a bit of Trackman data from a bit ago and.......... well that's about it. 

Personally, the reason why I don't join with those doubting Dan is that there is literally nothing to go on so I give him the benefit of the doubt. But I must confess that with a Flightscope at his disposal I don't get why there is no data, no screenshots, no skills tests. And then no videos of shortgame either. There's just nothing concrete at all. I don't know why.

I guess the blog is fine for people who want to follow the 'story' of Dan but for anyone actually interested in the golf it's pretty empty and that's a shame.

Edited October 19, 2015 by Nosevi

[Pretzel]

II believe @‌lihu was qualifying his use of elite to apply to non-pro golfers, which is why I compared them to division 1 athletes versus semi-pro and pro athletes.   

That's a decent comparison. I am nearly a scratch golfer and I compete in many tournaments over the summer. I placed in the top 5 4 times this last summer, with scores in the low 70's and high 60's, after placing 11th in the state last year, and I only ever got offers from Division II and III schools. I don't blame them though. The difference between me and the high level golfers in DI is that those golfer expect to shoot in the 60's and hope to go low. I expect to shoot mid-low 70's and hope to reach the 60's.

[Nosevi]

That's a decent comparison. I am nearly a scratch golfer and I compete in many tournaments over the summer. I placed in the top 5 4 times this last summer, with scores in the low 70's and high 60's, after placing 11th in the state last year, and I only ever got offers from Division II and III schools. I don't blame them though. The difference between me and the high level golfers in DI is that those golfer expect to shoot in the 60's and hope to go low. I expect to shoot mid-low 70's and hope to reach the 60's.

Sounds like a good year - nice one.

[Shorty]

Personally, the reason why I don't join with those doubting Dan is that there is literally nothing to go on so I give him the benefit of the doubt.

The real information is what he doesn't say, so you can safely join the doubters.

The fact that there is no data to prove an awesome driving game and incredible short game can make you assume they don't exist.

[mchepp]

Fair point . I believe I was incorrect saying that he does not back off his goal. Originally, he was earning a PGA Tour card via Q-school, which soon thereafter was no longer the process to do it. It morphed to just one event (with a made cut). Still quite lofty.

None of what I'm holding him to is stuff that he hasn't said he wants to do. For example, there are lots of interviews where he talks about the importance of setting goals- daily, weekly, etc. So I hold him to that. Ditto with the rest of what I've written in this thread. My expectations are simply what he has said at some point. Anyway, I think you'll find that consistent in my comments (which I prefer not to think of as "bashing").

I stated long ago in this thread that stating a goal of hitting scratch golf would be a complete and utter waste. Like a why the heck quit your job, start a blog, all in effort to do something hundreds of thousands of people could do. 

This is all about marketing 101. Make the goal splashy. It has to be an attention grabber. He stated many times he wanted sponsors, why the heck would Titleist, TaylorMade or any golf company, heck even a guy who wanted to donate to the cause bother to give him anything if all he was going to do was be a scratch golfer. He needed to make everyone invested in a greater purpose. He was marketing. 

I don't blame him for that. I have worked at start ups and we made splashy headlines. It helped get our 20 person outfit in the New York Times. Marketing does work. He had to make the goal to be a PGA Tour golfer or no one would have paid attention. 

My opinion is that you guys thinks he cares if he fails. I disagree. He loses nothing if he fails. All he did was prove some bogus theory wrong. Maybe he wasted a few years, but it doesn't seem as though he is worried about his career. I sense he knows the day he wants to go back he can. He is a talented photographer, he can probably do weddings until he wants to retire. Really good wedding photographers do pretty well. And if he doesn't make it to the PGA Tour so what, he is just like hundreds of thousands of college golfers, college football players, college soccer players, that had ambitions of playing professionally but didn't make it. So what. If I were him I could easily spin the story that I didn't fail at anything. 

[Nosevi]

The real information is what he doesn't say, so you can safely join the doubters.

The fact that there is no data to prove an awesome driving game and incredible short game can make you assume they don't exist.

That could well be true, maybe I'm merely putting it out there.

But there again, when I posted video of me hitting controlled drives, swinging well within myself, to about 300 yards and showing it wasn't all that difficult to carry the ball 290 if you put some (a lot) effort in in the gym and work on your technique (a lot), those who mocked when I claimed I could drive it as far as some on tour didn't exactly rush forward to appologise

I'm kidding, clearly. I don't have an answer for why there is zero actual concrete evidence in Dan's Plan. I have suspicions but there is just nothing in there that says how good or bad he is at golf.

[Shorty]

That could well be true, maybe I'm merely putting it out there.

But there again, when I posted video of me hitting controlled drives, swinging well within myself, to about 300 yards and showing it wasn't all that difficult to carry the ball 290 if you put some (a lot) effort in in the gym and work on your technique (a lot), those who mocked when I claimed I could drive it as far as some on tour didn't exactly rush forward to appologise

I'm kidding, clearly. I don't have an answer for why there is zero actual concrete evidence in Dan's Plan. I have suspicions but there is just nothing in there that says how good or bad he is at golf.

The difference between you and him is that you have basic fundamentals and a reasonable move.

You will possibly be able to maintain a handicap of 2 or 3 until you are in your late 50s. But like Dan, if it was going to happen, it would have happened a decade ago.

Look at any of Dan's videos. Compare him with the +4 and +5 guys you play with who are unknowns. Is he in the same ballpark in any facet of the game? He never shows you so, assume no.

The fact that he still doesn't acknowledge that he has "less than a snowball's chance in hell" (Feherty) shows how clueless he is. What's even worse is that he doesn't even acknowledge how good the pros are.

Look at that idiot football player Rice who obviously really believed his handicap was 1 or scratch or whatever. He was given a start by promoters who obviously believed his BS. Problem was he'd probably never putted anything over 3 feet and had something like 16 over the par 5s in two days. He was probably a 10 handicap. 

Dan had 83 at pebble and was super thrilled with his effort. Can't say I've ever met a 3 marker who is happy shooting 11 over par, or thinks it is a fair reflection of handicap.

Let's see some video of him hitting full shots, not publicity photos of him gazing into the distance wistfully.

I want it to be about his golf, not him.

For me, he seems to fall into the category of guys whose low handicap is accounted for by slope. "Oh, I've never broken 80 but my handicap is 4. It's because of course ratings."  If that were true, the pros would be happy to be shooting mid 70s any time they encountered a tough course. Scratch golfers in your country are aiming par, not shooting 79 and walking off happy.

Slope is part of the handicap calculation, but scratch is maintained by 75s being cancelled out by 68 s and 69s. and lots of them. 

Edited October 19, 2015 by Shorty

[natureboy]

I'm not going to pretend that my choice of the use of the word "few" implied anything more than about 100k people. I could have said "a couple" and it would have been 200k or so, but said "few" as the more ambiguous. 300k would be about the cap, given more thought.

Even if it's 100k people out of the 60M golfers in the world, I don't consider 100k elite.

Without much thought, "elite" would be Web.com, European Tour, or PGA Tour level. I don't know where that'd rank on Std. Devs but again, spitballing, 0.001% seems okay.

Top 100,000 is ~ .17% or slightly below 3-sigma. How about being on the 1,710 player long OWGR? Out of the world pop of golfers, that's .00285% while 4-sigma is .00315%. 5-sigma seems too high a bar as it gives a result of 17 individuals out of 60 M world golfers. Though top-20 is certainly an extreme 'elite' measure.

 

For you to truly become one of the elite, I should hope you're testing with an alpha level of at least 99.9%, if not 99.99%. Elite means the people who truly are the best at it, bar none. The people on tour are elite. As the population size goes up, the alpha level must also correspondingly go up to account for the fact that the number of the elite is still exceedingly small while the population grows. 

99.9% confidence interval would be .05% or ~ 30,000 golfers out of world golfers. 99.99% confidence would be .005% or ~ 3,000 golfers...somewhere between 3 and 4 sigma.

 

But there again, when I posted video of me hitting controlled drives, swinging well within myself, to about 300 yards and showing it wasn't all that difficult to carry the ball 290 if you put some (a lot) effort in in the gym and work on your technique (a lot),

I know you've worked at technique a lot and your driving is enviable. How tall are you again?

[Nosevi]

The difference between you and him is that you have basic fundamentals and a reasonable move.

You will possibly be able to maintain a handicap of 2 or 3 until you are in your late 50s. But like Dan, if it was going to happen, it would have happened a decade ago.

Look at any of Dan's videos. Compare him with the +4 and +5 guys you play with who are unknowns. Is he in the same ballpark in any facet of the game? He never shows you so, assume no.

The fact that he still doesn't acknowledge that he has "less than a snowball's chance in hell" (Feherty) shows how clueless he is. What's even worse is that he doesn't even acknowledge how good the pros are.

Look at that idiot football player Rice who obviously really believed his handicap was 1 or scratch or whatever. He was given a start by promoters who obviously believed his BS. Problem was he'd probably never putted anything over 3 feet and had something like 16 over the par 5s in two days. He was probably a 10 handicap. 

Dan had 83 at pebble and was super thrilled with his effort. Can't say I've ever met a 3 marker who is happy shooting 11 over par, or thinks it is a fair reflection of handicap.

Let's see some video of him hitting full shots, not publicity photos of him gazing into the distance wistfully.

I want it to be about his golf, not him.

For me, he seems to fall into the category of guys whose low handicap is accounted for by slope. "Oh, I've never broken 80 but my handicap is 4. It's because of course ratings."  If that were true, the pros would be happy to be shooting mid 70s any time they encountered a tough course. Scratch golfers in your country are aiming par, not shooting 79 and walking off happy.

Slope is part of the handicap calculation, but scratch is maintained by 75s being cancelled out by 68 s and 69s. and lots of them. 

Simple answer to the first bit in bold is no. But there is just so little to go on. I too would like to see more data and videos etc. I would like to see how the Plan is going, how it's transformed his game. Maybe we'll get more of that when the Plan starts up again in the spring? Kind of hope so.

I know you've worked at technique a lot and your driving is enviable. How tall are you again?

Lol  

OK, fair point, but it's not all about size, although I guess it helps. It's about technique backed up by physical conditioning rather than the other way round IMO. All the power in the world won't result in long drives if your technique is dreadful. 

It's just that I've seen good results through understanding the science (of both the physics of ball flight and when it comes to building strength), working hard on technique and putting in productive hours in the gym. Dan could do the same and see good results. That's why I keep saying that I think he could go further than he is but it'll require a change in the way he does things. I really do believe that. But he needs a good coach, a proper golf-specific pysical profiling to help determin what he needs to work on in the gym to build power and speed, hours spent working on technique, some balance work thrown in, some.......... It's not going to just happen.

[Nosevi]

But like Dan, if it was going to happen, it would have happened a decade ago.

 

Just noticed this bit and you know what, you're probably right, Shorty. In fact almost definitely right. But a decade ago I didn't play golf, I was having way too much 'fun' in hot and sandy places bikering with various Arab nations and when I was back here I was playing and training for Rugby, Golf didn't feature.

In the World cup the England team fielded Nick Easter at number 8 who's 36 so I think older than Dan. Now while you could quip "And how did that go?"  Please don't tell me the power and athleticm required for a golf swing is greater than that required to play back row forward at international level. People age at different rates and while I was hopeless at sport at school I represented my College in Oxford in Rugby, rowing, football and cricket. The coordination thing just clicked a tad late with me.

Like I said, you're probably right but I'm aiming at a lot lower than PGA Tour, I think my target is possible however unlikely. I've proved age isn't necessarily a barrier to learning to hit the ball well and with sufficient force to mix it with the youngsters if you put in the work. And besides, I have the time and it's fun trying to stretch yourself in this sport so what's the harm in giving it a bash?

But when I fail at QSchool for the Europro (2 steps down from European Tour) I will have failed. Had a blast trying but failed