Good segment on CBS Sunday Morning.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/are-elite-athletes-born-or-made/
Steve H
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/are-elite-athletes-born-or-made/
Steve H
Are Elite Athletes Born or Made
- Thread starter sjharr
- Start date
There are many researchers who support the idea that elite ability can be developed, as opposed to the notion that it is only inborn. The Sunday Morning segment agrees with this. Another great treatise on this subject is Geoff Colvin's "Talent Is Overrated". It is certainly what we subscribe to as pocket billiard instructors.
Scott Lee
http://poolknowledge.com
Scott Lee
http://poolknowledge.com
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As far as pool goes and any other sports/games, if you could get a true bio on the best dozen players in the states, you'd find a very high percentage of them started early, family member had a poolroom or a table in their home and were "A" players or better when they were teaching the very young SVB's the basics and more. The next biggest reason is they come from a poor family and that makes them hungry. As they get good in the beginning they find they can make more money gambling than school and job. They focus on every ball like it's their ticket to their next meal. The easy money starts to dry up quickly now a days with camera phones and the Internet. Even the great Mosconi's father owned a room. Johnnyt
If you take 100 babies from birth, raise them in nearly identical fashion, put them all into rigorous training for the same sport where shear size is not an overwhelming factor to success (like basketball and being 5 foot 9) after 20 years some of those kids would be "great" at that chosen sport.
BUT you are going to have a statistically normal curve showing that most of those 100 kids fall into a central lump of fairly strong play, some of those kids despite being brought up in the game are going to be lower then the curve, there will be an outlier or two way below the curve that simply could not do it and who never played at the speed of the norm, and there will be one or two outliers at the top of the curve who simply rose faster then all of the other kids, they showed dominance early and as the training progressed their skills increased far faster then the norm and they pulled farther and farther away from the pack.
You cannot simply dedicate 10,000 hours into something and be a pro. If you could I WOULD go play golf for 10,000 hours and become a pro, I would LOVE to have that life. But I know for an absolute fact that in that game that 10,000 hours simply would not get me even close to the lower ranks/tours of pro level golf. I might be a 70-something golfer after that time, single digit handicap, and for me that would be outstanding, but it would still completely suck compared to the pros.
BUT you are going to have a statistically normal curve showing that most of those 100 kids fall into a central lump of fairly strong play, some of those kids despite being brought up in the game are going to be lower then the curve, there will be an outlier or two way below the curve that simply could not do it and who never played at the speed of the norm, and there will be one or two outliers at the top of the curve who simply rose faster then all of the other kids, they showed dominance early and as the training progressed their skills increased far faster then the norm and they pulled farther and farther away from the pack.
You cannot simply dedicate 10,000 hours into something and be a pro. If you could I WOULD go play golf for 10,000 hours and become a pro, I would LOVE to have that life. But I know for an absolute fact that in that game that 10,000 hours simply would not get me even close to the lower ranks/tours of pro level golf. I might be a 70-something golfer after that time, single digit handicap, and for me that would be outstanding, but it would still completely suck compared to the pros.
If you can play scratch golf against the pros...
If you can play scratch golf against the pros on the toughest courses, you could do moderately well on the tour...
Only the elite do better than scratch golf on the tour and even them, not always...
If you want to be a top pro, that doesn't cut it, but if you can play scratch golf 99% of the time, you can do well.
Jaden
If you can play scratch golf against the pros on the toughest courses, you could do moderately well on the tour...
Only the elite do better than scratch golf on the tour and even them, not always...
If you want to be a top pro, that doesn't cut it, but if you can play scratch golf 99% of the time, you can do well.
Jaden
Are Elite Athletes Born or Made?
The answer is yes, it requires both.
Not "everyone" can become elite, no matter how much work they put in. Can they get to a very high level with the proper training and practice, yes. But only those who just "have it" will become elite.
The flip side is those with immeasurable natural talent, who don't have the work ethic to truly reach the elite level and maintain it.
The answer is yes, it requires both.
Not "everyone" can become elite, no matter how much work they put in. Can they get to a very high level with the proper training and practice, yes. But only those who just "have it" will become elite.
The flip side is those with immeasurable natural talent, who don't have the work ethic to truly reach the elite level and maintain it.
Good post. Pretty much sums it up if you ask me.
Born or bred? Nature or nurture? It's a question that we started to ask when we started to understand genetics a little. Now that we know that what we "knew" about genes is mostly, in essence, wrong and that talent can be latent throughout the lifetime of a person we shouldn't really be asking that question any more because the distinction is (in the way that it's usually meant) superficial. Give me a slab of grade A beef and I'll drop it on my griddle pan and make a tasty steak. Give me a slab of grade B and I'll make it almost as tasty (close enough that most people wouldn't notice the difference) but I'll need to do some prep first. Give me C grade and I'll need to do some serious prep but it will be tasty enough and still a lot of people will think it's good beef and not a single person will be disappointed except for the most discerning. D grade and now I've got an uphill struggle and will be found out......
Shame I'm not as good at pool as I am at cooking but there you go........
From a "rigrous, scientific study" point of view, the ideas have a lot of holes. Some of the original work was presented in a paper called "The Role of Deliberate Practice in the Acquisition of Expert Performance." What the authors did was look at/talk to a bunch of expert violinists and found that all of them put in about 10 years and roughtly 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. Conventional wisdom says that if someone were "naturally talented" they would get to the same level quicker.
People like Colvin and Malcolm Gladwell, ran with the oversimplified idea (the idea was already pretty simple, though) and said, "if you practice for 10,000 hours, you too can be an expert at something."
What I haven't seen is any discussion about the people who tried and failed: golfers who never make it off the web.com tour, baseball players who never get called up to the majors. Is it just timing? For baseball it certainly can be, but in golf you guide your future. So why can't a guy on web.com -- someone who is so much better than anyone you will ever see at your local course it would make you cry -- get those crucial wins and move up? Whatever it is, it isn't something you can get through practice.
Maybe "talent" as we normally think of it isn't itself innate, but the internal wiring that drives certain people to focus on the minute details of honing their craft is.
People like Colvin and Malcolm Gladwell, ran with the oversimplified idea (the idea was already pretty simple, though) and said, "if you practice for 10,000 hours, you too can be an expert at something."
What I haven't seen is any discussion about the people who tried and failed: golfers who never make it off the web.com tour, baseball players who never get called up to the majors. Is it just timing? For baseball it certainly can be, but in golf you guide your future. So why can't a guy on web.com -- someone who is so much better than anyone you will ever see at your local course it would make you cry -- get those crucial wins and move up? Whatever it is, it isn't something you can get through practice.
Maybe "talent" as we normally think of it isn't itself innate, but the internal wiring that drives certain people to focus on the minute details of honing their craft is.
"athlete"
The Oxford Dictionary informs us thusly...
athlete, noun
skilled performer in sports and physical activities
sport, noun
game or competitive activity (followed by a number of other definitions)
physical, adjective
of or concerning the body (physical exercise) (followed by descriptions and medical terms)
The Oxford Dictionary informs us thusly...
athlete, noun
skilled performer in sports and physical activities
sport, noun
game or competitive activity (followed by a number of other definitions)
physical, adjective
of or concerning the body (physical exercise) (followed by descriptions and medical terms)
That study found zero top level violinists who got there with less time which is what conventional wisdom would predict.
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So that would mean Buddy Hall is an elite athlete? Got it.
Right. But it doesn't prove anything. What if all of those violinists are the talented ones and the non-talented ones simply realized they weren't going to make it and went off and did something else? It's probably more accurate to say that not only do you have to be talented, you still need to work very hard at something for 10 years to be the best.
Don't forget all those web.com golfers who can't make it to the PGA. They all want to be there and the fact that they made it to the "minor leagues" means they know what it takes to get to the next level. And yet they don't break through? Why?
I agree that you can be fat and still an athlete, like many professional football players. I guess I just don't consider pool to be athletic. I also don't consider it a sport, but let's not all go down that road for the millionth time
.While size may dictate certain athletic ability. Hand eye coordination can be better in some genetically from birth. Hand eye coordination can be trained by repitition but some guys have it some don't
Take for example a 7 foot NBA player some guys have stone hands and that is just the way it is.
Take a small 3 or 4 years child that can hit a golf ball 50 or 100 yards. You can't tell me they have already trained by repitition to have hand eye coordination.
In many cases you either have it or you don't. You can learn it over time. But generally people have a ceiling on talent. Only small % have superstar talent
Take for example a 7 foot NBA player some guys have stone hands and that is just the way it is.
Take a small 3 or 4 years child that can hit a golf ball 50 or 100 yards. You can't tell me they have already trained by repitition to have hand eye coordination.
In many cases you either have it or you don't. You can learn it over time. But generally people have a ceiling on talent. Only small % have superstar talent
THIS!
Need, environment AND genes. All play a part. Desire, most likely more important than all the rest.
JoeyA
There have been prodigies in music that have had a fraction of practice in comparison to concert musicians and play far better ,, art is another example the talent is shown a the a very early age ,,,
A person with a 90 IQ simply is never going to see Einstein level
So why in gods green earth would anyone believe some people are not born with more physical talent than others ,,
It's mind boggling to me
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