Challenging the 10, 000hrs to expertise mania

Post date: Mar 03, 2012 9:55:36 AM

The 10, 000 hrs to expertise is quickly permeating the popular literature. originating from from the world of skill acquisition its now common in sporting culture and even the aikido community.

Why? well in an age of quick fix, goal setting and goal oriented practice its something quite readily achieved and very simple to grab hold of. At its simplest level it negates the need for mindful practice assuriing salvation to those following the gods of mediocratity. However at its heart its a lot lot more than just cranking out the hours (regardless of what those hours are). The article Aikido as an Elite Sport goes some way to sorting out some of the process behind gaining expertise, and how they are even embedded in evan a very traditional art like aikido. Its was actually stunning to see just how modern aikido practice could be, but also highlighted a few traps - like all those warmups everyone does wrong anyway waiting for the real thing!

But back to the world of elite athletes, scientist Ross Tucker duke's it out with peer and 'founder' of the 10,000hrs idea Anders Ericsson in an interesting transcript. If you are after easy answers the transcript is probably not for you, and sadly for most of us it tells us what we secretly already knew…your probably not gonna make it to the gold medal podium / elite level though you will make some good progress. Its his version of events so make up your own mind!

The transcript (you can hear the audio as well) can be found on http://www.sportsscientists.com/2012/03/10000-hours-vs-training-debate-no.html The comments on the article are also good reading

Thanks to Luca Lasi for the heads up on this one