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[Caesar]

Except most gifted athletes don't come to their chosen sport in adulthood, like Hunt and Folau did with footy.

Nobody is saying that hard work isn't important. People are just saying that when virtually all athletes have been working equally hard since childhood, natural talent ends up being what separates them.

 

[exe ex machina]

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[exe ex machina]

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[Caesar]

Well, you say it all came from his work hitting against the water tank with a stump. He told that famous story 80 years ago, and how many young cricketers do you reckon have copied him since then? One would think if it was just hard work then we'd have had at least a few more Bradmans by now.

Or maybe the fact he's miles ahead of any other batsman in history has something to do with natural talent. Rather than him working harder than any cricketer ever has.

You seem to be taking the self-evident fact of 'hard work and practice is important' and interpreting it as 'hard work is the only thing that matters'. Despite all evidence to the contrary.

 

[exe ex machina]

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[Gough]

Explain bradman. All from that drill he did as a kid hitting a golf ball with a stump. Relentless training of that etc. And a relentless mental attitude when actually batting that he could attain that consistency that so many players couldnt. No genetic reason. Tendulkhar lara sobers richards compton and all those old brits and pollack and richards barry. All had far more natural ability than bradman.

I bet that in the entire history of cricket only bradman ever seriously relentlessly trained with a stump and golf ball. Many probably did it for a lark or test but found it too hard boring and just went back to being ordinary kids playing street cricket thru youth.

All of the above bolded also spent significant parts of their career on the lash. Imagine how good they could have been if they'd showed a Bradman like devotion?

 

[imadodgyumpire]

Just curious. If someone can play golf off scratch and still be light years away from a tour, then how much "minus" would you have to be to get a spot?

Natural ability is a natural physical aptitide to sport per se. Coordinated good balance quick enough can spin and dip and jump etc, that they could partake in all manner of sports naturally. For instance, im like that. Ive played a ton of sports growing up, all came naturally in the physical sense. If I had the right work ethic I couldve focused on a sport and gone far perhaps...

I get what you're saying. The counterpoint I have to that is that no one has a natural physical aptitude to a sport. Those qualities are have been designed/evolved for other purposes and people take advantage of those qualities to be good at or better at sport. My point is I reckon playing sport may be a self-expression, rather than another theory. I also agree that no kid since Bradman could be bothered doing that exercise with the stump and golf ball.

 

[Caesar]

Just curious. If someone can play golf off scratch and still be light years away from a tour, then how much "minus" would you have to be to get a spot?

I'm not sure. I was talking to someone about it a while ago and they said that scratch golfers are usually only scratch at their 'home' course, which they are obviously extremely familiar with, and shoot worse elsewhere. To regularly shoot par or negative on unfamiliar pro courses (which are significantly harder than most local clubs) you need to be crazy good.

 

[exe ex machina]

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[Kram]

Except every single top-level swimmer at the Olympics would work just as hard as the another. But nobody was getting close to Phelps and nobody could touch Thorpe for years.

Isn't it a bit rubbish to tell Daniel Kowalski he could've won a few gold medals if he'd worked harder?

I still said that talent played a role, and 10% is a bit of an exaggeration but definitely a lot less most other sports. As for Phelps and Thorpe they were pretty much freaks, Kowalski was probably unlucky to not win an individual gold medal.

 

[chargers 09]

You could most definitely argue for swimming as a sport being 90% hard work and 10% talent, although having the right natural physical attributes (especially in mens) like an Ian Thorpe would be a considerable advantage.

Kidding yourself. Plenty of natural talent required to become elite.

 

[Illinois Nazi]

Kidding yourself. Plenty of natural talent required to become elite.

Good swimmers have weirdly long and skinny toes.

 

[chargers 09]

Good swimmers have weirdly long and skinny toes.

Not a sport you can tell quicker if the swimming is going to be good or not. Can usually tell by 12ish what they're gonna be like.

 

[zimma]

Not a sport you can tell quicker if the swimming is going to be good or not. Can usually tell by 12ish what they're gonna be like.

I didn't learn to swim until i was 17, constantly got told I had a "great swimmers body" though, used to shock people when I told them I can't even swim a lap. Probably fairly true though from what I gather about the right build...

 

[chargers 09]

I didn't learn to swim until i was 17, constantly got told I had a "great swimmers body" though, used to shock people when I told them I can't even swim a lap. Probably fairly true though from what I gather about the right build...

No necessarily build, but some kids naturally get "the catch", better propulsion in the water and better flexibility in the hips (breaststroke). These are just a few things one can tell by the time the kids are 12/13.

 

[DangerSloane]

Steve Waugh vs Mark Waugh is a perfect example. One had more natural ability, and the other had the more successful career.



Scud has 2 grand slam final losses, Lleyton Hewitt has two grand slam final wins. Scud won by falling back onto his strengths, and failed when they failed. Hewitt won by working hard at eliminating any weaknesses he had.

Genetics can give a significant head start, but application seems to be the biggest decider.

Just imagine Hewitt's attitude and fight with Poo's power and serve.

 

[DangerSloane]

Explain bradman. All from that drill he did as a kid hitting a golf ball with a stump. Relentless training of that etc. And a relentless mental attitude when actually batting that he could attain that consistency that so many players couldnt. No genetic reason. Tendulkhar lara sobers richards compton and all those old brits and pollack and richards barry. All had far more natural ability than bradman.

I bet that in the entire history of cricket only bradman ever seriously relentlessly trained with a stump and golf ball. Many probably did it for a lark or test but found it too hard boring and just went back to being ordinary kids playing street cricket thru youth.

To be fair dropping Tendulkar's name is a bit dumb.
When touring the guy doesnt even have net sessions, yet was the best batsman in the world for a significant period of time and may be the 2nd best ever.

 

[Illinois Nazi]

Not a sport you can tell quicker if the swimming is going to be good or not. Can usually tell by 12ish what they're gonna be like.

It's why the drug cheats are so easy to pick in the pool. If they weren't a State champ/record holder by their early teens then are suddenly world beaters in their early 20s...

 

[swiftdog]

Well what are we talking here? Buckley/Voss/Hird vs average AFL footballer or average player vs weekend warrior? Regardless, there's no doubt you need at least a little but of natural skill, favorable genetics and hard work to even make it to the AFL. I believe it's natural intangible skill (that can't be learnt) that separates a champion from a very, very good player. I'll use Peter Daicos as an example of possessing a common skill that he perfected (via genetics). Has there ever been a player as good as him as kicking a freak goal from the boundary? No. Daicos was ridiculously good at this particular skill yet he sets a benchmark that no one has been as to reach yet. Considering every single kid/teenager/adult loves snagging one from the boundary I have no doubt that it is a very practiced skill. I can only believe that it's a natural skill that allowed Daicos to be as food as he was.

I believe that this example of a straightforward skill (in the sense that it is a very visual skill, everyone can see if you're good or bad at snapshots. I hope this makes sense) can be extrapolated. It's probably some mixture of vision, composure, confidence, hand-eye coordination and body control that allowed Daicos to be as good as he was physically/mentally speaking (which you can't visually see as a spectator). It's natural levels of intangibles like these that made Voss, Buckley and Hird champion players. Why does Gary Ablett Jnr rarely get tackled? Why does time seem to "slow down" when Pendlebury or Dal Santo have the ball? I can't directly say why but they just have something that other AFL players don't have, some freakish combination of subtle abilities that allow them to achieve more than the average player. If these things could be learnt then every AFL player could do them.

The question is are these abilities somehow inbred into their DNA, or were they exposed to some sort of environmental factors in their developmental years that granted them these abilities (not the same as training)? Who really knows. I know sports scientists are trying to qualify questions like this but I don't think questions like this can be answered yet. One interesting thing that a professor mentioned at university is that children who grow up playing a variety of sports and physical activities tend to be more successful than those who just focus on a single sport.

 

[half_back_flank]

I'm positive I read this on GD, check out the blog of a golfer "the dan plan". Testing the theory that with 10,000 hours or progressive practice anyone can become an expert in a certain skill.
He started having never played golf before and aims to get his pro card, started in 2010 and I think is tracking alright, handicap down to 5

He's not going to make it, not even close.

When Greg Norman first started playing at the extremely late age of 16, he was making par fives in two and was off scratch two years later. While Norman wasn't just your average pro, it shows the level of natural ability needed to succeed without the 10 year head start the vast majority of pros had on him.

 

[Papa Juggs]

I'm sorry guys but these days it's all drugs.

People want to believe it's full natural but none of it is.

Why do you think many body builders take roids? They quickly come to realise you can't actually bulk that much fully natural.

 

[Starburns_]

Just imagine Hewitt's attitude and fight with Poo's power and serve.

Yeah, but so much of Hewitt's attitude would stem from knowing how limited he was in natural ability. I doubt he could replicate that kind of dedication if he didn't have that sort of chip on his shoulder from being less "gifted".

 

[Dirty Bird]

I was talking to a couple of athletes the other day, from various sporting codes, and something they all said kind of blew me away, I hadn't thought about that before, but it's true....

They said, there's no such thing as god-given ability, that skill is all just man-given, as in gained and honed thru training, working at it night and day, since they were kids. Out-working others thru their amateur and professional stages.

Example, Tiger Woods, is only Tiger Woods, because he was constantly practicing and honing skills of golf since he was a little boy. Night after day, year after year. Another example they gave was Michael Jordan. How he failed to impress scouts/coaches, and he just worked longer every day at it.

Obvious to me Tim Tebow wasn't a case study.

 

[Black Diamond]

I'd suggest their points highlight something else we know about sportsmen, a lot of them are not the sharpest tools in the shed...

I was listening to a top psychologist once who has done a lot of work with the best athletes across a number of sports who said the very elite athletes are either very intelligent or quite vacant. The evidence I've seen supports this.

 

[AGC]

There are thousands of examples out there, will use NFL one....

Perfect comparisons...

Jeff Garcia vs Jamarcus Russell
Peyton Manning (or Rich Gannon) vs Ryan Leaf

The former had a little athletic ability, and genetically not dominant. While the later were gifted with great athletic ability. On ability alone and the skill acquired at the point they all entered the NFL, it wasn't enough. The later could not make it on their level of skill at that point + oodles of natural talent. Whereas the former, their work-ethic, their 'man-given' skill/honing/learning allowed them to excel in spite of the limited natural ability.

So you're saying that now JaMarcus isn't a fatty and is working hard, he'll excel?