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How to be an expert at anything...

M

MarkDH

Monkey
Sep 23, 2004
351
0
Scotland
I don't know wether this article has been doing the rounds over the pond, but I read it in the paper a couple of weeks ago and found it quite interesting:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/nov/15/malcolm-gladwell-outliers-extract

The basic premise is that to be a world class anything, natural talent only goes so far, and the best of the best have worked much, much harder than the ordinary Joes, or even those that are quite good. Interestingly, the figure of 10,000 hours practice seems to be a recurring theme, no matter what the skill happens to be. This got me thinking about how it applies to DH.

Obviously, I have been riding my bike since I was a kid and riding DH for a good few years now, but if I take myself as a middling/average DH rider, then how much do I need to ride to get to a World Cup podium? When I can, I ride both days of the weekend all year round, so optimisitcally that is 104 days riding. Each of those days, mostly spent pushing up DH tracks and sectioning bits then having some longer blasts, lets say I am actually riding for an hour at a time (and I think this is very optimisitc personally, even at an uplift day with 8-10 runs at 4 mins each you are not getting a full hour of actual on bike time). At this rate, it would take me approximately 96 years to rack up 10,000 hours! Even if I wanted to get to half that amount of riding time, I'd be over 70 years old by the time I got there!

Which leads me to a few questions. A) Assuming (and this would be hard to prove) that the top pros have amassed around 10,000 hours, how do they get there? Take Sam Hill, same age as me I think (23). If he started riding at an early age like 3 years old, in 20 years he would have had to have ridden 10,000/20/365 = ~1h 20mins a day, every day since he started riding. Is this possible?

And B), given that the amount of actual riding time in a day of push up and sectioning a DH course is so small, would it improve you more as a DH rider to ride for example "agressive XC" for an actual 2-3 hours on easier terrain compared to riding for a much shorter time on steeper, more technically demanding DH tracks? This has lead me to think that maybe I should spend one day riding hard DH stuff, and the other day riding longer distances on easier ground. Perhaps even scooting about the streets in the dark (bloody winter!) on the hardtail would help?

What do you all think, let me know? :)
 
xy9ine

xy9ine

Turbo Monkey
Mar 22, 2004
2,940
353
vancouver eastside
you can do only so much with hard work (though it certainly doesn't hurt). good genetics & raw talent are necessary to play at tippity top.
 
Sandwich

Sandwich

Pig my fish!
Staff member
May 23, 2002
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I think you're basing your entire theology on one person's statement of 10k hours being the appropriate time to become a master at something. Just as some people are "naturals" at a task, so too are there training abilities. I know people who have spent less time at something and pick it up faster. Certainly repetition counts for a large part of it, but learning for different people occurs at different rates. I would argue that there are "naturals" in that their ability to learn is greater than the others, and therefore their "10k hours" is much less. I happen to agree on another point, the right talent/drive at the right time accounts for success as much as practice in general. I don't think somebody like Nico Vouilloz would have been quite so successful if he had to face the current competition in the field. Riders nowadays have more time on better bikes on harder courses....but Nico was well trained and well equipped at the time.
 
M

MarkDH

Monkey
Sep 23, 2004
351
0
Scotland
xy9ine said:
you can do only so much with hard work (though it certainly doesn't hurt). good genetics & raw talent are necessary to play at tippity top.
Click to expand...
While the potential for someone who really is hopeless to begin with to become world class with hard work could be debateable, I think the main thrust of this guys argument is the converse of what you are saying i.e. genetics and raw talent will only take you so far, it's hard work that will get you to the top. It also brings in the question of what is 'raw talent'? You say it is required, but no baby is born with the innate ability to drive a Formula 1 car, and access to an F1 car is something 99.999....% of people will never have. As an example perhaps Lewis Hamiltons 'raw talent' is in fact the product of many thousands of hours spent first scooting a tricycle round, then progressing onto go-karting and so on. It's pretty well documneted that he raced go-karts tirelessly as a kid, so without the amount of time he has spent behind a wheel, is it possible to say he has raw talent, or 'just' lots of experience at a relatively young age?

I'm not saying that this 10,000 hours is dogmatic, but the human brain has not evolved to have inbuilt talents to drive cars fast or programme computers well. I'd agree that some people have a genetic advantage in physical terms, for example, the ability to grow muscle, but I would disagree that Sam Hill was born already having a greater ability to ride a bike than the rest of us. I'm not a doctor, but I'm sure a psychologist would tell you that even the ability to learn well is learned, and a product of previous experience.
 
Uruk-hai

Uruk-hai

Monkey
Oct 13, 2004
144
0
The 'Quah
Interesting article. Inspiring in the sense that, for the most part, how good or bad you are at a particular task is up to you.

This past September I went on a riding streak after work at my local trail. I rode 9 days out of 12 on a 11-15 mile loop. Just got into a groove and kept going for several days in a row. Towards the end of my streak I had a mini-revelation that you can get pretty good at something if you do it a lot...I was feeling really comfortable on the bike, I was going faster, charging lines, had a lot of confidence. Naturally I started extrapolating and wondering how much I might improve if I continued this frequency of riding for a whole season.

Nutshell: Talent has it's place, but the more you do something the better you become at it. I think people give too much credit to "talent" and "equipment" rather than facing their own lack of discipline.
 
B

boerni

Chimp
Aug 7, 2006
5
0
switzerland
hi,
i think this whole subject is pretty interesting. and i think MarkDH you are understanding the talent thing a little wrong. in my opinion nobody has the telant to race a bike or a car. the telant lies somewhere else. mybe it has to do with balance, feeling for the car (michael schumacher), or just visual perception. Have you seen the interview of sam hill after worlds and the way he talked about his fall in the last corner? it sounds like the whole thing happened in like 15 sec, but when you see the video it all happens so fast. i have a theory about all this and this is the first time i'm telling it to the world. i think a normal human sees about 26-30 pics a second, lets say peaty sees 35 or even 40 pics a second, then everything just seems slow motion for him thus beeing faster going downhill. and this is a talent and no matter how hard you work you have no chance beeing as good as him. i would really like to start something to prove my theory but i'm in the wrong business and i don't have enough money. so if someone is able to check it, please let me know.
but please don't get me wrong, beeing able to work hard and just do it over and over again is a talent as well. and sometimes one person is gifted in some way but is not willing to work hard. but when everything comes together great things will happen, michael jordan, tony hawk, mat hoffman, nico vouilloz, sam hill, michael schumacher, ricky carmicheal, the list goes on and on, and for the rest of us, all we can do is watch.
 
boogenman

boogenman

Turbo Monkey
Nov 3, 2004
4,315
987
BUFFALO
RETARDED!

I will consider this to be true when it is proven.

Here is a good example. When I was about 13 I got into Trials, I sucked back then. I rode trials everyday as much as I could, I practiced in my basement in the winters when I couldn't go outside. I rode A TON of trials. I got really really good, I rode pro. Was I the best, NOPE. Was I close to the best NOPE. If I was able to ride and practice more would I have been the best, NOPE.

You can practice and get good at a skill or sport but only a select few are going to perfect it and be a champion. Unless you are Shaun Palmer.

 
M

MarkDH

Monkey
Sep 23, 2004
351
0
Scotland
boerni said:
hi,
i think this whole subject is pretty interesting. and i think MarkDH you are understanding the talent thing a little wrong. in my opinion nobody has the telant to race a bike or a car. the telant lies somewhere else. mybe it has to do with balance, feeling for the car (michael schumacher), or just visual perception. Have you seen the interview of sam hill after worlds and the way he talked about his fall in the last corner? it sounds like the whole thing happened in like 15 sec, but when you see the video it all happens so fast. i have a theory about all this and this is the first time i'm telling it to the world. i think a normal human sees about 26-30 pics a second, lets say peaty sees 35 or even 40 pics a second, then everything just seems slow motion for him thus beeing faster going downhill. and this is a talent and no matter how hard you work you have no chance beeing as good as him. i would really like to start something to prove my theory but i'm in the wrong business and i don't have enough money. so if someone is able to check it, please let me know.
but please don't get me wrong, beeing able to work hard and just do it over and over again is a talent as well. and sometimes one person is gifted in some way but is not willing to work hard. but when everything comes together great things will happen, michael jordan, tony hawk, mat hoffman, nico vouilloz, sam hill, michael schumacher, ricky carmicheal, the list goes on and on, and for the rest of us, all we can do is watch.
Click to expand...
I'm sorrry but I disagree with you on two counts. One, with regards to the natural talent thing, I AM talking about the basics of, for example, driving a car fast down to the level of balance, response etc. What I mean is that 'talents' like an increased sense of balance is learned at a very young age by doing things that might not seem related at the time e.g. Lewis Hamilton scooting round his house on a tricycle unknowingly increase his skills on a wheeled vehicle. Again, there may be some genetic factors that physically improve some natural talents, but I don't think any baby is born with a better 'feeling for a car', its learned but possibly not directly from driving cars.

Secondly, I think the resolution of the eye is pretty much set at an equal level for all humans. IIRC it is 10 images/second but I can't remember for sure. In fact, I seem to remember a documentary where they measured speeds of reaction of F1 drivers and they were no quicker than the average Joe. Factors like this are set by biological restraints. Furthermore, even if the resolution of Peaty's eye was faster, there is no way that would slow down time for him. A PAL screen IIRC is 25 images/second, an NTSC is 30 images/second, does the action on television slow down when you go from a European to an American TV? No, don't think so.
 
KavuRider

KavuRider

Turbo Monkey
Jan 30, 2006
2,565
4
CT
Uruk-hai said:
I think people give too much credit to "talent" and "equipment" rather than facing their own lack of discipline.
Click to expand...
Of course...because its easier to say "I don't have the talent or equipment" than to say "I don't have the drive and determination".

This is an interesting discussion though. Obviously something separates the rest of us from the top athletes of the world.

Nature vs Nurture debate.
 
Sandwich

Sandwich

Pig my fish!
Staff member
May 23, 2002
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borcester rhymes
Got to agree, palmer is great at so many kinds of racing, but flunked out due to being a giant ass. if that's not a natural talent, i don't know what is. If he trained continuously he could still be on top of the game, but i think he was trying to do too much at once with not enough focus.
 
D

DsDhBxracer13

Monkey
Feb 18, 2004
179
0
Burlington, Vermont
Please correct me if I am wrong here, but doesn't the above theory show the difference between the American racers and Euro/Aussie racers. I think it has been said many time that Americans in general are lazy, and when it comes to DH racers many of the talented top level riders don't want to put in the hard training that it requires to be a top level WC racer. On the other hand I've read numerous articles about other countries and their training camps, both Nico and Fabien doing huge amounts of off season training. I'm sure the "skill level" between these riders isn't very drastic but the training hours put in whether on or off the bike is much different.

From my own experience I will say that my most successful race season was when I actually trained, and it wasn't even very hardcore training. I did 3 2 hour or so trail rides a week and would race on the weekends, and that was the best season I've ever had. Just my 2 cents.
 
R

Rover Nick

Monkey
Oct 17, 2006
280
0
I agree with the above statement in that it's kind of silly to think that these guys just see the world in slow motion. I mean, could you imagine being drunk AND seeing things in slow motion?

Boogenman, I don't think that most of us know what 'dedicated' means at 13 years old. For example, when I was 13 I started playing guitar, I played constantly(or at least I thought) and didn't get very far, and quit. 5 years later, when I was 18, I picked it up and started playing again and I actually got quite good, with seemingly only half the effort hat I put in when I was 13.
 
Sandwich

Sandwich

Pig my fish!
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May 23, 2002
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DsDhBxracer13 said:
Just my 2 cents.
Click to expand...
on that note, cycling is much more accepted overseas. Out here in the homeland, pickup trucks are required to attempt drivebys on road cyclists, mountain resorts are required to put in minimal effort and have 1/4 of the vert of a european mountain, and BMX tracks must sign waivers to not be good or well maintained.

Most of the "classic" DHers came from BMX or road cycling (which require more pure training) and dominated early DH riding. Nowadays DHing is more specialized and it's not as easy to step right in and dominate.

I will agree that American riders, for the most part, are not willing to put in the time to dominate, but there are more factors than just that.
 
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CRoss

CRoss

Turbo Monkey
Nov 20, 2006
1,329
0
The Ranch
boogenman said:
RETARDED!

I will consider this to be true when it is proven.

Here is a good example. When I was about 13 I got into Trials, I sucked back then. I rode trials everyday as much as I could, I practiced in my basement in the winters when I couldn't go outside. I rode A TON of trials. I got really really good, I rode pro. Was I the best, NOPE. Was I close to the best NOPE. If I was able to ride and practice more would I have been the best, NOPE.

You can practice and get good at a skill or sport but only a select few are going to perfect it and be a champion. Unless you are Shaun Palmer.

Click to expand...

Physical training is one one part of it. You also need the mental aspect of it. I rode trials a ton at one time also what held me back most was I would think about the wrong things while trying the bigger moves.

To be good at something you need a whole combination of factors to come together. You can train 12 hours a day 7 days a week, but if you do not have the non physical aspects you will not be the best.

When I used to ski all the time I had people who always asked how I got so good. My typical response was there was something wrong if I was not this good with how much I skied. This is when I was skiing 8-10 hours a day 7 days a week.

I do not believe in a thing called natural talent. Some people learn faster, have a better awareness of their bodies, and have joints and muscles that allow them to move in ways making them better at sports. But they are in no way naturally good at riding a bike. They could be good at any sport of there choosing especially if they are aware of their body and chose one that there physical make up caters too. Why does a athlete chose a particular sport? They find it easy to learn and excel at. Are they naturally talented? No, but they have found a sport there physical make up works with.
 
WhiteRavenKS

WhiteRavenKS

Turbo Monkey
Aug 8, 2003
1,270
0
neither here nor there
i've been bowling a bunch lately. but when you count up my actual time really bowling, it's only like 3 or 4 seconds per roll. so in a night of bowling maybe i only get a couple minutes max out of it.

if you apply that same accounting to taking pictures, the vast majority of the shots i take are 1/100th of a second to 1/800th of a second in actual photo taking. in a given day of shooting downhill i've maybe only done 2 seconds of "real" practice. which is completely dwarfed by when i go out and take one pinhole photograph at night which can take literally a couple hours...

that 10k hours of invested time is not just downhill riding. it's a collection of all cross training, hitting the gym, riding road, cross country, dirt jumping, blah blah blah.

natural talent will put you on top. the difference between world cup podium and world cup top 25 is talent. i doubt there is really that much different in the training programs between someone constantly on the podium vs someone always in the mix of the top 20. everyone at that level is working pretty damn hard to be there.
 
Biffff

Biffff

Monkey
Jan 10, 2006
913
0
I think who you surround yerself with is key. If your riding buddies growing up are Steve peat and Sam hill (or anybody much better then you) you will learn their technique, and skills.
If you are fortunate, as a young rider, to be surrounded by fast riders in an area with good riding then you are at a serious advantage. You will learn at a much faster rate. This is why Josh Bryceland and Brendan Fairclough are so Fast. Those two guys don't strike me as fine physical specimends, but they're fast as fack!
I majority of the top riders are from France, Australia and the UK. All three places have 3 things in Common: Great places to ride, Very strong local race scenes, and wicked fast riders competing there.
 
yuroshek

yuroshek

Turbo Monkey
Jun 26, 2007
2,438
0
Arizona!
i dont believe in 10,000 hours to become "master" thats BS. i started out racing bmx when i was 13. i won nj state championship within 3 months, people said i was just natural out there on the track and picked it up real quick.

then moved on to flatland, turned pro within 3 years and beat an x-world champion "chris polous" look him up. i was only 17 at the time when he was about 32... he had alot of years and "hours" on me.

now im 22 and racing DH started april of 2007 and this year im moving up to pro class. i have talent on the bike, but not the talent to be a world cup racer and beat sam hill or gee atherton. people like that are born to ride, and if you think about it theres atleast 1 person in every aspect of sports that is "the best" sure theres a kid sitting home playing videos games right now that could get on a DH bike and maybe within a few years be the best in the world. but those people have to find it in them. everyone is good at something some people just excel more then others and dont have to work as hard.

im sure most of you have heard of neko maully, kid is 15. but yet beats pros that have been ridin 10-15 years. how does a kid at the age of 15 have over 10,000 riding hours? sorry but just doesnt work like that.

end of rant.
 
fluider

fluider

Monkey
Jun 25, 2008
440
9
Bratislava, Slovakia
Hi guys,
I don't want to talk a lot as my english is not clear enough. Some of you wrote about F1 pilots. Actually, WRC is much more interesting for me than F1 as I find it more difficult than F1. I was wondering for myself how the rally pilots are able to drive 120kmh (75mph) on slippery rough surface on 3m wide road betweens trees etc.. Yes, they have co-pilot a navigator who is telling them characteristic of the following section. But still how are they able to process so many informations. What I think is rally drivers imagine the following sectoin in their brain according to decription of their co-pilot's notes. At the same time they drive the car through the current section and prepare vehicle for the next section. I think they "see" two images at the same time. This surely requires some predisposition and lots of brain training. And remember, they are learning to drive car from little age. When I spend 8hours a day in school or 9hours a day in boring tiring job, they are driving, testing, reporting and doing physical training. And the last and maybe the first thing you must be equipped with in motorsport is MONEY.
F1 and rally have one thing (or requirement on pilot) in common. Pilot must be able to correctly recognize vehicle behaviour, to clearly describe it to his mechanicians and closely work on th vehicle settings. In Slovakia there is a folk wisdom "Even mother does not understand to her speechless child" ...

I think talent can only help move things further more easily but doesn't move those things. It's like friction in your drivetrain, but your power that DOES THE JOB of pedalling and moving is what matters.
 
fluider

fluider

Monkey
Jun 25, 2008
440
9
Bratislava, Slovakia
Yuroshek, you're right in one important fact. Kids or young people are able to learn and absorb impulses much much faster than older ones. Kids in the age of 3-6 are able to learn several languages simultaneously because their method is completely different from that used by adulst. Therefore your were able learn so many things, you were young and you had many impulses in your surrounding from the older guys. You quickly learned what they had been learning by themselves by trial-error.
 
G

General Lee

Turbo Monkey
Oct 16, 2003
2,860
0
The 802
Sandwich said:
I will agree that American riders, for the most part, are not willing to put in the time to dominate, but there are more factors than just that.
Click to expand...
I bet this guy knows how to dominate (though not an American either . . .):





on another note, someone above mentioned f1 drivers and reaction time. the new york times magazine did a story lat year about how inner ear sensitivity effects reaction time. your inner ear, besides being responsible for balance, also plays a role in spatial awareness. your inner ear can detect the change in your bodies orientation due to the rear wheel sliding at 200mph much faster than the nerves on your body that might feel it and far faster than your eyes could send any message to your brain. it was an interesting read and it definitely would have application in sports such as f1, ski racing, rally, dh, moto, etc.
 
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sanjuro

sanjuro

Tube Smuggler
Sep 13, 2004
17,373
0
SF
This one I can comment about because I coached a bonafide prodigy, DJ Augustin, a first round NBA draft pick for Charlotte. Born November 11 (contradicting the January birthday theory), he was the shortest player on our youth all star team because he was a full year younger than the rest of the team.

He probably played the most basketball of all the kids his age in New Orleans, but he is also so talented, he has been high demand since he was 8 years old, playing at the highest echelon available to him. So while he might have more practice than other kids his age, his talent afforded him playing opportunities that the less talented did not have.

As for why he was so good, his father introduced him to basketball at a young age, but his father was not especially gifted in the sport, nor did he push DJ particularly hard. His family was extremely supportive, which I am sure helped, but no different than most families.

The other part of this article was opportunity. And it is certainly true than you have to be at the right place at the right time. If Bill Gates was alive in the 1800's, he might have been a typesetter. Or if the Beatles were formed in 2005, they would be a local rock band around Liverpool. But both were born in the right era.

Finally, having coached and played with DJ, I know his talent on the basketball is something I could never duplicate no matter how many hours I spent on the court. I remember one story where he went to the Tulane B-ball camp when he was 12, and the coaches placed him in with the 16-18 year olds. Not because he was physical enough to play with them, but because it was the only group that DJ could learn something from.

Now that's talent.
 
jackalope

jackalope

Mental acuity - 1%
Jan 9, 2004
7,605
5,914
in a single wide, cooking meth...
I am hands down the veritable Darth Vader of flatulence...No one on RM can touch me...Sure, I've been "practicing" since 1971, but like Allen Iverson said " we talkin 'bout practice!" Trust me, it's mostly natural talent (plus a penchant for drinking large quantities of hoppy beer - which I suppose is analogous to having nice a nice DH bike)
 
William42

William42

fork ways
Jul 31, 2007
3,915
651
jackalope said:
I am hands down the veritable Darth Vader of flatulence...No one on RM can touch me...Sure, I've been "practicing" since 1971, but like Allen Iverson said " we talkin 'bout practice!" Trust me, it's mostly natural talent (plus a penchant for drinking large quantities of hoppy beer - which I suppose is analogous to having nice a nice DH bike)
Click to expand...
If you're Darth Vader, I'm Yoda.
 
CRoss

CRoss

Turbo Monkey
Nov 20, 2006
1,329
0
The Ranch
sanjuro said:
This one I can comment about because I coached a bonafide prodigy, DJ Augustin, a first round NBA draft pick for Charlotte. Born November 11 (contradicting the January birthday theory), he was the shortest player on our youth all star team because he was a full year younger than the rest of the team.

He probably played the most basketball of all the kids his age in New Orleans, but he is also so talented, he has been high demand since he was 8 years old, playing at the highest echelon available to him. So while he might have more practice than other kids his age, his talent afforded him playing opportunities that the less talented did not have.

As for why he was so good, his father introduced him to basketball at a young age, but his father was not especially gifted in the sport, nor did he push DJ particularly hard. His family was extremely supportive, which I am sure helped, but no different than most families.

The other part of this article was opportunity. And it is certainly true than you have to be at the right place at the right time. If Bill Gates was alive in the 1800's, he might have been a typesetter. Or if the Beatles were formed in 2005, they would be a local rock band around Liverpool. But both were born in the right era.

Finally, having coached and played with DJ, I know his talent on the basketball is something I could never duplicate no matter how many hours I spent on the court. I remember one story where he went to the Tulane B-ball camp when he was 12, and the coaches placed him in with the 16-18 year olds. Not because he was physical enough to play with them, but because it was the only group that DJ could learn something from.

Now that's talent.
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I believe Michael Jordan did not make the highschool basketball team.
 
O

Old_Sckool

Monkey
Jun 5, 2007
187
0
Sorry, I don't buy the whole lazy Americans theory.

Watch the Olympic's. Who dominates? Yeah, a bunch of lazy American's. Sorry, but plenty of Americans have a great work ethic.

Right now we have no real dominate riders in DH. But I remember when the U.S. was considered a joke in the world of road biking, but over the last 20 years, what country has been dominating the Tour De France?

Just wait, we got a LOT of rising talent. We'll be kickin's ass soon enough. Trust me. :cheers:
 
Sandwich

Sandwich

Pig my fish!
Staff member
May 23, 2002
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borcester rhymes
Old_Sckool said:
Watch the Olympic's. Who dominates? Yeah, a bunch of lazy American's. Sorry, but plenty of Americans have a great work ethic.
Click to expand...
right, but cycling culture hasn't caught up to the same level as other sports. when we have legit collegiate or high school cycling teams of any kind, just like there are swimming, track, and volleyball athletes, I promise you we'd see more American world cup competitors. Right now, the system isn't in place. You certainly see some american cyclist winners, because those people have had the benefit of an upbringing and training system centered around their respective sport.

On that note, if you wanted to go to the world cup, starting after college is bad timing, honestly. Without focused training before then, you just won't produce a pro. Some of the Jersey groms may eventually come up through the ranks, but I somehow doubt their athleticism and drive towards becoming the best vs. various other things kids do.
 
D

dhrace507

Monkey
Apr 2, 2004
139
0
Mountains
Wow, I started going off on all sorts of tangents writing my two cents (no penny jokes) on this topic, which I think is awesome. I deleted it all, after I decided it was mostly useless. I guess I think that a lot of hours is really a good starting point, but there are the untangibles like a person's talent or mental mindset that really dictate what happens when riding, driving or using other skills. I wish the old story was true, but I feel that in today's world slow and steady (as in lots of hours learning and building) does not always win the race. Luckily, that has nothing to do with the fun of it.
 
TomBo

TomBo

Monkey
Jan 13, 2004
300
0
Calgary,Alberta
MarkDH said:
Secondly, I think the resolution of the eye is pretty much set at an equal level for all humans. IIRC it is 10 images/second but I can't remember for sure. In fact, I seem to remember a documentary where they measured speeds of reaction of F1 drivers and they were no quicker than the average Joe. Factors like this are set by biological restraints. Furthermore, even if the resolution of Peaty's eye was faster, there is no way that would slow down time for him. A PAL screen IIRC is 25 images/second, an NTSC is 30 images/second, does the action on television slow down when you go from a European to an American TV? No, don't think so.
Click to expand...

It is not in how information is perceived, rather in how it is processed. We all see, hear and feel generally the same. How this feed back is interpreted is the difference. At least in my mind...
 
G

General Lee

Turbo Monkey
Oct 16, 2003
2,860
0
The 802
TomBo said:
It is not in how information is perceived, rather in how it is processed. We all see, hear and feel generally the same. How this feed back is interpreted is the difference. At least in my mind...
Click to expand...
i mentioned the role your inner ear plays in an earlier post. i couldn't find the article i was reffering to (at least not without paying for it) but there is some good info in this one, though the language is a bit more technical:

http://www.faqs.org/sports-science/A-Ba-and-timeline/Balance-Training-and-Proprioception.html
 
Mike Buell

Mike Buell

Monkey
Aug 9, 2005
766
0
On my way to the top of candycane mountain in a ba
There are two types of people in this world, those that believe they can, and those that believe they can't, and their both right.
The most powerful influence over anything you do in life is the personal limitations you set on yourself. If you believe you'll never be more then an average racer, then you'll never be more then an average racer.
The guy's at the top have never had any reason to believe they shouldn't be where they are.
 
SylentK

SylentK

Turbo Monkey
Feb 25, 2004
2,322
866
coloRADo
Yeah, I think with enough practice and training anyone could be an "expert". But not everyone has what it takes to be "pro". I believe this applies to any sport.
 
Gruntled

Gruntled

Chimp
Jul 17, 2008
4
0
I was once pert, now I am not, so I am now an ex-pert.
That makes as much sense as the "10,000 hours to become rad" theory.
 
S

stringbean

Chimp
Aug 30, 2008
68
0
i believe its not alla bout skill and tallent, they'll get you so far, i think its more about the 'want'.
why does australia have so many fast DH'ers for such a small, flat country. You go to any race anywhere in australia, be it club race or national race and yeah, everyones really realxed and chilled, but really, every one there 'wants' to beat everyone they can. they see that fast guy that you watch and dont know how he goes that fast, but you still 'want' to beat him.It's kinda hard to explain, but being bought up in australia make's you want 'it'. being naturaly mentaly strong is just as important as having natural skill, caus its all in your head.
 
M

MarkDH

Monkey
Sep 23, 2004
351
0
Scotland
I'm pleased at the good response this thread has recieved, and keep continuing the discussion for sure, but could anyone answer my question B? Especially from people that race DH, I would like to know wether they found riding hard DH for short times, easier stuff for longer times, or a mix of the two to be most benificial to their speed? I'm pretty sure most people would say a mix of the two, but some personal experience stories on this would be cool. :)
 
Cant Climb

Cant Climb

Turbo Monkey
May 9, 2004
2,683
10
MarkDH said:
I'm pleased at the good response this thread has recieved, and keep continuing the discussion for sure, but could anyone answer my question B? Especially from people that race DH, I would like to know wether they found riding hard DH for short times, easier stuff for longer times, or a mix of the two to be most benificial to their speed? I'm pretty sure most people would say a mix of the two, but some personal experience stories on this would be cool. :)
Click to expand...
Training for DH is "chasing ghosts" to a degree. Different things work for different people. Some racers spend an inordinate amount of time on their DH bike and they get super fast......others might ride xc nonStop and they are super fast......and others live on their road bike. It's kind of really hard to pin down exactly what works. Some people have a higher natural level of fitness than others, while others should be putting in a considerable amount of time into basic fitness. Some guys love to log alot of training hours and feed off it, others would burn out doing that. Part of being successful in the sport is being able to "self scout" and being honest with yourself. Then taking that information and combining it with some outside knowledge you've gained and trying figure out what might work for you. It can be a bit of trail and error....
 
Renegade

Renegade

Monkey
Sep 6, 2001
333
0
I've calcilated that on average, it takes about 500 posts on ridemonkey for any moron to become a suspension expert. That is far short of the 10,000 hour mark.
 
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