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I think I've read this at some point -- I've at least seen the 10 years / 10.000 hours numbers before.

I did a quick calculation with respects to martial arts practice -- and if you want to get in 10.000 hours in 10 years -- you do indeed need to practice quite a lot.

Start with a strong foundation: 2 hours 3 times a week, 48/weeks a year. Add 5 hours of training every other Saturday (or Sunday). Take seminars. Lets assume they amount to a full week of training/year (40 hours). You'd still by below 500 hours/year -- and you'd take 22 years to attain "master" level.

This actually fits quite well with the arts that still do rigorous gradings, like traditional ITF Taewkon-do, or karate and koryu styles that generally have two sets of gradings, first grading up to 4th dan, then to instructor grades -- and 5-6th dan generally being considered "full proficiency".

It also follows a somewhat simple rule of thumb from the traditional grading systems (before splitting the white belt into many colours -- at which point it is no longer white, to paraphrase Gandalf): After 1 year of (intensive) practice grade up to 1st dan, practice two years for 2nd dan, 3 for 3rd and so on -- for 21 years to 6th dan (assuming no breaks or injuries).

I guess all this is neither here nor there, but I found the correlation interesting.




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