10,000 hours practice
The sad fact is that there are physical and mental constraints involved.
10,000 hours of practice aught to get you about as far as your mind and body can take you.
The compentency learned in all that practice, sometimes makes room for genius to take the skill to a whole new level. Sometimes all that practice merely reaches good or d*m good, but still falls far short of the level of genius.
As for me I have some 30,000 hours of practice programming, and I'm no Paul Allen or Bill Gates. I'm better than most of the programmers I've known, but I've also known a few who stand head and shoulders above my skills.
