Dan McLaughlin

The goal of McLaughlin’s plan was to qualify for the Tour at the end of the 10,000 hours of practice. This would be accomplished by competing in the annual PGA Q-School. A handicap factor of 2.0 is required to be allowed entry in the pre-qualifying stage.

Dan comes from a family with high expectations. He is the youngest of 3, with a brother who followed his father’s footsteps and became an actuary in New York City and a sister who is a dermatologist in Atlanta. With intent on going to graduate school, Dan saved $100,000 over a 6-year span by renting out rooms in his house and limiting his expenses to $2,000 a month. At the age of 30 plans changed, Dan quit his job and decided to live off of his life savings and become a pro-golfer.

McLaughlin played his first full round of golf in August 2011. Since then, he kept detailed statistics for handicap, Greens in Regulation, Driving Accuracy, etc. As of November 6, 2013, McLaughlin had a handicap factor of 5.2. McLaughlin last reported his handicap factor of 5.5 in April 2015. McLaughlin has not updated any statistics since then. McLaughlin's Trackman Combine score as of December 2012, is 66.9

He was using the following golf clubs: Driver: Nike VR Pro Limited Edition, 10.5 degree loft, Project X 5.5 Shafts Woods: 3 wood – 15 degree loft, 5 wood – 19 degree loft, Project X 5.5 Shafts Irons: 3-PW – VR Pro Blades, True Temper Dynamic Gold Shafts Grips: Lamkin full cord grips

McLaughlin had no experience in golf. Starting in early 2010, McLaughlin began learning golf with the putter. McLaughlin would learn the game beginning from the hole and working further and further away. The only club McLaughlin used for the first 3 months was the putter. He then progressed to the Pitching wedge, then the sand wedge. A larger club was only used by McLaughlin once he showed proficiency with the smaller golf club. In November 2011, McLaughlin began using the driver and a full set of 14 clubs in January 2012.

With hopes of becoming a professional golfer, McLaughlin quit his job on April 5, 2010. McLaughlin based his goal of 10,000 practice hours on a misinterpretation of a theory by Dr. K Anders Ericsson, Professor of Psychology at Florida State University.

Dan McLaughlin (born June 27, 1979) is an American commercial photographer who quit his day job to become a professional golfer through 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. Using this method, he created a plan known as The Dan Plan. Prior to McLaughlin’s Plan, he had never played a full 18 holes of golf and had no previous experience as a competitive athlete. Dan developed his skills by logging in 30-plus hours a week of practice to golf and was originally planned to hit the 10,000 hour goal of deliberate practice by October 2016. As this practice persisted, Dan wished to make a successful appearance in the PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament to eventually obtain his PGA Tour card and win amateur events. His aim was to reach a golf handicap of 2 or less, but the best he reached was 2.6 in January 2014, and in the end, in January 2015, was back up to 5.5. Dan has quit the plan and started Portland Soda Works with his neighbour, Chris Onstad.